Anyways, to give a little context, my brother finally moved out a couple of weeks ago, and I was relieved. His autism is...very trying. He has very basic communication skills - mostly he talks in fragmented sentences lifted from various media that he likes...I am sick of a lot of Disney films because of this, let me tell you - and as he's gotten older he's gotten a lot more violent and dangerous. He's never been a threat to me, although he does hit our parents, and it's very deliberate. The dynamic in the house changes completely with him around, and I spend more time stressing about lack of sleep (he never wants to go to bed, and I have a fixed sleep schedule; I can't just catch up on lost sleep...and I have to be up at 5:30am for work), increased noise levels, and basically being confined to my bedroom because there is nowhere else in the house where I can go (I often sit in the dining room, but that's where he tends to go) and I suffer for it, a lot. There is no relaxing when he's around...that's just the way he is, though. I don't really blame him for anything...I blame our parents for not raising him differently, because if I can handle him with some basic techniques I don't see why they can't. I mean, for fuck's sake! I have told them, repeatedly, that if you want him to do something then you need to tell him AT LEAST three days in advance, repeat it to him several times, and emphasise that afterwards he can do whatever he wants to. Tell him, build up to it, then he'll do it. He might drag his feet, but he WILL do it. They try to do that with social stories, but honestly I think they overload him with an entire month's worth of information with these. One day at a time he can deal with. A week or more and he gets anxious, then he gets angry, then he gets violent. He's 6 years younger than me, and they haven't learned this by now? Quite often in the past I've been left to look after him, and I have never had the problems they have. But they let him get away with so much shit it's unbelievable, and they're scared of him, too. Sure, they say, it's alright for me because I won't get beaten black and blue if he loses his temper...so fucking what? If they didn't cave every time he started hitting them they he'd soon stop. If they stopped acting like doormats he'd stop treating them like doormats. They need to start acting like PARENTS for once in their goddamn fucking lives.
...and if that sounds vindictive, then good. I have no sympathy for my parents. I have a very vivid memory of being told by my mother "you were so horrible that we thought we'd try again" when I asked why they had my brother. I was about ten years old. My father used to terrorise me when I was a child. I'll confess to a certain level of satisfaction that their "second chance" at having the child they wanted turned out like this. Maybe that's unkind, and pathetic, but...well, I don't care. I've never made any pretense to be better than the people who made some effort to raise me before giving up except for when I did well at school, at which point I was something to boast about to colleagues. They fuck you up, your mum and dad. Or at least, mine did. I'm done making excuses for them.
My mother has been stressing - which of course means I've been stressing too, because I may as well have a target painted on my back when she's stressed; I might not be HIS punching bag, but I might as well be her fucking dartboard - about finding him accomodation since he finished College this year in July, and we were all relieved when it was all sorted...or so we thought. On Monday he had to come home, because he assaulted two members of staff. Apparently unprovoked, but I don't believe that for a minute: he has triggers, and they must have set him off, because I have NEVER known him to be violent for no reason at all. There was nothing about this behaviour on his paperwork (despite reports and notes being made - this is the College's fault, and frankly I think we should sue them for negligence) and after a meeting yesterday it was decided that he can't go back there because he's a health risk. They're still willing to work with him, but it'll be AT LEAST until the end of the year before there is another supported living place available for him. Probably longer, because they need to take the time to get to know him, what triggers him, and so on. So he has to live at home. So all the stress surrounding that comes back, only magnified, because none of us know how long this is going to last this time. We could be in this same spot this time next year.
...and my life has not be great this year outside of this. In February I found out that the company I work for was being taken over by another, and the transition period has been HELL. We don't know what we're supposed to be doing, we got access to the new system in JULY - and we were cut off from the old one in APRIL - and by the time we taught ourselves to use the new system on the most basic of levels, we had a backlog of work dating back months. My colleague took a week off a couple of weeks ago, leaving me to deal with a backlog by myself. She's talking about quitting, and there are only three of us in the finance team...one is me, and the other works ten hours, which is less than me, and she doesn't deal with the corporate side of things. How fucked am I going to be if she goes. That was the week a heatwave hit too, and I was in every single day of the week, which is something I've not done since 2013. It was only 4 hours a day, but my health is not the best, and with my parents and brother at home, I got literally no rest that week.
But you know, I'm more resilient than I give myself credit for. I have a dark, fatalistic sense of humour that helps me through the worst of it...and isolates me from everyone else because I'm too much of an emotional drain for them to put up with, but I'd rather be alone and coping than surrounded by people and falling apart, I guess. I have been pushing myself through the last six months by reminding myself that eventually, things would get better. I'd get a holiday in August - which I am currently on - and my brother would have moved out, so life would start to be a little more manageable. The transition phase in my job will be over come September and I'll be going into a permanent contract, so I won't have to worry about being ill and not being paid...which has happened this year more than once. My room would be getting redecorated and I would finally get some new furniture...and a new TV. I am long overdue these things. Especially the TV. And I love the end of the year anyway - games are being released, the weather is turning cooler, and things just seem better with my birthday and Christmas around the corner. I wasn't even all that worried about turning 30 this year when I thought about it like that.
You know what? From last week up to yesterday, I was actually happy. Things were going pretty well for me. I was home alone for a week because my parents were on holiday, and we were FINALLY on top of things at work, so it wasn't so bad. I'm getting a pay increase because of where I work, which is great. I love visiting my grandparents too, even if their internet connection is...sporadic. Next week I have to work the last two days, but my brother wasn't going to be home, we were going to redecorate, and...well, there was a lot to look forward to. As I said earlier, the last four months of the year are my favourite time of the year. I'd finally started to RELAX, for the first time in a long time.
...and now all of that is gone. All of it. I have absolutely nothing to sustain me through...life, I guess. Sure, I have small things to look forward to, but that doesn't change the fact that my day-to-day life is going to utterly miserable. I will get no peace - I have to look after my brother Wednesday mornings because nobody else can and I'll be off work, and even though I'll be getting paid for doing it that is small comfort really - and all of those worries and anxieties are just going to persist...only worse, because I have no idea when they'll end. Or even IF they'll end.
I have lost a lot of weight recently because of all the pressure I've been under, and I can't see myself putting it back on now...which is a rising worry I don't think I can deal with on top of everything else. I am still a LONG way from being referred back to secondary care - and whilst I probably shouldn't say it, I really would kill myself before I got to that point, because I don't think I could take what I went through from 2014-16 again; I fought damn hard to get where I am and I can't lose what little freedom I have, people act like there isn't but let me tell you from personal experience there are MANY things in life that make life no longer worth living. For me having my freedom stripped from me AGAIN in the name of "helping" me - when in reality these people make me worse; make me feel like a failure because I can't do what they want me to do - definitely qualify. I haven't thought about that in over a year, and now it seems like I can't think of anything else at times.
I have a doctor's appointment on the 2nd of September (which is thankfully a day before my monthly checkup, so I don't have to worry about a gap between the two) which will hopefully put that to rest, though. My doctor is absolutely fantastic and talking things out with him should help. I just need the reassurance that it won't happen and I'll be able to stop thinking about it. I also have therapy on the 30th which will probably turn back to therapy after this. We'd moved on to more of a life-coaching sort of thing as I was reaching some kind of stability, but now I'm an absolute mess again.
This is really affecting me, both physically and mentally. I was extremely ill after I got off the phone yesterday with my mother about this, and I haven't felt right since. I can't just push through it; I'm a shaking wreck. I get a lot of migraines and yesterday I was almost in tears from one. This morning I was utterly empty after my stomach rebelled on me, and I felt awful. This will keep happening to me - no matter what I think or do, my body seems to react to stress all of its own accord, and I can't do anything about it. I'm sure there is medication I could take for anxiety and stress - and probably depression - but I'm already dependant on medication to keep my weight from dropping to life-threatening levels, I can't swallow pills, the side effects of these things can be worse than what they're trying to fix, and...fucking hell, I'm fed up with being dependant on things. I don't WANT more fucking medication to try and pretend like nothing bad is happening. If I wanted to suppress things I'd take up drinking, or recreational drugs. I've seen what anti-depressants have done to my father and I don't want to go through a miserable trial-and-error process to try and find one that MIGHT work for me for a while.
I can't afford to move out on my current salary even with the pay increase, and I can't work longer hours because of my health. I'm trapped. This could be much worse - I contribute towards the bills etc. and my mother has no issue with the amount I pay...we've had the argument, and I won it and she seemed to accept that my points were valid ones - but it doesn't change that I literally CAN'T get out of this. There is no government support for someone in my position - when I was too ill to work, there were benefits (which were taken from me earlier this year because my health has improved...and I couldn't face the reassessment process because I knew exactly how that would play out, and I felt even worse waiting for replies from the DWP about my application...they sent me a text without warning about going to an assessment center the following week whilst I was at work and I literally broke down in tears) - but now I'm in that simply wonderful position of being well enough to work but not well enough to work enough...which of course mean it's my fault and I should just be better.
...and you know, I DO feel that everything that has ever gone wrong in life is my fault; even where things are out of my control, I feel that I should be able to cope with them better. I shouldn't get like this. When my mother takes her frustration out on me, I know I deserve it - I'm twenty-nine years old. I'll be thirty in November. I work 16 hours a week because that's all I can manage. I live at home because I can't afford to move out. I have no friends because I'm a worthless, miserable piece of trash that nobody would want in their lives; everyone who gets to know me hates me, this is a huge part of the reason why I am such a private person. No wonder my mother is upset, though: she has two failed children. One can't help it, and that one is not me. I have no excuse for being a worthless piece of trash.
So I guess that's my life now. The stress of having my brother at home, and the uncertainty of the future, is going to infect the entire house for the whole year. I suppose I'll deal with it, but the longer I go on dealing with things, the more I wonder why I'm bothering with anything.
