Category: Mental Health awareness

Firstly, I hope I am not upsetting anyone with my blogs. I began blogging just before my husband was diagnosed with Prostate cancer and every single week of that painful scary journey. Sometimes not believing I would survive as a wife of a man suffering from PC.  I wrote from my perspective not my husbands. My blogs were truthful, gritty, full of emotion and were written, including all the ups and downs of my family life. Warts ‘n all.As I have said before, when cancer strikes it takes no heed of what is going on in your life. Of any struggles, pain etc. It just strikes in it’s selfish painful manner with no thought for adding to the issues in our lives at that time. I have had wonderful feedback and comments from other partners and wives who could identify with what I was saying.Last week, I seemed to offend a couple of gentlemen on one of the groups I belong to. I did write a few months ago, saying I would still blog even  though thankfully, David, my husband has had the all clear, if members did not want to continue to follow my life story on here, for them to scroll past.It won’t always reference PC. I would like to re iterate that please. Many have asked me to continue to write, honestly and openly and sometimes with appropriate humour, so I will.

Today I am talking about our identity. How we see ourselves at certain times in our lives and how others may see us.Some of how we see ourselves can come from childhood, how we are seen by parents, teachers, friends etc. As a child I was told over and over that I was ugly. So often that I have always believed it. Not being loved by family, by my ‘mother’, convinced me that it must be because I was ugly. Why else would a mother not love her child? So as soon as I could, I began to wear make up, covering the ugly and making myself look different. So far, well until the past few weeks, it has worked. 

Once I became a Mum, something I loved from the very first time I held my firstborn daughter Lisa, Carol became, Mummy. I was a wife, a housekeeper, a cook, a cleaner, a comforter, a nurse, etc etc. Doing all the things a Mum does. And I loved every minute. Having 2 daughters I soon began to forget who Carol was. I was someone’s wife and someone’s Mum, my own name was seldom used. My identity had changed. I was part of something bigger, a family whom I loved with all my heart. But where was Carol?

 Just after I wrote my children’s book, I added my second name to my signature and am now known as Carol Ann, not a new person but yes, a new identity.I then moved to Wales and was known as Carol Ann from the start, changed my hair colour and was nothing like the little dark haired girl who had lost her identity somewhere. I went to college and pursued a career in Counselling, took a degree in Psychotherapy and gained my Masters. I had transformed from a frightened lost child to a confident mature Psychotherapist and author.I was also still a wife and mum. I changed my looks and my identity and have been happy with both.Well not so much my looks, getting older put paid to that.

Then I wrote my autobiography and had to take on another identity, a pseudonym to write under for legal reasons, Thus Cassie Harte was born. I had so wanted to use my own name but was not allowed. I wrote to change myself, this time by choice, from victim to survivor and it did just that. The book was a huge success and is still selling. Carol Ann had changed her identity and although I wasn’t happy with that, it was at the time the right thing to do. Now I own the book and have taken it back under my own name. I have identified myself as the author and it feels right.

This blog is about how we see ourselves and how others see us, how life can change our identity when circumstances change and we can’t stop it. Our roles change sometimes and we have to take on the challenge and I for one know how hard that can be. I have written in earlier blogs of how I found David being ill very  hard.He had never been ill in the whole 30 years we had been together, so this was new. This was a shock for both of us but he dealt with it in his usual pragmatic way. But it did change him. I have had many illnesses, not always serious but he had always taken care of me. A wonderful husband. He is my rock and although I am a very strong professional woman, or was, I still leaned on him, relied on him. We made decisions together but I nearly always took the lead from my man. After diagnosis of PC, things changed. He became hesitant, concerned about things he had previously not worried about. After surgery, for a while as we all do, I became the carer. Suddenly this was how I was seen. I wasn’t Carol Ann, I wasn’t the strong professional woman. I was a woman flailing in the wind but trying not to  show it. Terrified of life but appearing to be brave. I would try and creep into the garden, into the barn or to the fields, go to my ponies and cuddle into their manes and try and cry. Crying has never come easily to me. Did I mind being the carer? No of course I didn’t but I didn’t like it either. It seemed that I had lost ‘me’ somewhere and could not ever see a time when ‘I’  would return but I did. If you identify with me, you too will come back. Stronger and wiser hopefully. Since surgery 2 years ago, a great deal has happened and I have written about how David is changed, how he is different but we are both just glad he survived the cancer and I survived the journey. Many on  here did not and I can only send them my love and thoughts. I never ever forget that it could have been different.

As a Psychotherapist, I take on another identity, that of Counsellor. This has to happen, not a choice of mine but part of the service I offer. But again I am not seen as a woman, a family woman, with all that entails. I am seen as Professional, there to guide others at times of distress  or confusion. I was good at my job, I succeeded many times when other professionals had not. Maybe living the life I have lived prepared me, I don’t know but I loved every minute of helping my clients. Circumstance rendered me unable to work, stress in my own personal life, made me ill. Like a bad joke isn’t it.During the 22 years of working in my field, I gained confidence and enjoyed being seen as the strong Professional woman I had become.Losing all of this because of emotional illness, stress from family stuff, took it’s toll.

Back in 2013,and for the following 6 years, as I have told you in earlier blogs, I was having a horrid time with certain family and this brought out a side of me I didn’t recognise. It seemed again, to change my whole identity. I became someone who had to defend herself, had to fight for people I loved. I became a frightened , a sad ‘child’ and behaved in a way that I do not understand. I  have to reconcile myself with that. I lived it all out, on Social media because that is how it was for me, family attacking me in public view and me defending myself over and over.I was denied any other contact with those who were bullying me and those I loved. I didn’t recognise this person, the person I had become.Who was that? Why did she do that? Who had I become?I realise now that I had become the frightened child I had been, at 7 years old again and was trying to tell my side in the only way I could. On SM. I am not proud of that , wasn’t back then, but as I said, I don’t know who I was back then. My identity had changed because of how things were. 

This past year, my role has changed again. David is almost back to how he was but PC has left him with a great loss of physical strength than he had pre PC, that in itself brings change.Our lives are different, full of love but different. Last January I had pneumonia and was very weak. I had lost my beloved brother in 2018 and had not grieved properly. I know that now. Since then my identity, my role in the family has changed. I am being cared for and I don’t like it one bit. Again, I don’t recognise who I have become. During the PC journey I think, like many wives/partners, I tried to hide my fears, my worries and did not allow myself to grieve for how things had been. The only place I could talk about how I felt was on here, my blog. I have a great belief in writing as a tool. It can help so much and did.Then I had  virus after virus, still have conjunctivitis and very painful eyes. This brings me to another ‘identity’ note. I have worn make up all of my adult life. I love my eye makeup and it appears to be my signature ‘fashion accessory’ Marie my youngest has said that when I die, she will make sure she makes my eyes up as I like to and puts my lipstick, on as I am never seen without it. Well I am now! I would never leave the house, even to do the birds, I know, stupid isn’t it. But it is how I am. Get up, shower, wash my hair and do my make up. It doesn’t matter how rough I feel, my eyes are always done. But I haven’t been able to put eye makeup on for 6 weeks!! I never went out for the first 4, actually was too ill but I have felt well enough to go out this past week and have worn dark glasses. No make up, can’t be seen. Vain ? Maybe but remember, little Carol. ‘if I am ugly no one will love me.’ Make up covers the ugly. Childhood stuff like that never leaves. 

So circumstances can steal our identity. Jobs can do the same but underneath we must always try and be true to who we really are. 

As asked, I will continue to blog. It helps me. It may help others. If you don’t want to read, please scroll past. 

Thank You for reading x

These past few days, weeks for some of us, have been worrying, scary and upsetting.Raging fires in Australia, volcano’s erupting, floods in places where they were never expected. Swarms of locust destroying crops that were much needed. Terrorism, war, murders and rapes. Now a new virus that is spreading at an alarming rate. What on earth is happening to our world? All of these bring fear.I often wonder if our world is fighting back. Who knows but in my limited knowledge I can only see one common factor in all of this sadly. Us. the Human Race. As someone once said, we are living here like we have some place else to go. Like the Earth is not the only place we can survive. Well at this moment in time, it is and it is up to all of us to change things. We all need to do our bit. I am not going to talk in this blog about Climate change because everyone else is and I am in no position to preach about something I know little about. I am just venting and giving my opinion.

Most reasons for war, terrorism, rape and murder are man made.Where is respect these days? Respect for others, their right to live their own lives. Where is compassion, again allowing others to live how they choose as long as it hurts no one. But looking at the bigger picture, we all need to be kinder, more thoughtful of others, more compassionate and caring and show empathy for our fellow man. We all belong to the same family, the family of Man and need to remember this. 

But.

What hope do we have if we do not practice this within our own family, our birth family? What hope do we have of caring for others, those not blood related, if we hurt, ridicule, and cause pain to those who should be closest to us. Our own flesh and blood. Our own siblings. Our own family. How do we include the larger family we belong to, show them love and compassion, stay close to them, share with them and love them, if we can so easily hurt our brothers and sisters? No hope at all, so something has to change.

This past few weeks I have witnessed the cruelty and unkindness within a family. My family. The family I was born into and those I grew up with. I have been shut out at a time I should have been included. Nothing new there but I suppose it never ceases to shock me how wicked people can be, at a time when their own feelings should be set aside. As some of you know, I am estranged from most of my birth family, have been for the past 6 years courtesy of my youngest sister. I have been fed second hand lies about my sister’s funeral, having been told she has been cremated and her ashes sent abroad a few weeks ago. This is not true.How cruel, unnecessary and hurtful is that. During the last few weeks all kinds of stories and lies have come my way and I have seen the very worst of what lengths some people would go to to hurt me. But I have also seen the very best in those who really care and to them I am forever grateful. I have been comforted by my late brother’s family and friends who have shown true empathy and love and I thank you all. My own little family ‘here on the farm’, have, as always, shown support and love and held me while I cried. They know how I feel about them x

I fear for us as a race, I fear for the future of our children. During the past few years of blogging, I have been contacted by so many readers who have families like mine. That makes me sad. No one should have to bear that burden. No-one should be shut out of the family they belong in. But it happens far too often. Too easily. Some families have no respect or concern for anyone.We all have one mother and one father. I was not lucky enough to have a good mother but I was always there for her, right up to the end. Why? Because she was family. I also hear of awful things happening within a family but they pull through. Why? Because they are family and families should stick together.Mine have not done that, well, not to me. Of my siblings now, there are just 2 of us. Me and my youngest sister Tricia. For unknown reasons, she chose to alienate herself from me, more than 40 years ago. No one knows why, I know for a fact that nothing happened to bring this about. I have tried many times to make this right and failed. Coming back into the lives of my late brother and my daughter,after more than 35 years,she has caused me pain, loss, both financial and emotional and estrangement from my own daughter and grand children. How can family do this? Now she is on her own.

Why am I telling you this? Repeating it I think? Because if we can’t honour our own birthright, if we can’t show love, tolerance, respect within our own set up, our birth family,to our siblings, how can we ever expect to do this for others? How can we show these traits to the bigger family, to those in our society, those in other countries who live different lives to us but are still part of our earth family? What hope is there, for our global family? For the bigger picture? For mankind? Over the years I have been saddened by how many families can treat each other so badly. It needs to stop. It needs to stop now beginning at home. Why? Because the world is facing crisis after crisis and we need each other. We are all so quick to blame, to hurt, to destroy. Each other and our planet. As Billy Ocean sang today on the radio, ‘We have one world let’s take care of it. People out there will burst your bubble with the games they play.’ We need to stop. Stop hurting each other, stop harming our Earth and thus stop hurting ourselves. 

So let’s begin here. Let’s spread love to our friends. Show respect to our neighbours. Do our bit for Mother Earth and in that way we will help ourselves. Each and everyone of us.

Me! I have had enough. Enough lies. Enough pain. Enough hurt to last for the rest of my life. I don’t need or want any more thank  you.These past 2 weeks have shown me that people hurt you because they don’t like them selves. That is through no fault of mine, I know but it is sad. I can’t change them, can’t make this right as I wanted, so have to accept it. But in the wider world, I can make a difference. I can do my bit for the environment.I  can love my family and friends as I do and try always to be kind to everyone. I want to spread hope, love and happiness. Make people smile and make people feel good about life and about them selves. My life has changed dramatically these past years but I am still here. Still loving my family and in spite everything, I still care.

Thank you for reading . x

This post is for anyone and everyone who knew my sister June. Those who knew her and those who thought they did. A memoriam if you like, for a much loved sister. For those who loved her, those who mourn her and for me.Others, please feel free to scroll past.

My earliest memory, a real memory of you June, was being taken to Horsham, a sunshine school, where you and Georgina had spent some time after the war. I was very young, and didn’t understand why you were there. You took me under the Nissan huts and we shared sweets. Then you cried, you wanted to come home. I promised I would ask if you could. We both knew that my request, as it came from me, would be futile but I did ask. I am not sure how long after this you returned to our bungalow in Portchester but it seemed an age.I was the youngest at the time and we shared our home with our parents, Georgina and our beloved brother Tony. You and Georgina were much older than Tony and I so didn’t  have much in common but our love for each other.You were different from us, Nan would tell us that you had Meningitis as a baby and that had left it’s mark. She said you were ‘different’, a little bit slower than your peers but I loved you for that.We often slept head head to toe in a large bed, being left with Georgina in charge and she would read us stories. How you would giggle at ‘ghosts and ghouls’, she told us about, while I hid under the blankets.

My next memory was of the Portchester May Queen, I was a train bearer, 4 years old, Tony carried the crown on a cushion and you were a maid of honour. A lovely day, ending with us dancing around the Maypole. I wonder if you ever thought of that day? 

You found school very hard, no special needs back then but you and I, as I grew up, would spend hours reading, me teaching you and you lapping up the learning.You were very clever , practical, making things, sewing, embroidering. I still have a lovely picture you made out of black jack paint and silver paper , a crinoline lady with a parasol. No one taught you, you just knew how to do it.We would go cycling, to Lee on Solent and laugh, a lot. You had a lovely laugh.Did you ever think of those days? The days you  took Lulu , our Siamese cat out on your shoulders, on a lead. She loved it, loved you.Although you were much older than me, we shared happy times, few in my life, but always happy with you.

A sad memory, is of the day you left home.You were 21 and Mum did not approve of your choice of partner. We were coming back from Portsmouth, on the Gosport  bus and you got off long before our stop. That’s when you told me, you were going to live with your future mum in law and not coming home. I was heartbroken. You were part of my ‘respite’, my ‘okay at home’ and I would miss you. My favourite photo of you, in your spotted dress and urchin haircut, holds pride of place here ‘on the farm’.

We stayed in touch, I visited as often as I could. I was there when your first baby girl Angela,died, we cried together, held each other. I was there when your son and two other daughters were born and we shared our children’s times together regularly. It was good.I was Godmother to your first daughter daughter Tina and watched the children grow up.As adults, we saw each other regularly, throughout the years even after I moved to Portsmouth and then back to Catisfield. I helped you through your husband’s illness and subsequent death. We had moved to Wales a year before but came back many times and I would spend days with you.

We all talk about you June, especially memories of the lovely holiday you took with us at our cottage in Monmouth.Such fun times. You were like a big child in your wonderful innocence. Asking so many questions as children do. Staying up, long after David and I had gone to bed, learning to make dream catchers with Marie, giggling for hours. I don’t think we stopped laughing together the whole holiday. Wonderful times. You helped muck out the ponies, weed our garden and just spend hours enjoying our home. We went out for day trips and you never ceased to make us all happy.

After you returned home, both of us, all of us sad to see you go, you met your second partner, Keith and before long we were at your wedding. Another lovely day.I still have the pressed flowers you gave me, the wooden tulips, the beautiful little clock for my study. All here. All treasured gifts given with love.

Although we had moved to Wales, we visited often, always spending time with you and Keith. We shared friendship. sisterhood, love and laughter. 

When sadly our sister Georgina died, we both said  our goodbyes and spent a while chatting. You, sharing your kindness, your compassion and memories of us all. But that was when it changed and we both know why. But today is not a time for that. I never had a chance to say goodbye. I was kept out of your life for someone elses’s warped satisfaction and will always regret that, although it was not of my doing. I never had a chance to say goodbye June, that I will always regret. We did talk at Tony’s and I made my peace with you as you did with me but that was all we had. Throughout our lives we shared fun, happiness, grief and sadness and I remember mostly your innocence, your gullibility, your kindness and your love. I may not be there to say goodbye but you will know that I was there in spirit. I will trust our past, our closeness. Our love. Perhaps in the past few years, those who pushed us apart with lies and stories , think they succeeded in alienating us. They are wrong. I never blamed you for anything. Never held any animosity towards you. You were gullible, trusting and they were there, I was not. But in my head I know you knew the truth, knew that I loved you. Love you.

So here I am saying goodbye, sending my love, my memories and smiling. You brought so much happiness, so much love, in your childlike but wise way. Until a few years ago, we were very close, I was grateful for you to be able to stay and help look after Tony in his last months, wish I could have done that. My last memory of you June, was in his bungalow, talking about the awful things you had been told. You said you knew none of it was true, believed me as you always have done. We hugged, said we loved each other and parted friends. That is what I will add to my memories,that is how I will remember us. So bye bye Junie, give Tony and Georgina a hug for me please.They may have kept me away but they can never steal my memories. God bless. 

Your sister Carol Ann xx

Today, something happened, ‘here on the farm’ that made me look at how life changes, sometimes serving us a curve ball, sometimes unexpected, sometimes expected but not wanted.We may not always be where we either planned to be or wanted to be, at certain times in our lives. Emotionally or physically, life may not have been what we had envisaged or planned. Life can get in the way of the best laid plans. People can behave in such a way that affects how our life pans out. Change happens. People change. Circumstances change. Change happens.

To be where I am today, is not how I had planned my life. I have spoken of this before, I know, but bear with me. I always thought, as I was bringing my children up, that one day, this day, I would be surrounded by grandchildren, always having a full house, busy helping them with whatever was needed. Relatively healthy and happy with myself and my lot. Well, I have no grandchildren as such in my life now, having been denied that by my eldest daughter but I do have contact, albeit brief, with my eldest grandson and for that I am grateful. I had always hoped that my ‘dysfunctional’ birth family would all have grown closer and they would be a big part of my life, our life, since I met David. But that has not and will not happen. This is the reality, so not as I had imagined. Life happens and this is a change that didn’t, my family getting closer I mean. This is reality, life happens and can get in the way.

As we grow older , we ourselves change, that is a given. No choice. Sometimes for the better sometimes not. We change physically, we can do less, or struggle to do what we have always, done, well in my case anyway. Psychologically we change and have to accept that life is now different. We change physically and psychologically but not always emotionally. I cannot do the things I could always do and struggle with that, it annoys me, gets me down and sometimes makes me a bit angry, or frustrated at least. Inside I am still capable of everything I have always been capable of doing but my body has other ideas and often says No! I do argue with it but not always succeed. 

My darling husband is still the man I married, still the man I love but he too has changed. Since his operation for Prostate cancer, he doesn’t have the same physical strength, not as much energy and although the spirit is always willing, sometimes the flesh is weak. Or weaker, this makes him cross and frustrated, or did, and for a short time, made him doubt his manhood, but no longer. With a great deal of encouragement and love and support, he now knows and accepts his limits. Something I never thought would happen. But in his words, as life goes on and changes happen, we could just sit and bemoan our situation, but he says ‘we are where we are and we are both still here’ At that point, all is well.   He is still my man, my rock and the man I married, albeit a bit different as our life is, but still my David. Another change that I have spoken of, is he is more emotional, more able to share his feelings and accept his feelings with no embarrassment. That is a huge positive change and all of this helps him accept that although our life together is different, as it is for many who have survived the journey PC takes us on, life is still full of love and yes, laughter. So all is well.

These past years have changed me. With every loss, there is a change. Every grief stricken day, makes me slightly altered as a person,than I was the day before. Physically I am not as capable and that I find hard. Because of the past few years of stress and hurt, I am no longer able to take the stresses and strains of life in my stride, a change I dislike immensely.After my ‘meltdown, breakdown, last September, I feel far more fragile than I am comfortable with. I am working hard on this ‘change’ to change it back to how I was. I did for a while, after losing my eldest daughter and grandchildren, feel very hard done by, robbed in fact, of the life I had planned. But in order for me to survive, to live a worthwhile future, I now accept that I have done all I can to make that right and didn’t fail. It just wasn’t to be. To make things right, both parties have to want it. But I tried and now accept how it is. As David says, ‘we are we we are’.

Another change in my life is that I have now retired from my role of Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapist. After having pneumonia last January and not recovering well, I hadn’t worked. I intended to go back to the job I love but September showed me I shouldn’t. I need to put all my energy into my family here, my ‘role’ as mum and wife and to for the first time, look after Carol Ann. So no more counselling I am afraid and have to accept this.Another big change. I haven’t however, stopped working all together as I intend to concentrate on my writing. 2 books in the making and an update of my children’s books.I also have animals to be be more active in the care of and enjoy. 

One of the big events in life and something that changes us all, is the loss of those we love. These past years have seen many losses , my brother who I loved so much, my ‘Mum and Dad’, many ponies and my little Ellie Mae. Each loss brought about fundamental changes for me. Sometimes positive, sometimes for a while, negative. But changes. Losing Tony was like losing an arm or a leg. I didn’t at first know ‘how to be’, how to behave. Until I accepted his death, I was lost. When Ellie Mae died, I was bereft, unable to imagine her not being around but once acceptance had been allowed to happen, I grieved for both and began to heal. But I felt different, a change I never wanted but had to happen.

The world is continuously changing, it has to and we can do nothing about it. Heads of countries, politicians, may decide on changes that affect us, without our input. We ‘reap’ the rewards or suffer the consequences. Nature is continuously changing, Spring to Summer, Summer to Autumn and then to Winter, with no help or hindrance from us. Each season brings it’s own beauty and it’s own problems, but it continues to change. What we need to do, what I need to do is to concentrate on where we are in our lives. Who is in our lives.

For us, what lies ahead? A new home, a new way of life, more time for David and I to enjoy I hope. This will be a positive change. Although we have loved our life ‘here on the farm’, we have to accept the ‘ravages of time’, the changes that life throws at us and either moan about them or embrace them. I choose to embrace. 

So change can come as a shock, sometimes at the very time we don’t need it. It can come slowly, can be influenced by ourselves or others, or circumstances. Change can be seen, by ourselves, as not good, not wanted.But whatever we do, one thing is certain, change will come. In life we may meet certain people who can stop us in our tracks, behave in ways we don’t like, ways that are wrong and we hope they will change. My husband has always said, ‘people never fundamentally change’. In my professional life I have always believed that everyone can, the essence of CBT. Change. I now accept that sometimes people don’t, maybe they can’t, but accepting life as it is, people as they are, has helped me come to terms with how my family life is now. And that’s okay.

Prostate cancer changed us both, as individuals and as a couple. We had to learn a new way of being, if that’s not too profound, a new way of sharing a new way of loving. It tested us both to  our limits, sometimes I thought and felt I had reached mine and was not sure I would make it through. But I did. Different yes, changed yes but the one thing that didn’t falter, didn’t change, was our love. Well actually maybe it did. It made us stronger. Coming so close to losing my beloved husband, showed me how much he meant to me, how lucky I am to have him by my side. It made me grateful for every minute of every day with him. We were the lucky ones, PC was caught in time but we never lost sight of what might have been. How quickly life could have been snatched away and how our lives could change in a hugely negative way. At that point our love did change, I see that now. I gained a whole new respect for this man I married and he said he did for me. So sometimes, out of fear, worry and illness, change can bring about a huge difference in how we see and value life.  Change can be good, we know that only too well. 

So life isn’t how I thought it would be. My family is smaller that I envisaged but small is good. It’s not the quantity but the quality. The love we share is immense, what we have is wonderful and I will spend the rest of my life loving and caring for those around me and accepting any changes that come my way. So life, bring it on!

Thank you for reading x

This blog is my first for a few months. Because my presence on Social Media has been noticed and by some missed, which came as a great surprise to me, I feel the need to explain my absence.Of course I could just say nothing, or say I have been far too busy;that I have been away;that my Internet has been out of action but none of that would be true and honesty, as you know, is important to me. So do I say, I have been unwell and leave it at that? Give my illness a physical title, a name? Say I have had flu or something similar? No, I will say none of the above. I intend to tell it as it was, just as I promised a few years ago when I began blogging.

I want to start by thanking everyone who has commented on my page, messaged me or emailed me wondering if I was okay. I will try and get round to you all soon but for today, I will explain here, in my Sunday blog.

Yes I have been ill, very poorly. In this year of Mental Health Awareness with royalty, celebrities,sportsman etc. all disclosing how they have fought and in some cases  are still fighting, Anxiety, Depression and other emotional illnesses, little did I think, that as a Health professional for more than 22 years, I would be joining them. I should have seen it coming. Having bad dreams, when able to sleep. Reluctant to go out, loss of confidence and self belief. Feeling physically stressed all the time, hurting everywhere and the deep sadness I felt,some days was hard to handle. Family had noticed  a change in my behaviour but said nothing. I knew I was physically worn out, the bout of pneumonia in January showed that and my consultant asked if I had been under any prolonged stress.None of what I am writing is for sympathy, I don’t want that, I would like understanding and a commitment from readers that they always seek help and talk about how they feel.

We are all being encouraged to talk about our worries, our fears, our emotions, For goodness sake, that is part of my job, making others aware of the importance of doing this. But I didn’t. I played out my pain on here, received a lot of support for which I am so grateful but still became so unwell.So today, here I am talking about it, talking about the past few weeks/months, years that have rendered me dysfunctional. Talking about the importance of mental wellness, to prevent mental illness.

As some of you who have followed my blogs, you will know how difficult the past years have been. For those who have’t I will precis that awful time.At the end of 2012, after being entrenched in a horrid online hoax, I lost my best friend Mo. Cancer has taken so many of those I loved.Since 2013 I have been estranged from my eldest daughter and her family because of my need for honesty and integrity. This all got out of hand and some will have seen it play out on social media, something I regret so much. I have spent the following years trying to put things right, fighting to clear my name from the lies and stories told to anyone who wanted to listen, on SM and in person. I worried, fought, defended myself and struggled the whole time with emotions that were all out of control. I had to try, or rather, I felt I had to try and make people see the real me, not the one ‘family’ portrayed on here. Defend myself from the gossip and lies told that were, looking back, so stupid and nonsensical that no one who knew me, would have believed anyway. I now know that even it they did, I know the truth, my family know the truth so nothing else matters. Because of lies, my very successful autobiography was taken off the market, but this was a battle I eventually won and it is back where it belongs and still selling well.During this onslaught, I lost my eldest sister and my surrogate mum. I had a cancer scare and you all  know how that can affect you.At the very worst of this time, the worst of the onslaught by family, my darling husband was diagnosed with Prostate cancer and none of us knew how that would play out. Lots of worry, waiting and stress for us all. Still the nasties came, no respect for him, no thought for an of us.Anyone who has a loved one with PC will understand my blogs at that time.Since then I have lost my beloved brother, my surrogate ‘Dad’, 7 ponies and my little Ellie Mae my dog and a much loved cat. With each ‘event’ I thought I had coped with but I was wrong.

Every year, when Davids’ PSA test comes around, the anxiety levels reach a whole new peak. September would bring that again and I was dreading it.Thankfully, his test proved undetectable. Even without all the things that were happening in my family during our journey with this scary and unpredictable disease, the fear is real and if not talked about and acknowledged can cause you to become ill. Please talk about them,find someone who will understand, talk on here, anything but don’t keep your fears to yourself please.

As I was recovering, earlier in the year, from pneumonia I realised just how tired I was. As I became stronger, or thought I had, I began thinking back over all the losses. The futility of the nastiness within the family, I determined once again to try and put things right. I failed. Even at our lowest point as a family, David having cancer, the online stuff didn’t stop, so I tried to make it stop and try and rekindle my relationship with family. I have managed that but not with my daughter.We don’t only lose people to death, grieve their loss, sometimes grieving for someone who is still living is as hard, if not harder. The acceptance just doesn’t seem to happen.As September approached, always a hard month, my eldest daughter’s birthday and my first grandsons. This year was harder still as it was a year ago in September that my ‘Dad’ lost his fight and left us. As the days went on I felt more ill by the day, couldn’t actually identify how, but just ill and so very tired. I wasn’t functioning,couldn’t enjoy anything, wasn’t sleeping or eating properly and I collapsed with complete nervous exhaustion resulting in abject panic, fear and depression and unable to function. 

I should have seen it coming but I didn’t. I realise now that over the past years, being so hurt by everything, having so much loss, had been taking bits of me, slowly and rendering me a shadow of the woman I had been. My self confidence was rock bottom, my self love and self esteem even lower. My body had been under so much emotional and psychological stress that it had said, enough’s enough’ and almost stopped working. Scary, to say the least.I now understand what David had said all along. He would say, ‘ignore what they are saying, we all know the truth. Don’t engage with them, don’t play their games’ . But he also knew how much I love my daughter and grandsons and so understood why I was reacting the way I did. I also know that I should have responded and not reacted because being so hurt, the sadness came across as anger. ‘anger is sad’s bodyguard’. But my doing this set the scene for more nastiness and other people who didn’t even know me, becoming involved. It was out of control and I should have known better, should have closed it all down. But I didn’t. 

A Warning.

Stress kills. If it doesn’t kill you it can kill parts of you, rendering you helpless and hurting. Caring too much about what others think or say about you, can make you physically unwell and leave you emotionally empty, damaged. It reminds me of a blog I wrote about PC, asking wives and partners to make sure they look after themselves whilst caring for their partners. PC affects both of you, in different ways obviously but just as severely. Take care of you first to be able to care for him. In my work I often tell carers to make sure they have put their own oxygen mask on before trying to put one on the person  they are trying to care for.Sometimes we care too much. Forget that we are also human with all the vulnerability that brings. The past years , allowing people to get to me, struggling with worry, hurt, pain and loss has brought me to my knees.

Why did I ‘break’ when I did? Not sure but I had reached out once again to my daughter only to be rejected and I think that might have been the last straw.

For the past 22 years, I have worked helping people who were suffering from stress, anxiety, depression and other emotional psychological illnesses. I am good at what I do because I believe in it and love helping those who have lost their way or need support. It is something I am very proud to have been able to do. Every client who shared their stories, their pain, their fear, grief or loss, made me feel humbled and privileged. Although I often heard horrifying , sad heartbreaking stories of their true lives. I learned so much about myself. I wouldn’t have missed a minute. Now is the time to heal me.

Life is beginning to feel a little better today. I am back in touch with my eldest grandson and that feels so good.From earlier this week, I have begun teaching myself to change all my negative thoughts to positives, something that is life blood of my professional role. I taught others to do this over and over, I need to do it for me and it is is so hard. The thoughts just seem to come uninvited into my tired mind. But I will get there, I know I will. I need to learn that if I can’t change things, to accept them. When I miss someone, to remind myself of happy memories, good times and focus on them. To stop my when my body is tired and or my mind is telling me to. Sit and breath, enjoy this wonderful place we live in and let the future take care of itself. Love those around me who love me and don’t think about those who don’t. Hard yes by necessary. I need to  bring Carol Ann back and take care of her. 

So what I am saying  is, talk to people when you feel stressed. Respond rather than react to what others say. If you feel anxious, stressed or depressed, talk to someone about it. Find a trusted friend, a doctor, your practice nurse, someone who can help you identify your worries and help ease them. You know, if you push your body too hard, it might break. The same goes for your mind. And believe me, that is really scary.

This realisation of being mortal has made me make a decision to retire. I will miss my work but have not been able to do it since Christmas and feel it is time now to stop.So as I get stronger, I aim to enjoy life ‘here on the farm’ while we are still here and accept that life is now, not yesterday, not tomorrow, now. And now is actually okay.

Thank you for reading. x