I do not know what is wrong with me.
The psychiatrists do not know what is wrong with me.
The neurologists do not know what is wrong with me.
Now they tell me that I may or may not be suffering from 'non-specific psychosis'. Last year they told me that I may or may not be suffering from depression. I think that they are just guessing.
I am eighteen, and for as long as I can remember I have always felt a sort of 'nervous excitement'. It's the same as the feeling you get on Christmas Eve when you're seven years old, only much more intense. There is always a knot in my stomach. I always think that I am going to explode. Sometimes it gets so bad that I have to run as fast as I can, scream as loud as I can. I move constantly to try and dissipate the tension - I always have done. My family call me 'cricket' because I rub my hands together all the time. At school my friends used to call me 'the walking generator' - they said that I could supply half of Europe with electricity. I twitch, jiggle my legs, clap my hands. People laugh at me and say that I'm a 'speed freak'. They think that I take drugs to make me this way.
Two years ago I decided to run away from home. I wanted to go on an adventure. I packed my bags and left in the middle of the night. It felt like a dream, as though I was watching someone else do it, watching through their eyes. I half believed it was a dream, and in a dream you can do anything, be anyone. I walked and walked and walked...
I woke up on a bench in a bus station. Why was I here? I rang my parents. I was confused, sick with panic.
I was sent to a psychiatrist. I told him what he wanted to hear - I was scared of failing my school exams (this was a blatant lie, I was virtually guaranteed all A grades). I just wanted to be told that I wasn't crazy. I was diagnosed with depression. I didn't mind that - people with depression aren't 'mad'.
Six months later, my world fell down - no reason. I couldn't stand to be in the same room as any of my family. Suddenly they were the most irritating people on earth, and I was sure that my father was evil. The sound of their voices made me feel ill. My exam results were due in a month and I knew I'd done well, but I didn't care. I unscrewed the blade from a pencil sharpener and slit my wrists. It was too blunt. The next night I swallowed seventy terfenadine tablets (anti-histamine tablets that can cause cardiac arrest). Two hours later I awoke - dizzy, double vision - and saw the empty bottles. I was in a state of disbelief. I started screaming at my parents to call an ambulance. I didn't know how I could ever want to die.
I spent three days on a general hospital ward in a dazed state of mind. I was still under the impression that I was dreaming. The doctors found scars old on my arms (I used to cut myself to release the excitement). I was sent to see a psychiatrist again. It took him six months to give a diagnosis - non-specific psychosis. I was prescribed olanzapine. I took it for one week - one week of emotionless, zombie-like weariness, like thinking through treacle, coupled with unbearable depression. I have not taken it since.
I see the psychiatrist twice a year. He won't change my medication. He only talks to me for ten minutes, and even then he does most of the talking. I am not a high priority case. I do not know what the British National Health Service classes as high priority. Maybe you have to be an axe-murderer before you are taken seriously.
Nothing has changed. I am still always painfully excited. Even when it seems like the world is about to end, when every one is watching me - trying to get inside my thoughts - I still feel like I am a little kid waiting for Santa Claus.
Please, if there is anyone else who feels the same way as me, send me an email.
I need to be told that I am not just imagining it.
I need to know that I am not the only one.
ceriheather@yahoo.com