Finding HopeMass Observation Day 2023 (A Day in My Life)
Posted on May 13, 2023
So yesterday was the 12th of May, also known in the UK as Mass Observation Day! Every year, the Mass Observation Archive asks people to keep a diary for the day in order to record the everyday lives of the UK population. I’ve been keeping diaries for most of my life and I think that the idea of pulling together all of these accounts in order to get a picture of an ordinary day in the life, whatever that might look like, for a big group of people is really, really cool so I always try to participate. Here is my contribution for this year.
Some important things to know before reading: I’m neurodivergent, autistic and ADHD, and struggle with multiple mental health issues (Depression, Generalised Anxiety Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, and Borderline Personality Disorder) and physical health problems (Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome). Having spent eighteen months in the worst depressive episode of my life, I’m recently back on medication and trying to get my feet under me again, working hard at both therapy and hydrotherapy. I’ve also recently released my latest single as a singersongwriter, ‘House on Fire,’ and am working towards several other projects.
I slept through two alarms, completely exhausted. I’d had a really late night in London seeing Ingrid Andress in concert (supported by Nick Wilson), which was absolutely amazing but between the energy expended and how late I got home, I was beyond tired.
When I finally managed to force myself awake around eleven, I lay in bed for a little while: I did a quick check in with social media (I’m trying really hard to find a healthy balance around time on my phone), did some Duolingo practice, and read a little bit of my book (both of these things are habits that I’m trying to practice daily). Then I got up and got ready for the rest of the day.
At one, I had a Zoom date with one of my best friends. We had a good catch up about what’s being going on for each of us, with many a tangent on kind of bizarre topics like alternate universes or the different sounds that insects make. And then we continued watching the TV series we’ve been watching together for the last few months, a series we both enjoyed when we were younger; we love it but we also love making fun of it so we always have a blast. We managed to watch two episodes and had a great time before I had to go. I didn’t have long before my therapy appointment so I got my bag ready and then fiddled around on my guitar until I had to leave (I haven’t been able to play for long stretches of time recently since I hurt a couple of my fingers so I’m trying to build it up again).
I was so tired and really sleepy (one of the ongoing symptoms of my health struggles and quite likely a side effect of my medication), plus my chronic pain was pretty bad (my shoulder and knee have been particularly painful for several days now), but I tried my best to push through and engage the best I could with therapy. In some ways, it was a fairly chilled session (as they go): my therapist had asked me to send her the poetry I’ve been working on over the last month or so, which I did. But it was also hard and I felt really vulnerable because most of the poems are so honest and so revealing. There were some that I said, before we even started, that I couldn’t talk about; just writing about those topics and sharing them (my anxiety about them was so high that I was really tempted to leave them out) was a big step forward. Obviously I want my therapist to know about these struggles but talking about them is beyond difficult (just the thought of it makes me want to scream or run or both); this is the best I can do for now. So we went through the poems, talking about what inspired them and my feelings about those people or experiences or struggles, which inevitably turned into bigger discussions. That meant that we didn’t get through all of them but we did cover some important stuff. I’ve been back at therapy for a while now – several months – but my new therapist is still getting to know me and I’m still getting comfortable with her; there are many things that I can talk about but there are still things that I can’t, things that I’ve never been able to. It’s a process, as I often have to remind myself.
Back home, I talked with my Mum about some of the stuff that had come up in the session but I’m always completely exhausted after therapy – I have been known to fall asleep on the sofa afterwards, hence the late afternoon appointments – so I checked in with the cats, put on The Good Place (my current rewatch), and lay on the sofa for a bit. I called one of my parents for a catch up, had some dinner, and then spent the rest of the evening working on some different things for this blog.
What should’ve been a fairly pleasant evening was complicated a bit by how bad my hair pulling has gotten. That restless, anxious energy that drives me to keep doing it is so hard to resist, especially when I’m tired, and the longer I do it, the more it hurts: my scalp, my neck, my shoulder, my elbow, my hand. But I can’t stop. There have been periods of time where different coping mechanisms have at least reduced the amount of hair pulling but I don’t have one that’s working right now. It’s frustrating and it’s exhausting and painful but I just can’t stop, regardless of how much I want to. I did look into Hypnotherapy briefly a long time ago but didn’t get very far with that endeavour, maybe because it always felt like there were bigger things going on, but maybe I’ll try again because it’s been ten years and it would be really nice not to do this anymore.
Given how tired I was, I tried to go to bed earlier – I’ve been going to bed far too late – and while I did go to bed a bit earlier, I still ended up staying up too late, catching up with my diary. I had multiple cats curled up with me, which was very sweet, so it could’ve been worse and, after all of my problems with sleep, I did at least go to sleep quickly and easily; I’m always grateful for that now, having struggled so much over the last couple of years.
So it wasn’t the most fascinating day of my life but it’s pretty accurate to my life right now and I guess that’s the point of the exercise. It’s a normal day in my life and this is what normal looks like right now, for the most part.
If you keep a diary or want to note down some thoughts about what your 12th of May looked like, the website is here, where you can learn more about this project (and their other work) and submit your entry if you would like to.
Trying Tranylcypromine
Posted on August 6, 2022
TW: Mentions of suicidal thoughts and negative thoughts about food.
Back in May and June of this year, I tried another MAOI antidepressant, Tranylcypromine; it actually works a bit differently to the other MAOIs I’ve tried, like Phenelzine and Moclobemide, so I was hopeful that it would be the best of those and maybe even more. This one was a tricky one to get because it’s so expensive (a month’s supply is £300 – everyone I’ve talked to about it has asked if it’s made of gold, which made me laugh because that was my exact reaction) but fortunately, I have a great psychiatrist and a great GP who made it possible. I wasn’t in a great place but I was cautiously optimistic that this one would be better.
As is always the case with posts about medication, this is just my experience. Please don’t start, change, or stop taking any medications without the advice and support of a medical professional.
WEEK 1 (10mg Once Daily)
I was still struggling to sleep, not getting to sleep until after three in the morning, and then I’d sleep into the afternoons. I struggled to get up (probably due to both physical tiredness and my bad headspace) and doing pretty much anything – my week involved a stressful dentist appointment, multiple swims and hydro sessions, a meltdown, and more – had me falling asleep on the sofa as soon as I got home. And I was tired and sleepy all day, regardless of the hour.
I was very nauseous all the time and when I actually managed food, it wasn’t satisfying at all. So eating was tough.
The depression was solid, like it was darkening the edges of my vision at all times. I was also very anxious most days and I was really struggling with my concentration.
The chronic pain that had flared up wasn’t great but it was getting better. It was less than it had been and for that I was grateful.
WEEK 2
My sleep continued to be a struggle. During the day, I was tired and sleepy (and fell asleep on the sofa several times despite how wonky my sleep schedule was) but then I just couldn’t sleep at night. My brain kept going to scary places and nothing that’s helped in the past worked. I usually fell asleep sometime between three and five am and then I’d struggle awake in the early afternoon. I couldn’t shift it, no matter how hard I tried or what I did.
I was too depressed to do anything. I was completely paralysed by it. I was depressed and anxious and restless. I was struggling to concentrate. I felt overwhelmed and lost and hopeless. I was having suicidal thoughts again. I was desperate to distract myself from my thoughts. I nearly had another meltdown. I felt like something vital in me had been broken. I still do.
WEEK 3
Sleep remained the bane of my existence. I wasn’t getting to sleep until around five in the morning and one night I didn’t sleep at all (that was a particularly miserable day). I’d manage to wake up around three or so but feel sleepy straight away. And I was tired all day everyday but then I’d go to bed and just lie there, so anxious that my chest felt tight, so anxious that I couldn’t breathe; I just couldn’t calm my brain down.
I was still very depressed. Nothing helped, nothing made me less depressed, or made me feel better. It was so bad that I just couldn’t engage with anything; I felt trapped with my thoughts and it was horrible. And feeling like that, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I just felt like crying and screaming. I was also really anxious. And I just felt hopeless, my suicidal thoughts a consistent buzz in the background. My OCD also became more difficult to manage; the compulsions felt even more suffocating than usual.
Food was also really stressing me out. I wasn’t enjoying it and it doesn’t seem to give me any energy, which – in my head – meant that I was just gaining weight and the thought of that made me very anxious. I’ve never talked to anyone about my anxieties around food and body image because it always feels like there are more pressing problems. Sometimes it’s easy to ignore and sometimes it’s all I can think about and this was the latter.
WEEK 4 (+ Zolpidem)
After so much disrupted sleep, my GP prescribed me Zolpidem to hopefully get a handle on it. As a result, my sleep cycle became very erratic: some nights I barely slept at all, some nights I slept for more than thirteen hours, some nights I slept at a normal time, some nights it made no sense at all. But regardless of that, I was still tired and drained and sleepy during the day.
I was still feeling awful. I was depressed and anxious with almost constant suicidal thoughts. I felt useless and pathetic and I couldn’t stop crying. I just completely overwhelmed and utterly hopeless. Even the most basic engagement with the world was excruciating but hiding away hurt too. I ended up retreating from everyone, both in real life and over social media. As I said, I just felt completely overwhelmed and paralysed.
After a rough session with my psychiatrist, I came off the Tranylcypromine. That was fairly easy, all things considered, and I did feel better. Well, ‘less terrible’ is probably more accurate: I was less sleepy, which made things easier, and I had periods where it all felt a little less oppressive. I also got better at blocking the world out, although I’m not sure that’s done me in favours long term.
As far as my psychiatrist is concerned, my options now are to either start taking Phenelzine again – the one antidepressant that has helped – or to look at other options. My anxiety around going back to Phenelzine is that I will just end up here again, when the side effects become too much to handle. So it feels like searching for another option is inevitable (but then I’m scared that another option won’t work and I should just accept what the Phenelzine can do but… And round and round we go). I have been referred to the Treatment Resistant Depression clinic (something I had no idea existed) to discuss what those other options are and we are also talking to a private clinic, trying to get as much information as possible. But, as hard as I try, I don’t know what to do next. I don’t know what the right choice is and no one else seems to know either.
A Year of Autonomic Testing and A Discovery of POTS
Posted on May 21, 2022
After I was diagnosed with Hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, my Mum and I did quite a bit of research. There were a lot of things that suddenly made sense and one thing that caught our attention was mention of autonomic issues, like dizziness, fatigue, chronic pain, brain fog, problems with heart rate and blood pressure… These were all problems I’ve either struggled with or had investigated in the past so, with the hEDS diagnosis and the help of my GP, we started following that path to see if it yielded any answers.
As you can see, this post has been a long time in the writing. I didn’t want to post anything until I had something to say really, beyond descriptions of the tests, but then it all just went on and on and on. Everything moves so slowly and it’s very draining. I have to hope that things are better for knowing what I’ve learned from all of this but it’s also been a very trying, sometimes traumatic experience.
MARCH 2021
It began with a phone call appointment with a neurologist, a specialist from a neurology unit in London (which I talked about in this post). It wasn’t a fun experience. The call came two hours late, it wasn’t the person it was supposed to be, and then he spent twenty five minutes of the half hour call telling me that there were tests that they could do but that they’d probably be a waste of time. It just left me feeling really confused and upset. He had eventually said he’d write to my GP about doing some tests but after the way he’d been talking, I didn’t feel very hopeful about it all. After he hung up, I didn’t quite have a meltdown – it was like I didn’t have the energy that a full on meltdown requires to happen, like a rocket needing a certain amount of fuel or whatever to launch – but it was close.
MAY 2021
Despite his apparent reluctance, the neurologist did in fact write to my GP and the blood pressure monitoring was arranged. It took forever – I think because of a shortage of the monitors – but the day did eventually arrive (I wrote more about it in this post). I went to the hospital to have the monitor fitted and to get all of my instructions; the whole thing was relatively chill (not my general experience when it comes to the medical field) and the two women who went through it all with me were really great.
It wasn’t too bad. The cuff got very tight so it was hard to forget it was there and just do the day as normal but it was fine. I did find it hard to get to sleep but the squeezing didn’t wake me up, which I was grateful for. My arm did hurt like hell in the morning, like I’d been punched repeatedly; I was convinced my arm would be bruised afterwards but it wasn’t. I couldn’t get the monitor wet so I couldn’t have a shower until after I returned it but since that’s usually when the blood pressure related symptoms present, we faked a shower: I stood for the same amount of time in the bathroom with the shower on (so that the hot, steamy environment was the same as if I were having a shower) and let the monitor take its readings. I felt shaky and dizzy and lightheaded so it should have read as if I really had had a shower.
I got through the rest of the twenty-four hour period and then took it off, to my great, great relief. My arm was sore from the squeezing and the cuff was pinching in various places. I also had that Autism thing where the constant pressure for so long was causing me anxiety, like wearing my retainer for too long. The anxiety had been growing for most of the second day so I was very relieved to be free.
JULY 2021
The second round of monitoring involved a little stick-on patch with sensors over my heart, which had a little monitor that could be attached (and then detached for a shower) to measure my heart rate. I was supposed to wear it for a week and while it wasn’t exactly comfortable and sleeping with it attached wasn’t great, the first few days went smoothly for the most part.
But, after several showers, the patch started to peel off. The sensation of it constantly brushing my skin and the itchiness of the glue (or whatever it is) as it disintegrated was quickly overwhelming and I was regularly finding myself in meltdown territory. It was creating so much anxiety that we got in contact with the people who’d sent it and they said that after roughly four days of readings, it would be fine to take it off, that they would have enough data. Removing it actually really hurt and I think me and my super sensitive skin had some kind of reaction to the adhesive because it kind of looked like I’d been burned where the patch had been for a couple of days after.
AUGUST 2021
Alongside the blood pressure and heart rate monitoring, there were a series of other tests but it was a while before I got the letter to tell me that they’d been scheduled. The first of the two appointments was in August and was a bit of a mixed bag as an experience. Despite the letter from my GP that said I’m autistic and have an anxiety and therefore need to have someone with me for hospital appointments, the receptionist almost didn’t let my Mum come in with me. I was somewhere between walking right back out and having a panic attack (said receptionist actually asked me if I was okay, which I thought was a bit rich) but fortunately it was all sorted out and after a little bit of time to collect myself, the testing went ahead. The doctor for this particular appointment (I don’t think I’ve seen a single doctor more than once through this entire process) was nice and didn’t rush me at all after the somewhat upsetting start.
The testing was fairly straightforward. They wrapped me up in monitors (I’m not going to lie – I kind of loved all of the hand ones for taking my pulse and stuff because it kind of felt like I was having superpowers measured or something, which was much more fun to think about) and then ran me through a series of tests: standing for certain periods of time, breathing exercises (which reminded me a lot of the warm up exercises I used to do during singing lessons), squeezing an inflated pressure cuff (my hypermobile fingers made this one pretty difficult), and so on. There was still the tilt table test to go but I had to come back on a separate day for that one.
Just like with the day of blood pressure monitoring, they didn’t tell me anything about the test results. Once they had all of the data from all of the tests, they’d call me in to discuss it all. I could understand that but it was frustrating when the whole thing was taking so long.
SEPTEMBER 2021
Late September, I was back at the hospital for the tilt table test. I was all wrapped up in the monitors again and they strapped me (not uncomfortably) to the exam table so that when it moved from horizontal to almost vertical, I wouldn’t slide or fall. Everything was fine while I was lying down and they got all of their readings and then they adjusted the table so that I was almost upright.
It took about twenty five minutes before I started to feel noticeably bad. Like, more than just not great. My hands felt numb and tingly, my legs were shaky, my chest started to hurt and I got very breathless; they let me take my mask off (everyone else was still masked and I’d tested negative before going to the hospital) but I was still breathing too fast, on the way to hyperventilating. While they had an approximate end time for the test, they decided to stop there; presumably they had the information they needed and I was honestly relieved to lie back down for a few minutes. I was breathless for a long time, my head hurt, and I was pretty nauseous. I had to sit for about ten minutes before I felt solid enough to get up and back to the car.
A week later, we were called in by the cardiologist to go over the results. It was a frustrating appointment: my information wasn’t there and we had to wait while the doctor called around and tried to get a hold of it all and then, when he got it, he waffled a lot without really saying anything so getting a clear explanation wasn’t easy. As far as I can tell, my heart rate goes a little haywire when I stand for a long time or exercise too vigorously. The cardiologist diagnosed me with Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome and prescribed me Propranolol to help with the symptoms. I’m not sure we’ve managed to get the dosage quite right yet but it is now in the right range and has been helping a bit: I’m less dizzy and breathless although that hasn’t gone away entirely (yet, hopefully).
FEBRUARY 2022
We had been offered more thorough testing at UCLH in London and we figured that it couldn’t hurt to have more information, especially from an institution that apparently has more knowledge and understanding, better resources, and so on. I was in and out of there for two days (ish), doing tests and helping them gather data on whatever weird thing is going on with my autonomic system. It was a lot but I was cautiously optimistic that what we learned would make managing the symptoms easier.
DAY ONE – We had to be there super early, which was a real struggle because the ADHD meds were seriously messing with my sleep, but I did somehow make it on time. Despite my doctor’s letter, the people at the desk and then the nurse didn’t want to let my Mum in with me. I was ready to walk out – I’ve been traumatised enough times by medical personnel that I wasn’t keen to add another tally mark to that particular chart – but Mum managed to talk to them and get them to understand. I was fitted with a blood pressure monitor, like the one from my first test, and gave me a diary to keep for the next twenty-four hours. It was similar to that first test but it required a lot more detail in the recording: I had to do certain activities at certain times, which were recorded by the monitor. It was quite a stressful and exhausting day, with the monitor bleeping continuously. I was incredibly tired (I fell asleep on the sofa more than once) and I struggled to keep up with the activities they wanted me to do – it feels like the ADHD meds have fried my brain somewhat. And then, because my sleep was so messed up, I didn’t get to sleep until after three.
DAY TWO – Waking up and get to the hospital for eight am was excruciating and the fact that I was only about ten minutes late was a miracle. Fortunately, they weren’t completely on time either. The testing that day was all done in the hospital, in one room, with one woman who was, fortunately, really nice. I spent most of the appointment lying on the exam table, hooked up to various monitors and performing different tests. Quite a few were the same as the first tests I did but there were some new ones too, like having my hand wrapped in an ice-pack for what felt like ages (although it wasn’t actually that long but my god, my hand hurt afterwards). She tried to draw blood for additional information but she couldn’t get a vein in either arm (I think that may have been due to the fact that I’d been lying down for a couple of hours at that point and so my blood pressure was weird but I’m not a doctor so what do I know) and that was uncomfortable with nothing to show for it but oh well; it apparently was a bonus if they got it.
The last part was the tilt table test and I wasn’t as affected as I had been the first time I’d gone through it but it still wasn’t pleasant. And after that, I was done. After lying (and then standing) in one position for so long, I was really stiff and my hip and knee joints were so sore that I could barely walk. I was absolutely exhausted. I made it back to where we were staying and fell asleep on the sofa straight away. I woke up for food (I hadn’t been able to eat before the appointment) and then went straight back to sleep. I was utterly drained and it took me a few days to recover fully.
Again, they didn’t have all of the results for me at the end of the appointment: those would go to the team meeting that was within the next two weeks and then they would call me with a plan, another appointment, or whatever. I think it’s safe to say at this point that my expectation of it taking more than two weeks was correct.
MAY 2022
UCLH sent a letter with a brief explanation of their findings and a time for a follow up call where they would explain those findings in more detail and discuss next steps. That took a while to schedule because of other commitments so it didn’t happen until May.
It was a short call but the nurse was really nice and so knowledgeable. She ran through the test results and what they showed and confirmed the diagnosis of Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome. She explained the effects of the Propranolol in more detail and said that I would be receiving an invitation to their next online meeting about managing the symptoms of POTS, which will hopefully be helpful. And on top of that, she gave me a few tips to try in the meantime. So it was a good appointment and I’m looking forward to seeing if her tips help and to the meeting, which should be within a couple of months or so.
So now I’m waiting to hear about the online meeting. I haven’t had many good experiences with sessions like these but I’m nothing if not chronically optimistic; maybe this one will be better. But just knowing that POTS is the cause of the symptoms is a step forward. And the Propranolol seems to be helping although I’m not sure that we’ve got the dose quite right yet.
I wanted to write and post more about Borderline Personality Disorder during BPD Awareness Month but I’ve been really struggling with my depression and changing medications and it’s all been a bit too much; I’ve found it hard to write anything at all. I’m still trying and hopefully I’ll have something BPD related up next week, plus I have a few other posts that I’ve started that I hope to finish and post in the not too distant future.
Finding Hope 