Foooooood

I’m not overweight but I’m certainly more than chubby, and definitely not slim. Somehow I’ve managed to stay a UK 12 but it’s with a lot of squeezing and muffin top. I’m a massive comfort eater. Food doesn’t tell you you’re fat. Food doesn’t tell you you’re worthless. Food tastes pretty damn good, too. It makes bad days bearable. It gives you something to do when you’re bored, tired or procrastinating. But food also makes your waistline grow, and your jeans too small when you eat too much of it. I go to the gym. I go 4 times a week and I’ve seem no improvements. But I can’t stop comforting myself with sweets and crisps. Cola is my best friend. Cola, or any fizzy drink for that matter, makes me alert and awake. Something my brain seems to lack when you sleep for 3 hours a night.

I know these things are bad for me – especially being diabetic. I also know weight loss takes time, and it isn’t about the number on your scales or the size of your clothing that defines you. But I know this isn’t me. I’ve had hypoglycaemic episodes before, and my subconscious brain could deny and form of sweet sugary snack offered by my housemates who were trying to help me. I told them no, shook my head and said I was on a diet and I wasn’t allowed them. Why can’t my concious mind do that knowing that I’m excessively gorging on cake and biscuits?

I’ve always had people commenting on my weight. People at school, even strangers on the street, made comments. I was the “fat girl” of the class, the whale, the blob. I cried and cried so many times- into a packet of cookies, of course. I don’t want to be the big girl any more. As my degree is predominantly females I find myself comparing my body to theirs – she’s lost weight, so I’m bigger than her now. That makes me the X biggest in the class. I’m making these comparisons all while knowing that I’d hate anyone else to be doing that to me.

I’m determined to change and get healthier. And for my wardrobe to fit better. And to not spend every spare bit of student loan on chocolate.

Things this week that have made me unnecessary sad but can fuck right off

1. My diabetes

Stupid I know. It is my fault that it has been so poorly managed recently but as I said in a previous post I am having my “why is it happening to me” phase now. My doctor was sympathetic and very nice about it but she did point out it could be much much worse – I could have other illnesses on top of this that could be extremely debilitating or life-limiting. I am thankful that it is *just* diabetes. However this doesn’t change the fact that I have to carry out the work of an organ that most people don’t have to think about and my foot will fall off if I carry on the way I am now (my last HbA1c percentage was awful >.<) and I felt really bad for feeling so sick of it when I know a lot of people have it far worse than me. Thank you doctor. She has arranged for me to be seen by a psychologist to help me manage it better with my mood swings and potentially reintroduce me to antidepressants. YAY. Though I do need to get better at this I would still like to be able to wear shoes.

2. University

I have some lovely friends on my course who I will be living with next year but I can’t help but feel like everyone else finds me incredibly annoying. I think they see me as the thick one who doesn’t try. I do. I really really do. Unlike you, I know what it’s like to fail exams repeatedly even when you’re trying your hardest to ensure that you get a half-decent grade. I have a mind like a sieve so I have to do a lot more work than you guys to retain information. Please don’t think I’m lazy.

I also feel like the friends I made last year don’t have the same enthusiasm I do to remain friends when I leave. I have to move to another house because of my placement year and won’t be living in the city any more.  I don’t feel they make the same effort (sounds a bit like I’m hard work I’m not always I promise) as they did last year with me. I don’t get invited out with them, I don’t even have much conversation with them. I don’t want to be left out next year but I feel like our relationship now is just a taster of what’s to come next year – we’ll have nothing to do with each other. I don’t want that. I can still visit on weekends (I very  much doubt they’ll venture into the countryside just to see me!) and I’ll (hopefully) still be with my boyfriend who is living with them!

3. My head still isn’t well. That is all.

I sound like such a typical whiney girl.

What to do when you know you’re going downhill

Over the past 2 weeks or so I’d say my health has deteriorated. Bad.

I was already in an extremely late-arriving phase of “Why do I have diabetes? This isn’t fair! Why has my pancreas gone up shit creek?” kinda thing. It seems my initial calm take on the news that baffled doctors just took 2 years to arrive and it is in fact present. I’m not weird, endocrinologists!

I also stopped taking and requesting my citalopram. This was an accidental turned purposeful action as I did originally forget. However when I did pull myself together and decide it would be for the best, I took it everyday, knowing full well they can have side effects. Fortunately for me the nausea lasted a week or so but the fatigue never went. Despite being told that these would counteract my already sleepy brain these actually made it a bazillion times worse and I could be asleep for around 18 hours a day. As a student who has 20+ hours a week of lectures and expected to do work on top of that and have a job and some sort of social life, having few hours in the day isn’t great. This wasn’t just laziness. I couldn’t physically bring myself to get out of bed. If I sat up something in my head would pound and quite literally force me back down where I’d be instantly knocked out for a couple more hours. I persevered for a month or so, taking the tablet at different times, forcing myself to stay up. My mood did seem to stabilise but I had no life in which to showcase it. I know it can take longer than a month to fully be effective but like I said – this isn’t a feasible option for a student. I’d rather try and manage on my own.

I don’t know if it has been the stress of exams coming up that have made me worse but it hasn’t helped. I had a crying fit in my bedroom at uni because I didn’t want to be here any more. I still feel like that now. I am no longer self harming but I were to compare my average mood from when I was to now I would say I’m worse now. I can’t concentrate, I almost got hit by a van on my way to the shops because I just wasn’t thinking! I can’t bring myself to do simple tasks but then I feel guilty and do them if that makes sense? I feel like a complete failure.

This isn’t a very coherent post so I apologise.

Follow Up

So in my last post I mentioned about a lack of people to turn to, mentioning I wasn’t having the greatest of times.

Annnnnd I was right.

However the fact I have noticed means I can do something about it, yes?

It started off me feeling a bit stressed with university and imminent exams that I was (am) not prepared for. I thought this would pass as I got used to the new year but I seemed to have started the descent into the oh-so-common “FML WHY”

It began with me noticing little things – I was tired all the time, napping when I had the chance. This lead to me doing no work and no revision, and I had very little motivation to do so anyway. I stopped cooking proper meals for myself and relied on 8 minute pasta with sauce and moved onto microwavable soup when I ran out of said sauce. Also chocolate. SO MUCH CHOCOLATE WAS BOUGHT in secret, away from my housemates eyes, to consume in my bedroom. I’ve put on about half a stone and I’ve stopped going to the gym. Way to feel good about myself!

But now the crying is brewing. I stared at a picture of me and some friends and welled up at the sight of my face and thinking how disgusted I looked.

My blood glucose levels are being tested approximately once a week. In fact I just did it and it was 15.6. That’s hardly a good number but meh.

I’m feeling sick and self concious.

And fuck that.

I honestly couldn’t tell you who I could talk to about this, but I have a feeling that I probably should and soon.

So it’s been a while.

First of all-Sorry. I haven’t thought to write recently as I’ve not felt entirely up for it and knew if I started a piece of writing it would end up just being left unfinished and not making too much sense.

However right now seems appropriate, I’ve been declining into an awful place and have virtually given up on attending lectures and doing revision and am basically being a rather shit student. It’s 12.30pm and I am in bed, having only woken up and hour ago and thus missing my lectures for today (I’ve not been to one so far this week. Oops.) It makes it worse when people on your course are picking up lecture notes for you and you still haven’t seem them to collect them and everyone thinks you’re a lazy c**t who can’t be bothered with it all and want to blow 9 grand a year just having a good time. Wrong. I’m lazy, yes, but not because I can’t be bothered and think I’ll breeze through the exams. I know I’m failing. I know I’m not good enough. So what’s the point in attending lectures when I won’t concentrate and I’ll be shit anyway? I fall asleep in lectures because I have absolutely no energy. I don’t understand what’s going on. So….there.

I also started therapy with student services. Yup. I decided to make an appointment and got told I could have an initial assessment, but it could be up to 6 weeks for an appointment. Low and behold, my 20 minute assessment turned into an hour long session with immediate therapy sessions starting the next week and a note to go to the gp and get myself looked at.
So I did.
My doctor is absolutely lovely. She’s my diabetes specialist as well whilst I’m at uni and she doesn’t bullshit. I filled out a questionairre for her to rank my depression levels and apparently I’m at a level where antidepressents could work for me, and I have the prescription for citalopram sitting on my bedside table.
Now she said it’s up to me whether or not to go and get the pills.
Up to me…..DECISIONS.
Can’t she just say if I need them? I mean she kinda has, but this choice thing makes me think I don’t really need them. Do I? No? EUGH.
I found a post I did last year on medication when the topic first came up. *Copy and paste and slightly edit*

“I have type 1 diabetes, where my pancreas decided, so no valid reason, to give up on me and stop producing the hormone insulin. I now have little prefilled syringes of NovoRapid and Lantus which are destined to sit in my fridge until the day that I die, and have to prick my finger to test my glucose levels. Fun. Combining my two favourite things: blood and needles. Your levels can also go haywire when ill, which I always.on making it difficult to steady the levels. The perfect disease for me-the needle and blood phobic sneezing pile of ill. yaaaaay
A form of self harm is to overdose on insuline, induce a hypo and faint. You can also go the other way and stop the injections all together, go in ketoacidosis (spelling?!) fall into a coma and die. The idea is to keep a happy medium but this is not always at the forefront of thought when you are anything but “happy”. Which leads nicely onto depression.
Only today (October 2012) did I get told I.might be referred to a doctor for medicinal help, something im not too keen on. Granted it may be useful-I’ve had depression for 5 ( Now 6) years and counseling hasn’t had the desired effect-but the idea of controlling the chemicals within my body artificially seems silly. Ok. Hypocrite. I technically do it already with the insulin, so surely antidepressants would be the same, right? I mean all I’m doing is providing my brain with they serotonin that my body is failing to produce enough of. Diabetes=depression, just different chemicals.
No?
To be perfectly honest it’s the stigma. When I was diagnosed with diabetes all of 3 months ago (17 months now!), I was bombarded with messages saying “oh em gee I did not realise.you were so unhealthy!” even the nurses on my ward were banning.food from me and telling.me I can never drink again and I.must avoid sugar OR I WILL DIEEEEEE. Not true, apparently, the diatician told me, but the misunderstanding that my diet and lifestyle caused this is still there. I’m not overweight but people still ask if I am. I eat healthily (ok I just ate a massive muffin and I am eyeing up.some crisps right now, shhhh). I.go to the gym…sometimes. BASICALLY I’m not.an obese cake wielding couch potato. But people think I am. Stigma.
So surely people will think I’m completely unstable and desperately suicidal if I swallow happy pills everyday? I certainly don’t want people to view me any more weirdly than they already do. I think the transition from therapy to medication would even make me more socially awkward and confined to my bed for fear of the pills completely altering my mind and making me all hermit like. From what I’ve heard they can make you emotionless (already am) suicidal (yep, that’s me) headachey (erm…running theme here) and nauseous (diabetes does that, so got that too) so basically, i’ll be in the same boat I already am, just with a lovely big “DEPRESSED” stamp on my medical history.”

So there was my initial take on antidepressants. Still fits, I guess. I probably wouldn’t tell anybody about the medication, certainly no family members and few friends I would trust with such information. I just don’t want to not take them and not potentially get better, but also don’t want to just…because.
I should proably venture outside for a bit. Bleh.

Why things have gone really downhill since July 2012

-Getting type 1 diabetes and being told it was the only reason I was skinny and people found me attractive. Trip 1/3 to A+E and missing my holiday to Spain and a lifetime of injections.

-Failing to get into university and having to resit my exams and losing all my friends to different cities across the UK
-Getting so blind drunk I threw up for the first time in 10 years and warrenting trip 2/3 to A+E

-Having shitty arguments with my family 24/7.

-Burned my hand so horribly trip 3/3 to A+E occured and they found out about my self harm
-Everyone found out about the self harm to be fair…
-Self harm got a lot worse as a result
-I’m leaving home to go to uni, thus leaving my counicllor behind and having to fend for myself with strangers

-My hatred of going out and anxiety got worse. So. Much. Worse.

-Doing a job that meant any chance of me going out ever was extemely limited by shitty hours that meant I was confined to sleeping in my spare time.

-Finding out majority of your friends just wanna give up on you because of all of the above.
EDIT: My mum got a pay cut and is losing her job in a few years.
No doubt this list will be continued in another post and/or edited to included more things at some point when my brain allows me to remember stuff instead of being sleep depreived and full of flu. Yay.