I recently managed to start grief counselling but it has been a long time coming and a lot of the frustrations I feel about how I feel and dealing with my Dad's death is about how I have not been given help and the fight to get help.
When my Dad died I was 24 years old. An adult supposedly. How we were treated by the Police at times was disgusting and horrible. Were we offered support? No. I know through a previous experience when I was teaching that if I was under 18 there would have instantly been a team of support around me. Educational Psychologist recommending the best ways to support someone with teachers, counselling given on a short term basis to the child and all matter of other things. So at 24 years old getting no help I was just expected to cope.
Did I cope? No. Do I cope now? Just about sometimes.
I only had 3 months until I went travelling so I knew there was no point getting help to start with and being away at times was the best for me then. However coming back I knew that I needed to get support and help as those friends who had been there for me, still were but I knew I needed more professional help.
June 2012 despite trying to keep my head above water I just sunk into a black sea of depression and despair. I ended up going to see my GP which was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do. It takes so much energy just to compose yourself and talk about it that afterwards you feel drained and exhausted. She said to ring the service in Derbyshire called Rightsteps which you can self refer yourself for help. At this point I was unsure what I really needed as it was a mixture between help with the grief and the depressive feelings.
I called Rightsteps, a massive step as I hate using the phone, and I could not get a face to face appointment in the evening so instead settled for a telephone appointment. I knew this was not really right for me but I just put up with it and waited the 3 weeks until it was my time. When it came I spent at least an hour answering a lot of questions to in the end be given the choice of self help stuff or self refer myself to a charity for grief counselling as its not a service they provide. This was the end of June 2011.
I put off referring myself to the charities that help with grief counselling for 2 months and finally summoned the courage to email one of them in August. Did not hear anything back so just carried on coping until things came to head after splitting with a guy I was seeing and feeling like falling down the big black hole again. She was very empathetic and really wished she could do more on the NHS. She decided to write a letter to the same charity I had been trying to self refer to.
I got a phone call within a week of the letter being sent and an appointment to be assessed for a couple of weeks time. Unfortunately I was to ill to go to this due to getting pneumonia so I had to wait another 2 weeks to have this assessment. At this assessment my frustrations about lack of support were evident and the counsellor was really supportive in saying that now I was on their books I would not be forgotten about. I have managed to get a volunteer counsellor just after a month of that assessment. Finally some help February 2013.
I know others that have got help much quicker but they have been more severe having both self harm and suicidal thoughts neither of which I really have. But if I did not get help in some way I could see myself continuing down that path. Why not help me now when I am asking for help? If I had a physical illness would I have had to wait so long to get treatment? Would I have had to rely on a charity to give me that treatment? I do not know if my depression is based sorely on grief or if it depression. I have no idea and probably will never have that. The doctors at the minute are trying not to see it as depression as when I asked for more help they gave me sleeping tablets I asked for but were reluctant to give me anything else before this counselling started.
I know counselling is going to help with some of my feelings. Writing this blog has already helped because a lot of my feelings are around frustrations and anger I feel in particular in getting help. I know I am not the only one out there that feels like this. The NHS is there for all and I know it is stretched but at the same time is our mental health not as important as our physical health?
One thing I found on the Internet which helped me back in June and I still dip and out of is the mood gym programme. It has simple exercises similar to CBT looking at how you are feeling and why. It can be done at any speed and it saves the work as you go along. It is definitely worth a try looking as it is not trying to give you answers but help you find answers. It is easy to create an account and use and like I said you can do as much or as little as you want at any time. It has sections on feelings, thoughts, unwrapping, destressing and relationships. It has tests on anxiety and depressive feelings so for me it gave me validation that I was feeling highly anxious and depressive not just making them up.
Have you got help quickly or still waiting? Did you manage to get it through NHS or relying on charities to fill the gap?
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