I’m writing a post. Duh!

I haven’t posted much in either blog for a while- just the occasional outburst. However, my head has been FULL of ideas on what I want to say to the world. My drafts are also getting a bit overwhelming.

So- here I am. The first thing is about my disappearance from Facebook. I was quite happy on Facebook and made lots of online and real life friends there. It also allowed communication with various groups I belong to in photography, wine and dining. The problem happened over the last four weeks, with Facebook twice banning me from “Adding new friends” for 7 days. I hadn’t been aware of trying to friend anyone unusual or completely unknown to me and I hadn’t said anything offensive to anyone there. Maybe the new relatives I had been given the names of in New Zealand and Queensland complained about me, believing me to be a stranger, despite sharing my surname. Or, they suddenly got worked up about some feud my father is supposed to have had before I was born- who knows?

Most likely it was a series of totally false “complaints” by people connected with our mutual friend’s suicide last year as the first Facebook ban came around the anniversary of his death. If people want to blame me for a suicide, I don’t want to argue with them- but they needn’t interfere with my interactions with other people I know as friends. Further hints that these people might be behind the Facebook bans was at a dinner I attended, about which I previously blogged (above)- a woman came up to me and said something like “Oh you’re that Kay Walker from Facebook- humph!”. I didn’t know her, but vaguely recognised her face from some social events years ago. I guess she wasn’t pleased to find me at the dinner with a Facebook Group so made further complaints. It’s a mystery to me.

Maybe I am paranoid, but I’ve also discovered that some people on Twitter and Google Plus have recently banned me as well- or “blocked” etc. I have commented on one person’s blog a few times as I share similar experiences with depression and drugs with her, but the comments never appear. What have I done to her? Maybe I should learn to use more lists on Twitter so friends from one sphere don’t suffer the Tweets of my other spheres. Irrelevant Tweets don’t bother me- I know people lead multi-facted lives- but if they bother others, perhaps I could change my ways.

You see, the Internet is one of the few ways I get to interact with other people these days. I’ve been completely unemployed for 5 years now and was only employed sporadically for 7 years before that. I’ve been up and down with my depression [like the Assyrian Empire], but managed to maintain a small group of real life friends over all that time. The rest of my socialising has been via the Internet. With my exit from Facebook (I feel I have been hounded off there) and the way others are blocking or dropping me elsewhere, I’m starting to get a bit worried. I’ve made a few moves to join some other sites to make up for my losses, but they are not so much with people who could ever be friends IRL- eg. on Pinterest or Tumblr. They’re more to share interests.

Speaking of interests- Spotrick & I attended a pleasant (if freezing cold), sunset photography meetup yesterday at Gillman, near the industrial Port Adelaide, north of the City Centre. There we met some previous acquaintances and a bunch of new people who all seemed very pleasant. We also took a few good photos and shivered together!

Here are several pix from the trip.

Dour musings

It’s a happy time of the year, Christmas time and the Aussie summer holidays and I am pleased to be quite cheerful this year and not “pretending in the hope of becoming OK”. I’ve tested the practice of putting a smile on my face so that I can make some “happy chemicals” that cheer up my brain and it works (a little), but it’s no good long term. I either honestly feel pretty OK or I don’t.
While I would have called myself “chronically suicidal” over autumn, winter and most of spring during 2011, I was never in danger of jumping off the cliffs at Hallett Cove. However, one friend did succeed in killing himself in autumn and two other people I knew died in November. One suffered in isolation, consenting to one last-ditch dose of chemo for his bowel-liver cancer which he should have skipped and had a good trip to the Barrier Reef; the other was elderly and died peacefully in his sleep as everyone had wished he would.

The death of my friend from cancer, only in his early 50s, affected me quite deeply. It made me think of what it would be like when I know the lights are going out for the last time. With Richard, there was probably another century’s worth of things he could have done in his life, as he had multiple enthusiasms and stacks of friends to keep him company. Yet the curtain came down on him very early and it’s like he never physically existed. How did he feel? I can only imagine the swift fade of sensations and the rushing “water in the ears” sound of an anaesthetic taking effect, but then no waking up. How would that be different? I guess it wouldn’t be. It’s just hard to think of my own personality and “liveliness” not being in the world. But that’s what will happen.

This should spur me on to fit a lot more in my life before I go. I AM doing quite a bit compared to winter, so maybe I’m on the up.

What I wrote in Wendy’s blog

Dear Wendy, your neighbour with no interests is profoundly depressed- been there, done that. . She needs a good, undemanding and REAL friend who will keep pushing her to get the right care. It sounds as though she could afford a good psychiatrist who can do some cognitive-emotional work with her. I used to be an absolute livewire, constantly doing multiple things, springing up and down and annoying everyone in front of TV (while sewing, knitting, reading, cooking, studying, listening to extra music). However, after too many stresses made my depression emerge I gradually got to the state where I couldn’t even FORCE myself to do the things I used to love doing. I was determined to get fixed, but many years of failed medications and trying activities like aquarobics to cheer me up I eventually got to the stage of having 3 alternate plans to kill myself about this time last year [I'm trained in psychology and couldn't fix myself, that's for sure; and I was still very practically contemplating suicide]. Somehow I persuaded myself that I should get a new GP and demand I be given a proper mental health plan (which we’re entitled to under the government Medicare scheme in Aust.) She nearly detained me to the public psych hospital but I agreed to sign that I would not commit suicide while waiting to return to her in a week, plus going on some new medication in a decent dose. To cut 12 months story short, I was referred to a lovely woman psychiatrist (whom I had known vaguely in past work) who fixed me within 3 months/5 sessions plus FOUR TIMES the amount of medication I had been given by the GP. I am now finally back to my multifarious hobbies- knitting, sewing, felting, dyeing, reading etc and studying for my MPH better than ever. My only hiccup is that I have no job or income, so I can’t buy new materials for my crafts- but I’m NOT depressed about it! Seriously- you or someone else should take on the community responsibility of getting that woman back in the land of the living!!!