The Crash

I had been enjoying success in my chosen career of retail management. I was one step away from board level in my capacity as Assistant to the Managing Director.

But in my efforts to succeed I did not know when to say STOP.

I was given tasks that I had not got the knowledge to carry out efficiently and I suddenly found myself in a downward-spiralling crash dive that I could not pull up out of.
Every day became a blur of activity that was based around coping with situations that I was not capable of handling. My brief included Grocery Buying, Personnel Management, Store Supervision, Export Management, Human Resource Management and Public Relations. The only training I had ever had relating to these tasks was a 5 day general buying course and a 3 day retail management course. Suddenly I was responsible for 8 supermarkets with a turnover of 10 million pounds a year and a staff of over 200 people!

Things were going badly wrong and I turned to a number of diversions to try to stop the constant mental pressures that I was undergoing. I started stopping off at a bar on the way home, having a few (lot) drinks and playing the gambling machines.

I sought love from sources outside my family. I had a loving wife and two beautiful children but they eventually seemed to become part of the problem - which was totally unfair. I guess I saw them as additional responsibilities that I couldn't cope with. Things went from bad to worse. I would just switch off when I was at home. Stare at the television and forget that there were other people there who needed my attention in my role as husband and father. I was waking in the middle of the night thinking about problems at work and how to solve them. I was bad tempered and susceptible to tantrums that made my family very scared of me.

Eventually I had a weeks leave owing so I went to visit a friend in Scotland. On the way there I was involved in a road traffic accident which came about because of my carelessness. No one was hurt and there was not too much damage to either car but this appeared to be the last straw!

After my visit to Scotland (passed in an alcoholic haze) I returned to Huddersfield and work on the following Monday morning. The previous day, relations between myself and my wife also came to a head and I came very close to causing her harm due do my depression and despair.

I went to work but everything was hazy, I was not functioning and had retreated into myself. I did have enough sense left to realise that I needed help badly so I phoned my doctor and got an immediate appointment. I asked my wife to come with me and so I attended at the appointed time but all I could do was break down.
That was to be the start of many tears.
I think the doctor panicked a little at this weeping patient sat in front of me so he immediately arranged for me to see a psychiatrist that afternoon and then ushered me out of the building via a side exit. My wife drove me home and I just sat and stared into space until the appointment time with the shrink came round.

This was to be a repeat performance of my visit to the doctors.
When asked questions I just mumbled and came up with some vague response. I was told afterwards that the psychiatrist wanted my wife to sign me into the local mental hospital but I left with the offer of a place there but the choice was mine.
I went back home and sat down but I was a total wreck. I couldn't settle so I went for a walk which must have been directed subconsciously as I walked for 4 miles and found myself close to the hospital. I didn't know what to do next so I phoned my sister. She came and picked me up in her car and persuaded me to go to the hospital. Once there I was immediately admitted to a secure ward and my wife was called for.