HappyComeLucky

CW: Mental health, suicidal ideation, PTSD

Covid nearly killed me and I am still not confident that I will recover.

Except, that I have been very lucky and I haven’t contracted the covid virus so far. But covid is the reason that I came really close to dying recently and the reason why I am still not confident that I will survive.

We are pretty much all aware that covid and all of the impacts of it on our lives has been harmful to mental health. It is a rare person who can truthfully say that they have not had a negative change in their mental health during this year.

As a part of my job, I have had a lot of involvement with mental health initiatives during this year and opportunities to learn and understand the impact and responses that the current situation has had on people. I’m one of the people who are helping others with their own needs and helping them get the support that they need.

I believed that my knowledge and the fact that I use a lot of cognitive behavioural therapy strategies to keep my mental health stable put me in a good position to make it through all of this. I knew that my personal situation would make me need contact with partners and lovers but as a pragmatist, I thought I would be OK.

I’m not OK.

I wasn’t OK at all very recently. This lockdown and the roll out of the vaccine has reached a catastrophic tipping point for me. In the most fucking upsetting turn of fate, the roll out of the vaccine has precipitated the return of my PTSD which I worked so hard to conquer years ago. I was just holding it together up until then.

It’s taken a while, but I now understand why the vaccine roll out has triggered my PTSD. It is a combination of all of the emotions that I am currently experiencing. The anxiety and fear that has now been at a high level for a whole year and has led to increased hypervigilance and the fact that I can feel the adrenalin constantly pumping through my system. The lack of being able to do things that will keep me safe. The being scared but having to continue with going places anyway. Being one of the people who are forced by their job to be in situations that go against the safety advice. All of those things have put incredible pressure on my mental health.

The vaccine should be a light at the end of the tunnel but the fact that there is safety that I currently cannot get to, has taken me straight back to the scared abused child who knew that people could keep me safe but I couldn’t get to the circumstances where they would. It feels like being drowned whilst someone deliberately holds the means for my salvation just out of reach whilst laughing that I’m not worth saving.

I said at the beginning that I nearly died. Its true. A short while ago, I woke totally disassociated from myself with my only conscious thought being that I needed to die. I can’t go into the full details but the compulsion to cease being alive was overwhelming and the disassociation prevented me from being able to be rational.

I am really lucky that I managed to get myself out of the house and get to the woods. After a few hours of walking and crying amongst the trees, I broke through the disassociation and was able to start existing again. I feel sure that if I had not been able to get out that day, I would not be here to write this post. It was as if I was watching myself from outside with disinterest. I don’t know if I would have succeeded at dying but I know how much the PTSD was in control on that day and that I would have tried.

Since then, I am having to be very careful at looking after myself. I’ve mainly absented myself from twitter because it’s currently harmful to me to be there managing my fear whilst others are in their safe places – that doesn’t make me sound a nice person as it makes me sound bitter that others are safe.

Covid nearly caused my death and although I am currently safe, if I do not get the vaccine soon, I may not survive another attack. I’m exhausted and in the darkest times, I don’t want to keep fighting to stay alive.