Snow falls

My wife came in yesterday with the boy and a bulging carrier bag, She'd been to the doctor with all 3 kids before dropping the girls of at school. Multiple infections and a bag full of remedies. Yes its winter alright.

I've been a miserable sod during this period. Cold and dark are not my favourite combination. I read the other day that 1/3 of Scottish homes can't afford to put the heating on and this is before the government begin cutting off the financial lifelines and also while the energy companies yet again bump of the bills for this time of year. Depressing. Mind you my wife reminded me that when we were young we did without heating. There was no central heating back then. He had a 3 bar electric fire which rarely got turned on. No double glazing either so there was sometimes ice on the inside of the frames. I remember eating cereal before school on the settee wrapped in my quilt. Maybe things are just to easy nowadays and think of those poor souls who have to live on the street.

My mood changed last night as I stood at the window watching my drab grey world be painted white in a snow globe scene. I don't mind the cold if you get the visuals with it and winter snow can be a thing of beauty. It lifts my spirits no end, I love it. Though it does have its downside too for this agoraphobic. We've just been getting out in the car again and that is knocked in the head now which was my downward turning point last year- also this current trend of my mind questioning what will happen if the car breaks down. Walking is also troublesome too. I have boots with think grips but I seem to be all over the place. Most concerning though is the boy. On Thursday he got his cast removed and they told my wife to make sure he doesn't run about and fall. No chance of taking him out then at the moment and what chance do you have of stopping an energetic 2 year old from running about?

For some reason at the moment I seem to be entrenched in or near a panic cycle. Its there all the time. When I am not in it I am fighting my way away from it but it keeps coming. Its my own fault mostly. The other day for example it seemed to come out of the blue and wouldn't go away. It was like bordering on panic, like the throws of drowning it. It was burning up reserves needlessly. I then had to go around to the shops and meet my wife. Then we went for a 10 mile drive and when we came back I had soup and a baguette for lunch. After this I felt fine. So the truth is I need to do more. This current cycle is apprehension through fear of consequence which then leads to not doing and more apprehension and guilt. Its important to get out there- even if it means you come running back quickly. At least try.

With this white blanket draped over my little world I am in better spirits. I have the legs to get out there and start living less of my day in my head and that is exactly what I plan to do. The camera is gathering dust so its about time I started making use of it again. I'm becoming more aware of this inner dialogue and maybe just slowly starting to tackle it or maybe just obsessing about it.

We all have a voice in our head that we have no control over. Its volume or impact dictates our behaviour. It dictates between being perceived, even by yourself, what is normal and what is not. For people with anxiety problems they can remember a time when they were "normal". Did the voice shout loudly then? No it didn't and I'm sure we were unaware of it but it is there in all of us however loudly or silently. Tourettes being one of the most extreme cases. A person doesn't want to swear, does all they can not to but still a relfex of the mind makes them do it. Its unstoppable. Like OCD there are thoughts which bulldoze their way in and out making the person a bystander. Its no different with anxiety. The thoughts are automatic and seemingly unstoppable which is why anyone who thinks you can "just get over it" is wrong. I think we all know just how intense these automatic thoughts and sensations are and just how helpless we feel against them.

There was though a time when this was not the case. Its a conditioned state I believe and as such can be unravelled. I don't know how but there must be a way of undoing. In fact I am beginning to think there is and it is in action. Its about being a little bit brave and not fearing consequence and challenging it each day within reason and thereby conditioning new experience. No easy thing I grant you but something that may not lead back to the time before but will at least lift some of the anxious weight. I can see that in my own situation this time last year when I was much better than I am now or at any other time this year.

So I guess what I am trying to say is the snow is here and the world is more welcoming and I see it as an opportunity to venture out more. That is what I plan to do. I want to go out and enjoy it instead of watching from the window. I love it when the snow falls.

The origin of human suffering

I've been looking through some anxiety stuff and the different facets of helping in recovery. One of the most interesting I found was concerning meditation. Not the practice itself but some of the theory behind it. I could relate to it even if the act itself I found a little harder. Like this:

"Eastern philosophy has taught that the origin of human suffering is in our automatic, conditioned thoughts"

I can see that. Automatic thoughts being those ones that don't come from the consciousness but instead are there in your face before you can do anything about them. Conditioned because they are a product of all the previous times before like a habit that is instinctual. Human suffering, to a degree but lets be honest there is more external human suffering in the shape of wars, famine, natural disaster, terminal illness and lots more than internal.

In terms of anxiety though I see it. At its extreme in the form of panic it feels like immense suffering that no-one can fully understand unless they have experienced it. It is a state of torment. And crucially because there is actually no threat it is a suffering based on automatic conditioned thinking patterns.

That is all well and good but what to do? Therein lies the big question. I firmly believe, although I have read different many times, that its not in the genes. We are not born that way. It is very much a condition of living. When we are born we are without fear and fear is taught to us. Maybe there is a balance to be struck. Maybe each individual needs a different balance. Maybe that balance comes in the form of what is taught and what is found out first hand.

What I am certain of is that a young child is fearless unless they have been subjected to a trauma of some sort which imprints itself. Each day lived and each experience shapes that balance. We learn fear. Some learn enough, some learn too much. How we cope with fear is based on every day that went before and what we experienced to that point.

It takes me back to the one thing I found of interest in the ACT workbook. That state of being able to disentangle yourself from the thoughts that you have so fused with that you believe them to be true. And in untangling yourself you are able to observe at a distance and watch without interacting. In fact I have read a few books of late coming from different angles saying the same thing. Basically by observing the automatic patterns at a distance you then don't have to react. I see and agree that it is not the thoughts themselves that are the problem but the reaction to them and if that is because the thoughts and reactions are fused as one to become automatic. In theory it sounds right.

Even better is the theory of meditation being a practice that can, possibly, allow you to find awareness- awareness being that original unconditioned state below the maelstrom of thinking. According to what I read that pure state is always there but is obscured by the mind chatter we develop by years of living and gaining life experiences. Imagine if you could tap into that. Imagine if you could stop these thoughts at source. But for the moment its all just words and second hand experience. Like anything else I think you would have to experience these things first hand to believe them. Still I can't help thinking that this makes more sense to me that a lot of the other stuff I have read. Each person is different but in my case automatic thinking is definitely the biggest problem. So with another big book in hand I am off to give it a go.

The written word

I don't know if you notice things more that are always there when they come into your life or whether its just the way the world has changed over the years. Take anxiety for example and in its extreme form panic. I've been reading for years and never knew what a panic attack was until I experienced one. Never really thought much about anxiety either nor to my knowledge came across it much, if at all, in the books I read. Though having read a lot of horror books I am sure I must have. But I wonder if it was always there and I didn't pay it any notice or whether its now a case that the world is so demanding and fast that at some level there is more anxiety in everyone's life.

In the past week I've read two novels which were very different. Yet somewhere in there there is an anxious experience. In some there are more of them than others but it seems like every novel I read there is a reference to it somewhere. Then again I wonder is it not a case that any novel is going to have a character going through a full range of emotions and the most prevalent of those is likely to be fear?

He stretched awkwardly in his seat now, the stiffness in his arms prompting another memory, of folding them around Siobhan outside the Sunday Herald and kissing her goodnight. The way she'd pressed her body against into his. Why the hell did it have to feel so right, when it was obviously never going to work with her? Suddenly, he felt a tightness in his chest, as if his lungs were constricting inside him. He felt the woman beside him shift an inch or two further away, and wondered if this is what it was like to suffer an anxiety attack. But it only lasted a moment and once it had passed her felt a great wave of relief wash through him.
THE PRIEST, Gerard O'Donovan

This was an average crime thriller in which you would think there would be a lot of anxiety and fear but strangely there was very little in it. The main reason for that is that the crimes were not told but instead investigated later so apart from a victim reliving the trauma under hypnotherapy this was about the only other reference. It made me wonder though if this was a first hand experience related by the author. Here an Irish detective is on a plane to Madrid remembering the night before and being torn by his emotions- the old love/hate thing.

Cale was astonished at himself as terror drained him of the strength that had made him invincible for almost half his life. His tongue, dry as sand, stuck to the roof of his mouth, the muscles in his thighs hurt, barely able to support him, his arms, oak strong, felt as if to lift them would be an impossible feat and there was a strange burning in his ears...Panic ran riot through Cale's wilting soul as if some reservoir of fear had been dammed up in him for all these years and now had burst its banks and swept away all nerve and guts, all gall and the will to power.
THE LEFT HAND OF GOD, Paul Hoffman

I really enjoyed this fantasy novel except for the abrupt end but have since learned the reason for that was its the first part of a trilogy. Here a boy who is a fearless, in fact emotionless, killing machine suddenly finds himself for the first time in his adult life panicking in a duel. Probably its intensified by the fact that he has been free of fear every time in a fight up until that point. And the only reason for it is finding love. Maybe that was the burst of the dam which itself was maybe repression.

While I am on the subject of this book off on a tangent for a bit. Although fiction there is a great dandy philosopher with the strange name IdrisPukke. There is not enough of him in it for me. He's a real scallywag but his views are both insightful in some ways and funny in others.

'Solitude is a wonderful thing, Cale, and in two ways. First, it allows a man to be with himself, and second, it prevents him from being with others.' Cale nodded his agreement with a sincerity that was only possible for someone who had spent every waking and sleeping hour of his life with hundreds of others and always being spied upon.

'To be sociable,' IdrisPukke continued, 'is a risky thing- even fatal- because it means being in contact with people, most of whom are dull, perverse and ignorant and are really with you only because they cannot bear their own company. Most people bore themselves and greet you not as a true friend but as a distraction- like a dancing dog or some half-wit actor with a fund of amusing stories.'
THE LEFT HAND OF GOD, Paul Hoffman

I just love that. But to get back on topic I could quote paragraphs from all the books I've read in the past few years were it not for the fact my memory banks are now so clogged that two a bit more than I can fit in there. There is something reassuring, for me anyway, about reading fear in another and seeing it here, there and everywhere. It reminds me its not uncommon. OK for me its out of context but take away the situation and the experience is no different from what millions of others have felt too. Even in fiction there is some comfort. I remember reading an historical fiction novel, the title escapes me, about Spartans in training and their methods for achieving fearlessness. Not only their methods but also the philosophy behind it. It didn't matter that it was fiction because to me it was fascinating. And I guess that is why we are all in the bloggy community because there is something of interest and a common ground from which we hope we can gain understanding and if not that then comfort in knowing we are not alone via the written word.

Petty Crime

My wife at the moment is getting a bit "ratty", as we say up here, at the moment. That is to say every little petty thing is getting on her nerves. It may indicate a symptom of her current situation living with a mental case but I think it runs deeper than that. Along with her, the rest of her sisters are always commenting on how little things get to her dad to the point where for example although he loves his football small irritants now have a number of football grounds blacklisted for petty crimes. My wife is very much her father's daughter. I'd say 90-95% of her opinions are inherited rather than formed and it sometimes leads to arguments between us which she can't back up, but because her dad says so she won't back down either.

Just setting the scene though. One of these little irritations came to a head tonight. Every Thursday there is a function of some sort across the road from us and the guy who runs it continually parks almost on our doorstep despite there being a car park. It infuriates the life out of her but there is nothing that can be done as its a public road. So last night she took it upon herself to go out in real stormy weather with rain hammering down and strong winds swirling to park our car out front to stop this guy parking there. Soaked to the skin even for the short time out she still wore a smug smile. When I looked out I noticed she hadn't mounted the pavement to allow cars to pass into the car park. Why I don't know but as I mentioned this she disappeared back out again no doubt sort the problem. I should have just left it.

It was ten minutes that passed before I went to the window again to see her standing with the car door open outside seemingly just standing there. Most peculiar so I went down to see what she was up to because the weather was so bad that you could not call across the short distance and be heard. It turns out in her little moment of pettiness she had opened the car door and the wind caught it. She'd heard a crack and the door fully open could no longer be shut. It was stuck and not budging. The inside was absolutely soaked as the rain battered in as was she. There was I standing in just a T-shirt freezing and wanting to go back up to get a heavy jacket but she insisted there and then she needed to move the car out of the wind and needed me to walk alongside holding the door so I got soaked. A lesson learned I hope. As I helped the car limp around the back the guy she had been trying to thwart pulled up and rested on our doorstep to add salt to the wounds.

I should say I had up to this point being lying content half asleep on the couch. For some reason the night before I had a real bad time with panic late on and for the first time in about a year and a half had that horrible derealisation. I'd woke up in the morning still the same and it was getting me panicky as hell. Its hard to explain. Its like staring into space and knowing you are doing it but unable to snap yourself out of it. Like having a thousand yard stare on and unable to refocus. Anyway it turns out it was a bit of a bug, probably, as the accompanying symptoms were the same as my wife had on Monday when she had to go to bed ill. Though she did make her work eager to keep up her excellent attendance record. Basically it was burning eyes, headache, shakiness and even she had complained on Monday of feeling "unreal" and "not there". All things I've had before with anxiety so took it just to be that. Just a bug though.

So I wasn't in the best of moods while my wife called the AA and I sat in the car trying to work out what was going on while getting soaked through. In some ways it was good as I felt better for being out in the elements in my mind doing something but I was feeling so shitty that I soon started to get anxious. The AA wouldn't send anyone out and recommended that my wife just try forcing the door shut as that is all they would do anyway. So that was her plan. But I investigated further and disagreed. I found a latch which I could move, covered in oil, and checking against the other door found that wasn't right. My wife got a torch from one of the neighbours and I set about trying to fix the problem. It was a nightmare though. Hanging over a car door the rain was battering off the windscreen and creating a spray directly into my face. I had the sensation of being at sea because apart from that it was pitch black and my legs were like jelly- never have been a good sailor.

Not to waffle on, I finally with the aid of a torch managed with all my might to lever this piece of broken metal over a bolt head and shut the door. What bloody relief. My wife had her arms around me and the neighbour watching from the window was singing praises. I felt very uncomfortable so legged it- never been one for praise. So the reluctant hero of the hour ran away quick smart finding even jelly legs will move when you need them too. It was though good because god knows what our next move was. Our car in torrential rain with the door wide open- we could hardly leave it over night. All in all it was an hour from my wife breaking the door to me managing to close it with no other alternatives up until it was done in that bloody swirling rain. And to be honest before the door gave way I was ready to run anyway as I had started to get into a panic.

Later I was frozen to the bone and feeling the cold from the soaking. Our little flat just doesn't heat up regardless of how long we have the heating on. There are too many gaps in this leaning little tower of subsidence. But I did have a warm glow inside. Not from solving a problem but from being out in the elements and feeling briefly alive instead of locked away. A reminder, which I need, that I need to get out there instead of contemplating consequences of actions.

Halloween passes

"Just out of theatre, surgery went well, sleeping off anaesthetic. should be home around lunchtime x"- H

A message from my wife on Facebook. Not that I go on there that often but as she does and I hadn't heard any news at two in the morning I thought that would be the best place to check. She was at the children's hospital with the boy.
Around tea time after being excluded from carving up the pumpkin I was in the kitchen making that trifle I promised and making a complete pig's ear of it. I'm hopeless in the kitchen but do try. I managed to burn the custard and then after spooning out all the burnt bits with more patience than I usually have left it too long so it solidified and I couldn't pour it on to the jelly. Complete waste of space I know. As I was in the kitchen I heard my wife on a number of occasions tell the youngest two to stop running around but the constant thudding of feet let me know they were not for listening. Then there was an almighty thump, short silence and then screaming. Not unusual for our home I have to say. There is such limited space to run about in and the hyper kids are forever leaving their toys lying about on the floor that falls are commonplace.

But when my wife called me I knew something was wrong. The boy looked in agony. His left arm was hanging limp and above the elbow looked wrong. I can't actually say what was wrong with it but it just looked wrong for some reason. And added to that the whole of the upper arm had come out in blotches. As I tried to calm him and dress him my wife arranged for one of the neighbours to take her to hospital and then they were gone. It was horrible. To see this little soul in such agony and not be able to do anything about it. What I found more worrying was he kept closing his eyes and I had to keep making sure he would stay awake. Just a horrible feeling in the pit of my stomach and I didn't envy my wife's journey ahead with waiting rooms and the like. My mind took me dark places. It took me to all those stories I'd read and wished I hadn't about young children being beaten with broken bones and god how could they suffer that?

Two and a half hours later the boy was back with his arm in a sling. He'd broken his arm. My wife had been sitting on the floor sorting out washing when he had run in the room and tripped over the basket landing awkwardly. Unfortunately for him and my wife that was just the start of it. The broken bone was out of alignment and the local hospital couldn't deal with that so he had to go to the specialised children's hospital in Glasgow for an overnight operation. So off my wife went already stressed and not looking forward to an overnight. I looked after the girls and we muddled by for 24 hours. I didn't go to bed until the back of four. I just couldn't sleep and didn't want to sleep then I was up at eight with two hyper children and a long day ahead but nothing like the length of what my wife must have been going through.

As they are young the girls didn't understand the significance of what had happened except for momentary spells. Where was the Halloween they were promised? How do you explain it to them? Well I tried but it didn't quite do the trick. I can understand that. In the morning they had been promised costumes and games and a buffet and trifle and other Halloween delights. It was the night that was going to make up for their disappointing school party. Instead they got a take away with their dad in silence and a dimly lit pumpkin in the background.

Halloween though has now passed. The disappointment for them has now passed. The boy is still coming to terms with having his arm in a sling and still in a little pain too but already on the way to recovery after his operation. Without making promises to them I think we will try to make it up to them with fireworks of a different kind.