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Unofficially Official Geek:
Games, Tech, PC-Building, Computering,
BookBug, Reader Writer of Things,
Casual Writer & Blogger ~ Reader of Geeky FanFic ~ Kindle-Lover ~
~ Animal-Lover ~ 2 Loopy Wackadoole Doggies ~
~ [Former] Singer-Songwriter ~
~ [Former] IT Consult Data & Databases Analysis ~
~[Former] Researcher & Background Analyst ~
~ [Former] Musical Theatre Performer ~
Addicted to Mass Effect Games, Dragon Age Games, Skyrim, SIMS 4, Divinity Original Sin Games, my PC, my iPad, Starbucks, general coffee, having coffee made for me, Pasta, Pesto, FanFics & Online Shopping…
… Isn’t everyone?
I Used To Be Me…
Coffeeholic and Starbucks Obsessive, Chronic Bookworm (particularly crime novels), Gaming Aficionado & Tech Mega-Geek.
I Am [proudly] Autistic, Chronically Ill, Chronically Pained, C-PTSD & Anxiety-Filled Agoraphobic, Social-Phobic, People-Phobic, Wheelchair-Whizzing Spoonie, living with Fibromyalgia — mixed with Hemiplegic Migraine (yep, that’s literally what the Neurologist told me & as far as I know… It’s Unique…[!])…
I contracted Pneumonia in 2013, and it somehow turned into a Severe Version of Fibromyalgia… So severe, it affected my nervous system to the point I ended up virtually entirely Paralysed from the sternum (chest) down. It took about 4 years, slowly deteriorating, whilst literally the entire Medical Service of NHS North East London & NHS Wales (Betsi Cadwaledr) ignored my plight and just… Let Me Get Worse.
I was forced to return to North Wales to live with my parents in November 2015. I could no longer take care of of myself and Souly, and there was no help or treatment being offered to me in North East London [Foundation Trust — under Heavy, Severe Budget Issues AND JUST In Special Measures At the Time… For Good Reason…], anyway.
I had been Discharged from everything with the Classic “We Can’t Do Anything Else For You” line. Even The Rheumatologist [who Diagnosed the Fibromyalgia] stated it was the Worst Case Of Fibro he had seen and was sad I was “So Young“… I went to see him in a wheelchair, with my father, at the age of 32. I couldn’t walk properly by then, and when he so much as even tried to poke at me, I flinched and near-screamed outright from the PAIN.
And Yet. After All That… He. Did. Absolutely. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Dim Byd. NOTHING… He. Just. Simply. DISCHARGED. ME… And That Was That. There was No Choice in the matter. And My (wonderful, brilliant) GP back then was half-livid about it, bless him. But there was nothing else for it. I was on Pregabalin, and nothing else because the rest were SSRIs & Other Anti-Depressant Style Drugs (known a LONG time I Absolutely CAN’T Take Those!) and NSAIDs (which may or may not outright kill me because I had Von Willebrand’s Disease).
After Precisely Two Years Of All This… The Person I Was Living With for 10 years — never came home one day, after ignoring messages, and I had to Find Them to see what was Going On… At which point they told me they no longer wanted me there, couldn’t carry on living with me because of how ill this thing has made me, that they wanted to give up the apartment, and that I needed to get my Mam and/or Dad to come and get me and my stuff… And they would return to say goodbye [and make sure I left — unsaid but clear.].
The Intense Betrayal… Sickens Me To This Day… And it’s been… Years & Years & Years Later. THEY Made ALL MY Decisions FOR ME – and I never got ONE SAY In The Matter. In One Day — One Single Minute — They Stole My Future & Destroyed It.
My Heart Broke — my Everything was London — Belonged in London — and now what Independence I’d had left, was Snatched From Me. I was Gutted & Torn…
And I Ended Up In The Clutches Of A[nother] MAJOR Nervous Breakdown…
I was forced to live with the [aging] parents that had tormented me, hauted me & traumatised me as a child, and I was once again with them in a VERY Vulnerable State living under the same roof and having to be cared for like a child again. I had ALWAYS Declared I Would NEVER GO BACK HOME… But — Here I was, LITERALLY Living My Exact WORST NIGHTMARE.
The Sheer Traumatic Devastation of All This, The AGONISING PAIN & The Meds I Was On — alongside the Immense Nervous Breakdown I Experienced, left me with almost Complete Amnesia, Regressed Me to the State of a Three Year Old, and I literally couldn’t remember how to move or crawl, or speak properly — let alone walk.
For Years, I was in Immense Agony… with no real Pain Meds and Zero Medical Intervention to help. It was a Living Nightmare — unable to get any respite from the abject Screaming Agony whilst my body failed me more and more… Until I could not walk or stand or feel my legs anymore.
And Then… That’s Really When My life As I Knew It Was Over.
It took Contracting Lethal Blood Poisoning to actually get proper treatment for the Fibro — how dumb is that… ?? There was a UTI (Urinary Tract Infection), which became a Bowel Infection, which bacame… Staphylococcus AND Streptococcus Blood Poisoning… Sepsis…
You know, it actually took Six Weeks of constant IV Antibiotics to get rid of it, even included being in hospital for my birthday. I was rushed in barely conscious by my parents to A&E, and I woke up there without a clue as to what happened. I was supposed to actually be in an Accessible Room of a hotel because it was my baby niece’s christening the next day — so I was immensely confused to be looking at the familiar bright lights and ceiling of a hospital when I opened my eyes…
During my stay I was given Morphine (Oramorph form) and Tramadol, with IV Paracetamol. I don’t know what it did for the Occocuses, but it Really Helped me deal with the Fibro. A one-time-only talk with an on-call Rheumatologist (because they’re the ones who deal with Fibromyalgia) gave me permission to keep it all once I left hospital… and It’s the only time I’ve ever seen one, except for the day of my Diagnosis.
Zomorph has been added since, and the Fibro Agony is at least kinda-sorta under control now. And I have a Super-Awesome Chariot (Kushtie The Wheelchair).
Background
I previously worked as a Professional IT Geek, Specialising in Database Admin & Data Analysis, to pay for coffee and games (and the rent, I guess…?!). I worked around London as am IT Contractor, working for various Large Companies, and even the NHS — which I was very proud of. I lived in London from 2003 to 2015, having moved down from my birthplace of North Wales.
I originally went for Singing & Performing Arts, and I was extremely fortunate enough to be a part of the once-significant Musical Theatre Company Star EFX, who put on regular Sunday Night Live shows on in the West End. I am proud to say I appeared within the elite cast of 50 performers, in Five of their West End Shows — Twice at the London Palladium, then at The Palace Theatre (Shaftesbury Avenue), and Twice at Her Majesty’s Theatre (Haymarket).
I lived there with my best-friend and Staffie doggy, Soul. My friend saved him (June 2013) from outside a pub and we adopted him from the horrible man who tied him up outside in the cold, so tightly, he couldn’t even sit down.
We used to have a beautiful pussy-cat Spooky. Unfortunately, our lovely Spooky passed away in March 2012… We still miss him. He was a Failed Foster cat – we were supposed to foster him only until someone else adopted him, but we adopted him instead. We had him for four beautiful years, until one day when he seemed to quite suddenly become really ill and we rushed him to the emergency vet. After tests we were told he had a huge abscess in his belly… and it was too late for him. He was crying in pain when we left him, and even on painkillers he was still crying. In tears, we agreed to end his suffering, as there was nothing more that could be done to save him. He was only 6 years old. It was heartbreaking.
Spooky
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I have been a life-long sufferer of “Depression”. Until 2014…
Diagnosed aged 12, unfortunately no-one looked any further. I lived with it for over 20 years, without any idea what was really going on. I thought I knew – I was put through pure Hell for the better part of two decades, made me descend into a living nightmare of hysterical anxiety, eating-disorders, agoraphobia, painkillers addiction, self-harm, retrograde amnesia… and other things too.
Bad Things happened. No one bothered looking any further than that diagnosis, though. They never realised it was more complicated than that, but unfortunately fixating on that allowed them to miss other vital things that would have made my life easier if they had spotted it.
Twenty years later, I was finally diagnosed with what was really making my life miserable – I was Autistic (Asperger Syndrome). Unfortunately, because this was missed, the first 30 years of my life was excruciatingly difficult to cope with, particularly with all the Bad Stuff that happened.
The Bad Stuff and the Autism caused the severe depression. I’ve tried to come to terms with the horrible things that brought the depression on… I don’t really think about it that much anymore. I can feel Overwhelmed and hopeless sometimes, and it brings that yawning terrible black hole consuming me, taking me Down the Rabbit Hole and into Hell itself. But now… I know a lot more about being able to stop it consuming me too much, and how to climb back out if I do fall in…
It is actually how I ended up getting really into music, singing and performing – it was a virtually life-saving passion that gave me a great outlet for my feelings and enabled me to be strong enough to fight the demon that lived inside my mind, and ruled not only my thoughts but my life.
More Bad Stuff has happened, but the worst thing I generally feel is a bit of pathetic self-pity, and a LOT more frustration. But… There’s no real depression, now, not really. I can see the black hole looking at me, but now I realise what it is that causes me to fall in – so I now mostly turn my and walk away from the edge.
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Classically trained, and having studied Performing Arts & Musical Theatre, I have been singing, song-writing and performing since the age of 13, and performed several times on the West End stages of London. I have also been randomly writing little books since I can remember, but have only now decided to try and take it seriously and work at getting somewhere with it.
I am now hoping that any capability I have can be assisted by my experience writing music and songs, and the storytelling ability required to write songs can be transferred into book-writing. That, and a vat of coffee every hour whenI’m busy trying to coherently type – that’s always helpful too!
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What I put myself through – as well as a rather delicate physical disposition anyhow – I’ve ended up with a myriad of physical problems and chronic illnesses, which are admittedly difficult to live with.
Occasionally, something new gets added to them, as the consequences of my youth catch up with me and accumulate. Whatever was already there anyway has been made worse by the way I treated myself and ignored my heath altogether.
I’ve pretty much worn my body down to where illness and pain are constant daily companions for me, making most things difficult – from breathing and eating, to going out. I have not made life easy for myself, but these days, that is exactly what I try to do, so I at least don’t make things much worse. Sometimes I fail at this because I still push myself too hard and expect too much from myself.
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My solace from these things are in games, reading and writing, and indulging in my obsession with anything techy or gadgety. So, these days, I don’t suffer quite so much with depression at least… Although I do feel ‘blue‘ from time to time with pain. But instead of beating myself up about things in my head, I take it out on the bad guys in Skyrim (or SIMS, or Mass Effect, or Dragon Age… You get the idea…) and have a nice coffee. Or three. Or four…
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