Part 23 - The Final Push

"Dressed To Kill" - New Found Glory

About three years ago, a young lady was transferred into our department. I had met her briefly before, but didn’t really know her well. However, she was a very friendly and bubbly person. Really easy to get along with. Her name is Lauryn*. Over the course of a few months whilst getting to know her, she revealed that’d she’d had a life-long struggle with depression. I didn’t really pry too much at first, but we just shared some similar experiences.

Months later, she began to open up (although she’s a very open and to the point girl), and let spill that the major course of her difficulties with depression had been due to extensive abuse (physical, mental, and sexual) at the hands of the man that she had called Dad. He wasn’t her real Dad but had acted as though he was since her early years. Her Mother had split from him, and Lauryn resided with her for many years, but at the age of twelve she returned to live with him. Between that age, and when she was sixteen years old, he frequently (almost daily) abused her in the form of beatings and bullying, followed by sexual abuse.

Had Lauryn not disclosed this information to me, I would never have know. She projected such a level of confidence and brightness, without any fear or bitterness, that I couldn’t comprehend the strength that this young woman had. She had formed a relationship with a gentleman, (all be it, a relationship where she was very slightly dominated), and even gone on to have a child. She’s an amazing Mother, and she has every right to be seriously proud of her daughter, who is now six years old. Looking back now, I can see some of the cracks that were there, but she recently underwent further counselling, and then later hypnotherapy. She is a true inspiration to me, constantly fighting to be the wonderful person, that she doesn’t even realise that she already is.

After a couple of years knowing Lauryn, I had confided in her about my own traumas. Particularly the rape. She was very supportive and comforting, and was one of the only people in my life, that truly understood all the mixed up feelings that I had in regards to this incident. And she surprised me, by saying, that (like I had with her), she would never have known that this had happened to me, had I not confided in her. As a rape victim, you often feel like everyone around you can see the flaws in your sytsem, and that you are wearing your status for the world to see. To me, it all seems so obvious; my behaviour patterns can often link directly back to my rape. I began to realise that I hadn’t fully achieved any sort of closure on this incident. Keeping it quite for so long, I had then continued once people knew with the belief that now people knew, it could be thrown away into the deep dark recesses of my conscious mind, and that it would never hurt me if I just ignored it.

I knew, through, many impromptu counselling sessions during cigarette breaks at work, that I had to resolve this issue in my own mind, and that I would only be able to do that through returning to counselling. So off I went to my GP, who kept trying to put me back onto medication, whilst I insisted that counselling would be all the action that was necessary. The wait for counselling was excruciating, so I did end up falling back onto anti-depressants (in amitriptiline form), and ever increasing my dose. I’ve got to admit, I’m still taking them now, but hell, I sleep so well. Finally my counselling began, and they had all my notes from my previous adolescent counselling. I didn’t even need to tell them what had happened. Which was lucky, because I couldn’t. I couldn’t bring myself to say the word. I think this was for three main reasons. Number 1: I knew that in re-attending counselling, I would have to endure an emotional breakdown. One that I was worried, I wouldn’t be able to control, and would therefore drive me back to my old ways. Number 2: Once you tell someone, it becomes real. I’d spent the majority of ten years running from this, and now I was going to have to face up to it. And Number 3: You can’t ever take it back once you’ve told someone, and with a lot of people, once you have, that’s all they will see. A rape victim.

My new counsellor (lovely lady) had complimented me many a time on my high-functioning abilities to cope with my disorder. She was pleasantly surprised that I had such a good relationship with my parents, and that I’d managed to hold down a relatively "normal" life for so long. But I knew I wasn’t normal, and part of the new counselling process was about me learning to accept that, and to be able to control my illness in a healthy and productive way. But first I had to get over the big hump.

After picking up on the fact that I frequently used code words such as "what happened", she asked why I wouldn’t say the words. I told her about my fear of having an emotional lapse back to what I was, but she stressed that I would be able to bring myself back from the edge, as I had done so many times. Having found the trigger she required, she then proceeded to commence dropping the word "rape" into the conversation wherever possible, and after about twenty minutes, I broke. I roared my heart out that day, and all my emotions concerning what had happened poured forth from me. And it felt so cleansing. I was finally honest about everything, and I wasn’t scared. I was proud. Proud at what I had endured and come through, and I knew I could finally finish my journey.

The next step was to confront my family. We had all tip-toed around the subject for so long, and in order to move past it, I needed to hear certain things from them. Things like my Dad telling me that he didn’t blame me, or that my Mother wished I’d have told her when it happened. And they also needed to hear from me that I would no longer let "him" win. My life had been geared so much by the rape for ten years, that he’d become this huge figure in my life. I realised that, when it came down to it, he just wasn’t that important. I was me, because of me. My parents love me, because I’m me. My friends care for me, because I’m me. And being a rape survivor figures very little into that equation.

I am finally more secure and confident than I ever have been, and through this last push of counselling, which ended approximately one month after my discussion with my parents, I can finally accept my depression for what it is; only a small part of me, and although it will be there every day, it’s who I am that people are going to most notice. And I feel petty okay about what they’re going to find.

Part 14 - Off The Rails

"Prescription" - Mindless Self Indulgence

I had struggled with my insomnia since I was thirteen years old. It’s always the first thing that’s affected when I’m particularly down, or going through a rough patch, depression wise. The day I split up with my boyfriend, I knew there was zero chance of me getting to sleep that night. So when, as the evening wore on, Phillip was outside smoking a joint, I went out to smoke a cigarette (the house was a strictly no-smoking zone, unless we knew we could get away with it), and, I asked him to share. That’s how I came to smoke cannabis for the first time. I did sleep that night, thanks to a joint or two, and found myself wanting to do it every night thereafter. At first it had been a genuine need to sleep, something that I now know can be induced by legal prescription drugs, but I had stopped taking Prozac, and other forms of medication, a while before. But then, the drugs became a habit. It became more and more regular, and my parents did pick up on it.

I was still drinking heavily, and this, mixed with the drugs, made for a volatile mix. I was more popular round the house, but my cutting had continued and was increasing in severity. Many times, I would be coming home to my parents at the weekends with cuts all down my arms (and even some on my legs and stomach), with a bag of weed in tow. My parents pretty much decided that the easiest option was to turn a blind eye to all the negative behaviour, and just encourage the good.

I started sleeping about at this time as well, starting of course with Phillip. I never stuck to one guy for very long, but had started down the road of sexual experimentation. I’d been vaguely aware that I was bi-sexual since I was around fourteen, but there were other gay women living at the house, and it wasn’t too long before, in a drink and drug induced haze, I started playing the field with girls too. This, my parents were not to know!

My counsellor, decided that, as I was due to turn eighteen really soon, that I should go into adult (rather than adolescent) counselling, and due to my drug issues, referred me to a psychiatrist, to hopefully get me back on some form of medication. That was the point I left counselling. I just stopped going. The NHS had made a big mistake, without actually being aware of it. They’d referred me to a male psychiatrist. Big problem there. Guys in my circle of friends, or who I shared a house with, I could handle, but grown men terrified me. One of the huge side effects of the rape. The rape that was still largely unknown or talked about. So I decided that I could take of my illness all by myself.

The moods in the house could often be very unstable. That many mixed up kids, in a confined space! Louise was naïve to think we’d all just behave ourselves. There’s be shouting matches, fights, suicide attempts (not from me), thrown objects, and a hell of a lot of drama.

When I’d told my parents that I was smoking cannabis to help with my moods, they had laid out a grave warning: that soon it would progress; it always does with drugs. The drugs did accelerate. I was soon trying ecstasy, magic mushrooms, stronger strains of cannabis, and eventually, a little bit of cocaine, although I often couldn’t afford it too much. I tended to just dabble with the other drugs, as my drug of choice was always cannabis, due to the price, availability, and the effect. I didn’t want to dance till the sun came up, or get really mellow; I wanted to have the giggles, and find everything funny for a little while, which is mainly how cannabis affects me. Except of course, for giving me the major munchies.

I went through my eighteenth Birthday whilst all this was going on, and it was not the life milestone that people make it out to be. I was so stuck in this hellish rut, that although I did celebrate with my housemates and friends, and then later with my parents, it seemed to just pass me by. Nothing changed. It didn’t suddenly get better now that I was an adult. Everything still hurt as much as it had before, and I still felt like there was no way out. Except the obvious.

So, now that I was out of education, with no job, or any prospects, that’s how I spent my time. Drinking, getting high, fighting, arguing with my parents and Louise as they tried to keep me on track, sleeping about, and basically pissing off every one around me. I thought I was having the time of my life. I never took anything seriously, never thought about my future and how my current activities would affect it, and never really cared who I was hurting. I became an emotionally hard young lady at this time; probably as a result of some of the people I had to mix with (including hard-core drug dealers, and users) in my new exciting life.

But there was always one person that would know exactly how to hurt me. And that’s when I hit rock bottom.