Digging Holes In Space. - December 2001

Time marches slowly by and the tremors of depression have now become a full blown earthquake, size 8 on the Richter scale.

As I write this, at the end of December, 2001, I find myself sat alone in a flat in Leven, Scotland, alone, cold, unemployed and cynical - oh and did I mention depressed.

Time marches on and I have allowed myself to become the victim of circumstance.
My employers had decided that the dot com boom was not going to be as significant as was initially envisaged and, as a result, decided that the regional portals were overstaffed.
Redundancies followed and I accepted that my future with them was something I could live without, I had been off work due to my depression for almost a year anyway so I guess the situation just served to add a full stop to this particular period of my life.

As things were it was a minor event in a particularly troubled time anyway and the lifting of responsibility came as something of a relief.

Things inside my head had taken a turn for the worse!

Here I was in Leven with a head full of self pity and no real responsibilities.
Add a bit of booze and you have the recipe for self destruction.

24 hour self imposed solitary confinement - sorry I did go for a newspaper every day out of habit.
If I told you why a newspaper was so important to me you would smile, but I will simply say that the crossword is a good kick start for the brain in the morning.

I ramble, please forgive me!

At times of deep mental stress I can erupt in an outpouring of venom and self-loathing and on one of the evenings in Leven an occasion arose that had rather bizarre repercussions.
Read about it HERE!

I had also arranged a medical appointment for early December and drove back down to Huddersfield to fulfil my obligations.
My wife accompanied me to the doctors at my request as I wanted the medic to understand what a misery my life was, and for those around me, from a third-person point of view.

At the end of the consultation the doctor gave me three options and these were;

• Admit myself voluntarily to the local psychiatric hospital, or

• Be sectioned by the doctor under the Mental Health Act and be taken to the local hospital by the police, or

• Be taken to the hospital by the police and then get sectioned by the hospital.

Good choices huh? What would you have done? I chose the first option and found myself at the local psychiatric hospital.

Oh they tried their hardest to get me to stay as an in-patient! Tried and tried, chipping away at my resolve.
But the bottom line was that residency was not an option.
I mean, have you seen the type of manic psycho's that inhabit psychiatric hospitals?
Goodness me, even my depressive side would become depressed if I was ever to sat there!

Even as I waited for the duty shrink to appear two inmates decided to have a physical disagreement and the plain-clothed nurses trebled immediately.
This was not the place for a depressed person.

I was released and warned to stay with someone who was capable of monitoring my actions. An appointment was made for me to see my consultant the following week (yes, week).

I returned to Scotland and engrossed myself with my work.