by Tony Salter
'...'
'Yes, I'm sure it wasn't intentional. I don't know exactly what happened but of course she's grateful for everything you've done to help. We both are ...'
'...'
'Yes, I promise. I'll make sure she gets an appointment straight away. No, no. Sam's fine. Look, don't worry Mummy, I'm dealing with it.'
'So, everything sorted then?' I said, after long, silent seconds had stretched into minutes. 'Are you going to tell me what I'm supposed to do next? Or maybe you'll send me an email?'
'There's no need to be so bloody sarky, Fabiola.' I'd never seen Rupert stay angry for so long. 'I'm trying to sort your mess out – again – and I'm getting pretty fed up with it.'
'Well, how do you expect me to feel? I'm sitting here listening to you and bloody Mummy decide everything between you. It's my fucking life you're discussing and it's like I'm not even here.'
'That's absolute bollocks and you know it. I'm doing the best I can and you're not the only person involved in this mess, you know?'
'So you didn't just promise your mother I'd go back to the shrink then?'
'Well, yes I did.' At least Rupert looked slightly sheepish. 'But you're not going to disagree are you?'
'Probably not. I have to do something, but it's got fuck all to do with your mother what I do. It wouldn't surprise me if she's behind everything anyway.'
'Don't be ridiculous,' said Rupert.
'Is it so ridiculous? She always wanted to spend more time looking after Sam, and now she's got what she wanted. And she never liked me. Not from the start. I'm not good enough for her little Roopie.'
'Are you serious?' Rupert screeched. 'Are you saying my mother is some sort of witch who's making you do things you don't want to? Or maybe poisoning your tea to make you crazy?'
'I don't know,' I said, my voice now flat and emotionless. 'Are you going to deny she's getting what she wanted?'
'Of course I am. I hate this paranoia. It terrifies me. It makes me afraid you took too much of the wrong sort of wacky baccy or whatever when you were in London.'
'Wacky baccy?' I said with a sneer. 'You really are a straight-arsed plonker sometimes, aren't you?' I'd had enough of being pushed around. 'I mean, seriously, no-one's used the phrase wacky baccy since Bill Clinton didn't inhale in 1968.'
Rupert hated to be reminded of what a conventional, sheltered upbringing he'd had and, when we first started going out, he always used to rabbit on about how boring I must find him. Like most couples we knew each other's weaknesses well, and I was set on going for the jugular.
He was still struggling apoplectically to splutter out some sort of retort, so I ploughed on. 'Have you ever actually done anything, Roopie dear? Taken any sort of risk? Lived even a little bit?'
There was a long silence as we stared at each other, neither willing to break the gaze.
'Well, it seems I took a pretty big risk on you, doesn't it?' Rupert didn't sound angry any more and I knew he was close to tears. 'How would you say that's working out for me?'
And at that, he turned and walked out.
Mother-in-law's Tongue
Phone bugging software isn't always used by malicious hackers. The majority of purchases are legitimate and over 65% are made by concerned family members. Not only worried parents and suspicious spouses, but also the children of aged parents and dementia sufferers. Research indicates that 85% of subjects are unaware of the software's installation.
"How much is your Life Worth? Protecting your Identity in a Digital World". JJ Martin, Insight Business Press 2015
I wasn't childish and pig-headed enough to refuse to go to a counsellor simply because Virginia had insisted that I did, but it did cross my mind more than once. I was finding it more and more difficult to resist channeling my fear and frustration into anger; it felt better and Virginia was such a good target.
The reality was that I had no choice about going back to a counsellor. I'd known in my gut that the mess with the nursery shouldn't have been brushed under the carpet so easily. Mistakes and misunderstandings are one thing, but the situation had moved beyond that.
The cold and terrifying reality was that I was capable of doing or saying things without any awareness, or knowledge, of my actions. The fact that these random acts of semi-conscious, sleepwalking, zombie behaviour were, step-by-step, sabotaging everything which I loved or cared about made it doubly terrifying.
Rupert's dramatic storming out after our fight a few days earlier had been short-lived; he came back after five minutes but then didn't speak to me or attempt any kind of reconciliation. He just took a pillow and a duvet and settled onto the sofa for the night. It was only later that I figured out why.
In different circumstances, he probably would have gone out for a few drinks and crashed at a mate's house to make sure I fully understood how upset he was. The only reason why he had come back was because he didn't trust me to look after Sam.
Could I blame him? Did I still trust myself? The possibility that I might not was too awful to contemplate. Sam was my constant. He needed me without question, judgement or qualification, and that need was the anchor which was holding me in place while everything around me was being swept away. Having him gave me the strength to weather the storms which were threatening to rip me away into dark waters where wild eddies and tugging undertows were waiting. Without him, I would have nothing.
I called Deborah the morning after the Facebook fiasco and we talked for ten minutes on the phone. She was disappointed that my problems had recurred and told me she was surprised by what had happened. She also made it clear that she no longer believed she was the right person to help me; she would speak to a couple of friends and colleagues, but suspected I should probably be seeing a psychiatrist rather than a counsellor.
I was disappointed and the idea of starting from scratch again filled me with dread. On the other hand, she was giving me advice which went against her own financial interests so I had to assume she was being objective and professional.
And it appeared that I needed all of the help I could get.
'Good morning, Mrs Blackwell,' said Dr Mayhew. 'Please, take a seat.'
It had taken three days to get an appointment with my GP; meanwhile there had been no sign of the ice in Rupert's heart melting. I was lonely and desperate and struggling to contain the rage which boiled inside me from morning to night.
'Good morning, Dr Mayhew,' I said.
'I listened to your phone message,' she said. 'I understand there have been more problems since your panic attack at the nursery?'
'Yes. That's right. Much worse and it's now caused a huge divide in our family. Rupert is barely speaking to me and, as for my mother-in-law ...'
'That's such a shame. I was hoping it would be an isolated relapse.'
'No such luck. I actually lost Sam for a few minutes in Woodstock. I have no idea how it happened and I know I'm not a bad mother, but that's shaken me more than anything else.'
'Have you spoken to your counsellor?'
'I spoke to her a couple of days ago, but she said she couldn't help me and that I probably need to see a psychiatrist. I don't care what it is. I need some way of resolving this. I'm not sure how much longer I can cope.'
'Are you still at work?'
'No. I lasted three weeks – which was great – and then everything fell apart again. I've been on sick leave since Monday.'
'Well, for starters, I think you need to take some more time off. I'll write you a note. In retrospect, it seems likely that it was a mistake for you to go back to work. Trying to juggle too many balls at the same time inevitably creates additional stress.'
'But it didn't feel like a mistake and I felt less stressed at work rather than more. I'll be leaving them completely in the lurch. They'll have to fire me.'
'You mustn't worry about that,' she said. 'You need to focus on yourself for now. And, in any case, they can't fire you. It's illegal.'
'OK. I'll try, but it's easier said than done. Wha
t about me? What can I do to make this stop?'
'I agree with Deborah. There seem to be some serious underlying issues here which need to be addressed. I know a psychiatrist at the John Radcliffe who's very good. He's a bit stuffy, but he's worked wonders with a couple of my patients. I'll write you a referral.'
'Thank you. Do you have any idea how long it'll take to get an appointment.'
'I can't say until I've spoken to him, but I'll stress the fact that it's urgent, and you should hopefully get something in the next couple of weeks.'
'Two weeks! That's a long time. What am I going to do until then?'
'If we can get you in that quickly, it will be a great result. He's a busy man, I'm afraid. Like all of us these days.'
'Yes. I do understand. I'm sorry. I just need to do something to make this stop.'
'Of course you do. I'll do my best but, in the meantime, you should get as much rest as possible and try to avoid stress.'
Dr Alastair Pettigrew had an office at the John Radcliffe hospital and that set the scene for a sea change in the way I thought of my illness. No-one likes hospitals; there's something about the way they involve a handing over of control which triggers a deep fear in all of us. Walking down those antiseptic, blue corridors did nothing to put me at ease.
As small children, we are happy to be thrown high into the air, never questioning our simple faith in our parents. They will be there to catch us. That's how the world works.
As we grow and mature, we develop a more complex and nuanced understanding of the world around us and many of us become wary of simple faith and blind trust. Hospitals and churches both expect that faith and trust and I found it difficult to force my feet over the threshold of either.
Dr Pettigrew seemed to be a pleasant enough man, and reminded me of a slightly remote father figure from the 1950s. I could imagine him sitting in his armchair – reserved for Father of course – horn-rimmed glasses on the mahogany side table next to a pipe, or maybe a small cigar, a serious, self-satisfied smile playing at the corners of his lips as he listened to Radio 3 or the Goon Show.
His initial goal seemed to be to let me talk – without comment or guidance – and I was ready. Following my collapse at the nursery, my thoughts had been corkscrewing inwards in spirals of despair and my mind was brim full.
I would have found it easier if the normal me had been able to see some evidence of my crazy self, but I couldn't remember anything. Even some sort of trace memory would have helped. Glistening tracks of snail slime clinging to the cracks in my memories – clues to the paths of my secret activities.
But I had nothing. Plenty of hard, incontrovertible evidence of my sins, but I still wanted to shout out that it wasn't me, that I would have known. A big part of my conscious mind continued to believe there was nothing wrong with me. Now, that was crazy.
Psychiatrists probably have to work hard to get most patients to open up. Not me. I talked almost non-stop for two hours. I talked until my throat was sore. Repeating myself of course, but each repetition dug a little deeper and stretched my mind around the patterns and themes which had now become my life.
The first and strongest was, perhaps unsurprisingly, my growing sense of loneliness and isolation. One subject but so many different elements: I had no contact with my family, my parents were dead and my brothers and sister wouldn't return my mails; the limited family which I did have through Rupert had never liked me and certainly didn't now; all of my friends had slipped through my fingers like so many grains of sand; the one true friend who remained, Rupert, appeared to have given up on me and who could blame him?
The common thread was obvious. I had been responsible for the breakdown and destruction of each of these relationships, but I had no idea why. Since I was a child, I'd always been lucky, healthy and surrounded by wonderful, kind and warm people. As I talked and talked, cycling through the litany of my broken relationships, I couldn't see any logic, no reason why I should have consistently been compelled to undo everything which made my life good.
Each individual element could easily be rationalised and explained away, but when they were all brought together, they formed a coherent narrative which was difficult to ignore and even harder to explain.
Dr Pettigrew sat and listened, his sole contribution the occasional scratch of pencil on paper and the clearing of his throat every few minutes. I remember thinking that the scene was only missing the lonely shlick-shlock swinging of a pendulum clock ticking away time, second by second.
It was only a few baby steps from talking about my loneliness to launching into a rambling exposition about the steady erosion of my sense of identity and self worth. I didn't know who I was any more and I didn't trust this stranger in my skin.
This, of course, led to the biggest fears of all, which floated underneath everything like a hidden armada of paralysing jellyfish. If I was capable of doing things without control or awareness, how long would it be before something I did, or said, actually harmed Sam. Leaving aside the damage my condition was doing to my relationship with Rupert, was my son at risk?
I could sense a change in dynamic when I started trying to explain my feelings about Sam. Dr Pettigrew sat forward on his chair and the pencil stopped its scratching. Maybe he'd only been doodling before.
'What makes you feel you might be a bad mother?' he asked, breaking his silence for the first time in half an hour.
'I don't think I am,' I said. 'But I don't think any of these things are actually happening to me either. Whatever I think though, they are happening. When I lost him the other day, it was only for a few minutes, but I don't have any memory of how it happened. That's what I was trying to say before. If I don't have any control of my own actions, how can I be sure about anything?'
'Well, we have to work on the assumption that we'll find a way to give you back full control of your actions. That's what we're here for. The problem is that it may take some time, and I'm worried about the stress these concerns are creating. Is it possible for you to arrange your daily schedule so there is always someone else around when you're with Sam?'
'So you think I should be worried? You're saying you agree that I might be a risk to my own son?'
'No, Fabiola,' he said. 'That's not what I'm saying. If you're going to get better, it's important that we try to limit your stress, and this is clearly causing you a lot of anxiety. If you can take away that element, it should allow you to relax more and to focus on becoming well.'
'I suppose that makes sense,' I said. 'I can probably arrange something in the short term, but how long do you think it'll take me to get past this?'
'I'm afraid I can't possibly say at this stage,' he told me. 'We've only just started and, as you've rightly identified, the fact that you have no memories at all of these episodes does potentially make things more complicated. You need to take a long-term view and to recognise that there's a possibility there may not be a cure as such. Lots of people lead perfectly normal, happy lives despite experiencing regular lapses of this nature. It's not as difficult as you might think to build a coping structure into your daily routine and, as long as the episodes remain infrequent, they don't have to make such a difference to your regular life.'
'You mean I might always be like this? For ever?'
'I'm saying it's a possibility which we need to consider, but it's not the end result which we hope to achieve. For now, you need to be patient, I'm afraid. We'll know much more after a few more appointments.'
Fortunately, we were coming to the end of the session as I didn't feel up to talking more about this Domesday scenario. He'd glossed over the real conclusions but they were clear enough to me; it would be better if I wasn't alone with Sam, and there was a possibility I would never totally recover.
Rupert would remain a carer and, as Sam grew up, he would start to become one as well. What sort of life would that be? For any of us?
On my way home, I wondered why I hadn't shared my more morbid thoughts with the good doctor.
A long-term, active member of one of my self-help forums had recently committed suicide – the site was full of condolence messages – and I couldn't help wondering if Jude was in a better place now. A majority of the messages seemed tinged with envy and someone had started a specific thread on the subject.
... Anyone else jealous of Jude? It must be amazing to be free. She had the courage.
Yeah. Easy to talk about. Not easy to do.
If I ever get there, I pray I have her strength.
If you're gonna do it, you've got to do it properly. Have a look at this website to see why.
OMG. I never knew that. Terrifying.
Yeah. I don't think I'll ever have the guts, but if I do, I'm not going to do half a job. I know how I'll do it and I've got everything ready ...
I'd followed the link and quickly fallen into an amazing world of websites dedicated to people whose lives were in crisis.
Even though Rupert and Sam would probably have been better off without me, I wasn't seriously considering anything drastic. That didn't stop me spending hours trawling through the reams of content; the websites were detailed, diverse and strangely compelling. They ranged from esoteric Plath-analysing sanctuaries for teenage girls' angst to the unbelievably practical.
My initial reaction was that it should be illegal to discuss suicide in public like that. Surely offering advice on the various methods and selling kits online was wrong?
Most of the sites had links to support organisations, but not all of them, and the matter-of-fact way some websites acted as impartial DIY manuals for taking your own life shocked me deeply. Who wrote all of this stuff? Why?
There were even suicide websites devoted to Catholics. Of course suicide was a sin against God but apparently the official Church line was more nuanced:
Grave psychological disturbances, anguish or grave fear of hardship, suffering or torture can diminish the responsibility of the one committing suicide ... We should not despair of the eternal salvation of persons who have taken their own lives. By ways known to him alone, God can provide the opportunity for salutary repentance. The Church prays for persons who have taken their own lives.
