Immune System Status: Fail

I love it when my immune system goes on vacation at the same time as me. It adds that little something extra to the photos, y’know? Red nose, puffy eyes, sweaters in summer.

However, it usually gets back to work once I’m back home. Maybe the death of my cat kept it at bay, in sympathy to her. It probably thought I needed to be alone.

Which is how I’ve managed to remain slightly ill for two weeks straight. First there was a really nasty cold, probably caught off this one guy on the train who kept coughing and wouldn’t put his hand over his mouth (I’m pretty certain everyone in that carriage got sick afterwards). This turned into a dry cough, hesitated around my tonsils then decided to dive right down into my lungs and try brochitis for a bit, was chased out by my actually taking meds and eating properly, leaving the cough, which turned back into a really nasty cold exactly a week after the first one, just in time for me to learn about Kitteh having to be put down, so y’know, I’d need tissues even when I wasn’t crying; and now that seems to have been replaced by a vague but persistent dizziness that won’t go away.

This after three months of near-perfect health, which is quite a lot for me. Maybe my body has decided to have all its illnesses at once to then I’ll be done for the rest of the winter.

I wish.

Grief.

Kitteh died. Kidney failure. We had to euthanise her.

I think the saddest thing is that, in the end, she wanted to die and put up no fight at all. Or maybe it’s the way she cuddled us and purred until the sedative set in, like she wanted to comfort us.

I love her so, so much.

Love something

I was going to post something along the lines of how important family is when I got back, but something more important has happened.

My cat is sick. We went on a week’s vacation to see my parents, leaving a friend with the keys, and said friend messaged us two days before we got home saying she wasn’t eating. At first we thought it was normal – in as much as being so depressed that she’s refusing to eat could be normal. We knew that when we went away, she had a tendency to sleep a lot, lick herself a lot, and eat little. She was still drinking, though, so it couldn’t be that bad.

When we got home, she seemed to be sulking. Which would be normal, although usually when we’d get home she’d have a little crazy run-about and then stuff her face with food, only to vomit it up later. We were used to this, and had already begun dosing the food in her bowl… except that she didn’t eat it, and we found a nasty red vomit stain on the sheets. That night she threw up twice, yellow bile.

A little nervous, I took her to the vet the next day. It’s a good job he was ten minutes away on foot because I couldn’t find her catbox and had to put her in her harness – which she hates – and carry her there, ignoring the stares of people who didn’t know cats could meow so loudly and holding her tight in case she panicked (which she did every time a car went past).

The vet diagnosed a tummy bug (“everyone’s got them at the moment”), gave her two jabs and prescribed an anti-inflammatory sirup and pills to take every morning. He warned me, however, that if she hadn’t eaten by this morning (two days later), she’d need a blood test.

That night she stopped drinking. I took the seringe from the sirup and used it to feed her water. It contained 1ml at max.

The next day she looked a little better, and drank on her own – at first. But as the day wore on, despite the meds, she progressively stopped moving, crying plaintively at us when we was thirsty. We had to accompany her to the water bowl and encourage her. Sometimes she tried to lap a little, but most of the time she just crouched there getting her neck fur wet and occasionally looking back to see if we were still there.

I took her back today. Did you know that when you take blood from a cat, you take it from their neck? The veins aren’t big enough elsewhere. She got another jab, of antibiotics this time, but no more prescription meds. I have to take her to a radiologist in another town so he can do a scan of her kidneys, which are swollen, and depending on that and the blood test results, she’ll probably have to be hospitalised.

Either that, or she’s got AIDS and has no chance.

I’m exhausted and terrified for her. I’ve lived with three cats, but Kitteh is mine. I brought her up. She’s not my baby… but to her, I’m her mother. She depends on me, and although this is costing a bomb and will probably cost us even more to come, I’d give my own blood to save her, if I could.

Caring for another living being makes you more human. I think children should be brought up with animals to care for, because it teaches them responsibility, but also compassion. When something else’s survival depends on you, you learn to put that thing first. And I think that, while we all need to take care of ourselves once in a while, in order to evolve towards that need, you first have to learn to take care of each other.

On the other hand, this experience has given me an idea of what a taxing job being a carer is. I don’t think it’s a job you can do well without becoming emotionally involved in it, which makes it not only physically exhausting, but also emotionally exhausting. I’m giving her seringes of water every half hour, and every time she manages to drink by herself, it cheers me up for an hour or so. When she meows at me like she’s in pain, I feel like crying. It’ll be a relief if they hospitalise her, because at least then I’ll know she’s in good hands, despite the fact that she’ll be scared and miserable away from home.

So I’d like to tell everyone who reads this that carers, temporary or permanent, whether they’re paid for what they do or not, deserve your respect. And that includes you, carer. Respect yourself, take care of yourself, and realise your own worth, because the work you do requires incredible strength, and the fact that you do it is priceless.

I Need To Take Care Of Me Right Now.

…is one of the phrases I’d often heard said, usually in the context of a TV series making some self-help-addicted woman look really selfish, and which suddenly made perfect sense during my last shrink appointment.

I need to take care of me right now.

Because self-sacrifice is all fine and dandy until you’re on your deathbed, regretting all the wasted opportunities you gave up on for someone else. Who probably didn’t even ask you to.

Because resentment is good for absolutely nobody.

Because just reading job offers – “Assistant – Master’s degree and at least 2 yrs exp minimum – 3 month part time contract.” is enough to make me want to curl up in the corner and rock myself gently until the day is over and I can go to sleep and forget.

Because the smallest setback – spilt milk – can trigger tears these days, and I’m having trouble functioning.

Because I have no fucking choice.

Not that you’d notice. We had a hallowe’en party last night, and I bet absolutely none of the guests guessed (LOL) that I was depressed (TRIPLE RHYME COMBO YEAH!!!). That’s because I was on a Revelation High since the shrink appointment on Wednesday. I still am. Because I’m extremely lucky, in that my partner (despite being a phone monkey and wanting desperately to quit his job) has enough income for both of us, and after discussing it post-Revelation, has agreed to allow me a few months in which to concentrate entirely on all my creative activities. Starting with NaNoWriMo.

So yes, for about forty-eight hours I didn’t feel depressed AT ALL. I went to the station to get our also-depressed friend M, who was in a pretty normal state, and we nattered cheerfully about our experiences in depression and watched TV until Honey came home and made us cocktails. We spent the evening playing instruments. The next day we did pre-hallowe’en shopping, cleaned the flat, prepared food, moved tables, and then three of our friends turned up to help decorate. I carved my first pumpkin (we never did that when I was young) and then the sweets came out, and we put on the special hallowe’en playlist I’d made, and another guest turned up, and we started eating and drinking and the party got gently underway.

More guests arrived around eight-ish. It was a pretty calm party, in that there was little dancing and we could hear each other talk, but it was by far lively enough to be enjoyable. Not everyone knew each other, but they all got along fine.

As it got towards eleven, I got tired. Alcohol does that. My antidepressants are mild and herbal enough that there are no counter-indications against drinking, but maybe that contributed. I changed into my pjs and spent another half hour listening to the talk and occasionally nodding off. I was about to go when I noticed our friend outside the window with his head on his knees. So I went out to see how he was.

“You ok?”

“I’m fine.”

I knelt down and hugged him, and he started sobbing quietly, so I kept hugging him until he stopped. It took about fifteen minutes. My bare feet got really cold. I was shivering. I knew this, but alcohol thickens the wall between me and my senses, which was an advantage right then, so I just stayed there feeling stoical and stroking his head.

At some point Honey came out to ask if we needed anything, went back in and brought me socks, then left us to it. And M began to speak.

He really had just gone out to get a breath of fresh air, and hadn’t expected the tears. He’d been surprised and embarrassed when they started. He honestly was over his ex (who was in the living room) and hoped she didn’t feel like it was her fault he was in this state, because it wasn’t, it was his own, he was really sick of being unable to control his emotions and reactions and it was weird because he was, like, the opposite of a control freak, he hated being given control because he was terrified of making mistakes, he preferred to let others make his choices for him; but that was paradoxical because he also hated not knowing what was going to happen next, and he hates being paradoxical like that, he knows he’s a good person and really wishes he could stop judging himself and build up his self-esteem again because it’s detroying his life…

I nodded along with it, because although those weren’t my problems, I knew what he meant. I occasionally mentioned something my shrink or Honey or someone else had once told me, that I thought might make sense to him, if not now then later. I told him he had to accept the feelings in order to let them pass. I told him it would get better.

Some time later, when he’d wound himself down and was just melodramatically repeating what he’d said earlier, I recognised that he’d had his say and now it was the drink talking. Honey chose that moment to conveniently turn up and say someone was asking for me, and took M back inside. I said my goodnights and went to bed.

The next day, I felt odd about what had happened. M hugged me a few times in the morning, and said thank you several times, I said “any time”, because that’s the right thing to do.

The problem is that the right thing to do doesn’t really correspond to my “Taking Care Of Me Right Now” thing. And that’s a problem, because although I don’t feel like it all the time, I am depressed, and a depressed person is probably not the best confidant another depressed person could have. I’m pretty sure that if M decides to confide in me all the time, I’m going to have to say “stop” very soon, because although I love him very much, I can’t handle it right now. And he can’t handle me breaking down while he’s breaking down either.

I think this is what people mean when they say you need a “network” to help you through depression. Honey is part of both of our networks, but he lives with me, so M can’t count on him too much, or we’ll drag him down with us. M doesn’t live with anyone, and has trouble confiding in his parents. He doesn’t want to worry anyone, and lives 50 miles away from us anyway.

I thought about this for a while, and came to the conclusion that the best thing I could do given the circumstances was to encourage M to confide in other close friends. To build up his own network of people to prevent him falling down that black hole. I felt satisfied with this solution until I realised that I wasn’t doing that either. So far I’ve been depending solely on Honey. I have few friends here, and I don’t feel close enough to them yet to confide in them about this kind of thing.

It doesn’t matter. I speak to my mother over Skype almost daily. Honey’s mother knows I’m on medication and called the other day to ask how I was doing. One of my best friends told me off the other day for not telling her I wasn’t doing too well, and insisted I talk to her when I’m upset, even if she doesn’t understand. Technology means I can create my own network, and if I don’t want to drag Honey down with me, I have to. Taking Care Of Me Right Now is not a selfish sitcom cliché. It’s an obligation, and I have to find people to help me do it.