Howdy,
I got back from the gym like an hour and a half ago, i ended up doing LBT and body tone with 40 minutes on the treadmill in between. I dont know why we thought this would be a good idea. I'm going to be in so much pain tomorrow especially as im spending all day tomorrow in the office writing up my assessments etc. Gah! It was because today was a uni recall day so we all had this big lecture/guidance thing to help us with our placement work. It was boring as per and then we got careers advice from someone from the coucil which was totally pointless to me as at the end of it he was like " o and by the way these schemes only apply to people wanting a job in childrens services."
Useful!
But yeah my original point was i decided as i had the afternoon off i would do something productive and go to a class but then Hannah said why not both and i stupidly agreed. We did however on the treadmill decide that we're going to do the Race for Life again. I think its in June by which time i'll still be in Sheffield but will have finished uni so i have no excuse!
Its been kind of a draining week and its only Tuesday night! I was so completely drained yesterday. I had organised a day of being out and about seeing clients. The first lady i went to, Carole, i had seen on Friday for her initial assessment. It was for enablers so i would be doing things like taking her out and shopping with her (Age Concern Sheffield doesnt have enablers in place yet so i was acting as one until the scheme got up and running, i dont normally take people out into town....without being paid to do so anyway!)
But yeah when i saw her on Friday she was fine, she has a range of issues, Arthritis, OCD, high blood pressure and ME. Or thats all i thought anyway. INFACT...this whole thing just highlights to me how local authorities just love to pass the buck and push problem cases onto charities and agencies like Age Concern, as this woman was so much more complex than the referral said. How convenient that Sheff council didnt go into more detail!
But yeah got to the house on Monday morning ready to take her into town and i find her in her nightie in a right state. She obviously wasnt going to go out so we sat down and she explained that she had been sick with worry all weekend due to our arranged appointment. It turns out that she also has agoraphobia and severe depression all of which are antagonised by her OCD and ME. I told her it was fine and we would just sit and have a chat instead of going out.
The longest 2 and a half hours of my life. her mood was so drastically different, the world was a dark and lonely place, all good had disapeared and we were all going to die painfully when the apocolypse came (she is a jehovahs witness i should point out...). Nothing i could say made the slightest difference, and i didnt really expect it to in all honesty but i couldnt just sit there and not make the effort. Then she calmly told me that she wanted to kill herself, had saved up pills in the past but obviously hadnt done anything, and had studied the way in which Harold Shipman had killed his patients. As in her words, "Diamorphine sounds like a nice way to go, it only takes 10 minutes and you feel no pain. If i could find some i'd just inject it and id go peacefully."
The thing is though that she is actually a lovely lady and its so sad that shes fallen through the system like this. I'm obviously going to do what i can for her but due to her mental afflictions it makes everything so much harder. The saddest bit i think was at the end when she was saying goodbye, we had just decided to not arrange another visit, i'm going to leave her a message (she doesnt answer the phone much) and see how she is later in the week. She told me that the hardest part was that she was so lonely and wanted to meet people but lived in conflict because at the same time the idea of actually saying hello to someone terrified her.
I came home in such a state! I think I had started to chanel her emotions and actually thought the world was shit and what was the point of anything as Jehovah would smite me anyway for not believing in him when the end of the world came!
Its hard. The cases i see coming through are so varying. The coulple i saw yesterday afternoon were completely opposite, all they want is for me to speak to the council about getting them moved closer to their family. Nothing complex or life threatening!
Its probably because im so tired that i'm rambling on. I've got so much to do tomorrow with those 2 cases though, i spend half my time doing paperwork. Plus its Hannahs 21st in a week and i need to speak to her twin about ordering this crazy cheesecake for her and i need to order her present online. O and the usual uni work and NVQ! O well!
Right bed i think, as in sleep, i'm actually in bed now but i'll blatantly watch tv or something if i dont put the laptop away!
Later Beasts
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Gosh. I always feel bad for people with agoraphobia that bad. I guess I find it much easier to relate to than other mental issues cause I understand it. I dunno how you do your job. I'd probably have had a breakdown by now if I did it.
