Men and mental illness

[ARGH!!! I'm not sure what I did, but I just deleted 15 minutes writing on this!]

I’m not implying, by my title, that I believe men are the root cause of mental illness (though they do play a part in mine), but if you choose to believe that…

Rather, the two major things playing on my mind (other than job and house issues, but another day for those) are men and my own mental health.

My mental health

Last Friday I went for an assessment to see if I was a suitable candidate for a new group CBT session there were setting up for people with depression. My initial referral suggested that I was; spending time with the therapist revealed that I am not. I am no longer showing signs of depression (hooray!), but am still showing signs of significant lack of self-esteem and need to know how to manage this so that I will not be reliant on the antidepressants for the rest of my life. I’m back on the waiting list for one-on-one CBT.

We did, however, discover 2 rather fundamental trains of thought that underly my low self-esteem:

• I do not believe I am particularly intelligent.
• I do not believe I am very feminine

However, I do know that these are negative thought patterns and in themselves are not true (though there are elements of truth in all of them), but I am unable to break out of them myself. And they are a fundamental part of my shyness around new people, and my struggle to relate well to men.

Intelligence

I was always the ‘clever one’, while my brother was the ‘arty one’. And then I went to Uni and realised some things are just beyond my comprehension. The guys at work can talk politics and sociology and other things I don’t understand: I feel thick, and considering most of them are younger than me, I feel stuck, forever to be tied to jobs that require no particular intelligence, and imagine myself at 75 still unable to live on my own, stuck in a house share with people I don’t particularly like, because I can’t get a well-paid enough job because I’m stupid.

And the only way I can see out of this is to move in with a man. But we’ll get to that in a bit.

I have a 2:1 degree in Microbiology from a very good London university – I am clearly not stupid.

I can do things with spreadsheets, Word and PowerPoint that make some of my colleagues weep with envy. I am clearly not unintelligent.

I am learning First Aid and have already put it into practice. I am clearly not a political geek. My intelligence is in a very different area to that of those I spend a lot of my time with, which makes me feel rather insecure. I’m surrounded by those that think deeply about things: politics, faith, life. I don’t think so deeply, so abstractly.

This does not make me unintelligent. Comparing myself with others is understandable, but detrimental. And when it’s a guy I have feelings for as well, I feel doubly inadequate, as not only can I not match his intelligence, but I’m not a ‘proper’ woman!

Femininity

I was a tomboy growing up. I didn’t like skirts or dresses – they made it difficult to climb trees. I was probably too competitive – being smaller and skinnier than the boys I could climb higher.

Boys didn’t like me. Depressed from an early age I was moody. I went to an all girls school; then co-ed at A-Level. I blossomed. Girls are bitchy. Boys liked me; boys are week; girls ’stole’ them from me through gossip and bitching. I became a pariah, a joke. Only the freaks and geeks went out with me.

And then they left me because I wouldn’t put out.

And all the while I don’t feel girlie enough. I look better with short hair. But I still don’t like how I look. I look like me Dad. I look at me and see man’s features. I have dark hair, particularly on my legs. I have man’s legs!

The self harm started as a result of getting rid of these man hairs. And punishing myself for having them. And the more I do it the less feminine I feel. And so I continue in the hamster wheel of self-harm.

And now it’s a habit. And I’m trying to stop.

I have not wanted to burn myself since before Christmas – that was the last time I did it.

I have stopped biting my nails. A friend bought me nail files and nail polish and I remembered how much fun nail polish is! I’m now a little obsessed, but I have nice nails now, and with moisturiser and discipline, I’m healing the skin around them that I used to pick.

I still pick my legs. But I’m working on a bargain with myself to stop this. I’m giving myself 2 reasons I am allowed to pick, and 2 only:

• If I cut myself shaving. Which is rare only because I epilate mostly. But sometimes it takes too long to do that, and when I shave I usually take a portion of the back of my knee off. Those I can pick. There’s something I rather like about picking scabs. I know it’s gross, but I have that kind of morbid fascination with that. And I also like scars. They tell a tale, a history.
• My feet. It’s summer. Summer shoes attack my feet. I can pick them because shoes hide them.

It’s a start. It’s like moving from 2 packs to 1 pack of fags a day. I can’t do it all at once. In fact, I’m struggling to limit myself to just that. But each day I pick (pun not intended there) myself up and try again.

Men… well, I’ve gone on a bit much in this post. Shall leave them to another.