Dancing Injuries

Last night was the last class of the term which has somewhat depressed me because it means six weeks of no classes aside the odd class over the summer holidays.

Last night was jazz which almost killed me though my flexibility seems to have improved somewhat but could always do with further improvement. After that class was ballet and that's when the problem began, again. During the barre work my knee cracked loudly and extremely painfully but I thought nothing of it and carried on as usual.

No pain, no gain and all.

Then we did pointe (toe) work which in my head was a good idea though my knee really hurt. Sure I managed it but by the end I was in agony. I very sorry fully limped home and crashed out.

Hours and hours on my knee is getting worse. I can't straighten it or completely bend it. It's nicely swollen and puffy looking too.

I'm annoyed at my body-not myself because I have an important dance audition at the end of August and I need to practice like mad for it.

Does my body not know these things?

Couldn't it have waited to break?

Right now I'm really worried I'll end up on crutches again because of it.

It's really not a good time to be injured!

Fallen-Angel

Better The Devil You Know

Say you won't leave me no more
I'll take you back again
No more excuses no, no
'Cos I've heard them all before
A hundred times or more

Unlike my usual self the lyrics of Better the devil you know are the best format of putting my thoughts into words. I'm not usually one for being short of words but for now they have somewhat avoided me. They are not my thoughts least I don't believe them to be, they are words of the darker voice that reins inside my head. Voices that I thought had vacated the empty space between my ears but have returned with a bigger force.

Something happened late last night, something that has changed me and that change is why I'm sitting her eating boiled vegetables in gravy, hungry. A thought came into my head, it spoke to me in a soft but serious voice. It told me that the fun and games are over and that its time to get serious. It went on about how I was alone (without this voice) for a longtime, how it was a test of my ability, test of my strength and willpower. This voice which I used to call Ana has over taken my rational voice of thinking replacing it with rituals and routines just like it did before.

I'm not fighting this persistent voice because I've always believed it to be right. I have however in the past tried to fight it and prove it wrong but I've never quite managed to, so for now I'll just follow it through and see what happens.

Nothing can go wrong, can it?

Fallen-Angel

When, Why and How?

When did everything become so complicated, when did it all get too much and when did life decide to kick me in the ass?

When was the point of no return?

Why me, why does this keep happening to me?

How is this possible and how can I change?

When did it all go wrong and why?

I have so many questions just like the ones about that float through my mind 24/7, I can't answer a single one of then but it doesn't stop them asking me.

We are told that smoking, taking drugs, drinking and this, that and the other will kill us or give us cancer but what won't kill us? I, for one will not live my life without the things I enjoy like smoking because when I do die I want to say, well I didn't live my life pure I did smoke, drink and starved myself. I did try to take my life, I did hurt myself and for the most part it didn't feel good but I still did it.

Why prolong the inevitable?

We are all going to die eventually.

Fall

And So It Goes On

I've been working at the cafe now for two weeks and I'm still enjoying it but the hours just aren't enough so I'm on the hunt for another part time job and I think I've found one. The job is a sleep in support worker two nights a week-Friday and Saturday 8pm-8am at £24 a night. The job involves answering emergency calls and nothing else. Sounds perfect and just what I need to top up my earnings.

I am also setting up my own little business for Ebay. I'm not going to divulge just yet my intentions business wise in case I jeopardise myself before I've even begun. All I'm prepared to say is that it has cost me twenty pounds to set up.

I've finished the book I was reading-The Invisible Girl by Peter Barham the daughter of the late Debora Ann Barham who at the age of 26 died of heart failure from Anorexia. The book is different from what I normally read though I'm not a conventional reader only having interest true stories of Anorexia. Debora Barham or Debs/D.A Barham was a highly intelligent sadistic comic writer. She wrote for every type of media from magazines and newspapers, to television and books, what ever the media she Concord it. What makes this book differ from others I've read is that the story is told by her father Peter Barham rather that the Anorexic themselves. It's more heart wrenching to read a father's story of how his beloved and successful daughter starved herself to just over four stone and died alone in her London flat.

A quote below is D.A Barham's version of the lords prayer via Tesco.

Our cashier
who art at Tesco
Sharon be thy name
Thy customers come
Thy tills be rung
On Sundays and in the week

Give us this day our daily bread
(only 35p for one large loaf down in price for all this month)
And forgive us our pushing past a pensioner to grab the last cream horn
As we forgive who leave a jar of fish paste on the cake shelf just to annoy us

Lead us not into temptation
(Although chocolate Hobnobs have 50% extra free and after all are too good to resist)
But deliver us the six-piece patio set we bought on impulse
within 28 days or our money back
For thine is an open shop, the deli and in-store bakery
For six hours each Sunday

Amen.

D.A Barham.

The book really touched me at how isolating being an anorexic is and that by wanting myself to be isolated is related and not me being retarded.

May she rest in peace at her burial in London.

Fallen-Angel x

Mansion Cafe

I started last Wednesday, technically should have been Tuesday but I didn't answer my phone or return the call to the agency.

I just didn't feel like talking that day.

The cafe is small with nine tables inside and four outside. The serving area is small but well organised just like the tiny kitchen of which I've seen bigger bathrooms! The walls are yellow and it has the distinct air of a fine eateries.

The food is organic, free range, fair trade and all home made on the premises which means none of this processed junk the type you take from a box and stick in the oven or deep fat fry like many eateries and many people do at home. We don't even have a deep fat fryer.

No chips for you!

The cook and boss is a lovely lady who looks after her staff and customers so well ensuring everyone is happy and pleased something you don't often come across. She prides herself on her work and it's well receive via all giving great positive feedback of her cooking and rightly so.

Other staff are really nice, friendly and helpful though there aren't many of them as the cafe only requires two front of house staff.

A typical day starts with me sorting out the display fridge and preparing the various salads after making myself a cup of tea. Most mornings are very quiet with only a handful of customers most only wanting coffee.

The coffee-well that's a whole new trick for me! There's regular filtered coffee, decaf, espresso, cappucchino, Americana, mocha, frapie-mocha-boca-thingy coffee and more! I'm still in a state of confusion about this coffee thing and how to make any of them! I think I've mastered espresso, cappucchino and obviously filter but the rest might as well be in Greek for all the sense it makes to me.

I'm learning, slowly but I'm getting there.

I serve the customers, take food orders and make some, take money, waitress though not much and help keep the place tidy.

Time flies between twelve thirty and two thirty when all of a sudden everyone comes in and orders meals.

I get quite a lot of perks working in the cafe; free drinks, any drinks, any meal I want for lunch, cigarette breaks when I want and I go half an hour early so I don't have to wait around forty minutes for my bus but I still get paid till the end of my shift.


The job is permanent if I want it which I think I do.

Fallen-Angel

On And On And On........

That's how it goes, right?

Nothings really changed-does it ever?

I still don't have a permanent job nor a place to live not that I could afford it right now.

I've been working for Wise Employment doing various jobs but the works dried up and I'm stuck at home day after day which doesn't help my mental state.

Mum and dad came back from their holiday about two weeks ago and things are back to normal or what can be called normal which is quite the opposite of the meaning of the word.
Dad continues to ignore me and mum just moans and groans about everything which I think makes her happy.

A lot of things have been plaguing my mind and on the top of the list is my eating followed closely by my relationship.

My eating is out of control, I'm terrified that I will eat all the weight I lost and be back to my fatter self, that self that made me attempt to take my own life on more than one occasion. After thinking deeply about this I came to the conclusion that it's living here that makes me want to eat because that's what I did before when I lived here. When I moved to Liverpool I lost loads of weight and the same happened when I lived in Kent. Living at my parents drags back all the memories that I'd tried so hard to forget when I moved away but here they are always around me dragging me down.

I keep making plans and writing out diets but it's hard here to stick to them especially when my own parents think I'm Bulimic-which I'm not. I also have to be very careful about planning diets because I don't want to arouse suspicion with what I'm eating.

I can't wait to move out and to be free of the rents.

Moving out means the world to me and I don't even care where I live. I want to have control over my life again, I want to do what I want when I want and eat whatever plan I create without people watching over my every move.

My relationship. I don't even know where to start with this subject as it's been going on for a longtime and I don't know if things will ever return to how they used to be or even if I want that.
We've been getting more and more distant over the months, less of the "I love you", less of the cuddles and romance, and none of anything else including the spark. I know I started this downwards spiral with my mental state being all over the place. I feel low and depressed and when I feel like that/this I don't want to be touched, kissed or cuddled and I push everyone away. Things are strained, she's moody and cold and I'm distant and non responsive.

I've been questioning weather or not I actually want to be in the relationship anymore, questioning my love for her and questioning if old flames buried deep still burn for another person.

I'm lost between how I feel and how I "should" feel.

I hope that once we move things will improve because if they don't then I don't know what I will do.

Maybe it's what I truly want but can't admit to, I'm so lost and confused I can't tell between what is real and what's just in my head.

It's all very confusing.

Fallen-Angel

"I Want You Out!"

Roughly three weeks ago mum suddenly announced that she wants me to move out. Yes me, she didn't mention anything about my girlfriend though she probably thought that where I go she'll follow which is true to a certain extent.

Her reason?

We don't get on, there are too many women in the kitchen and unless she means that literally then I have no idea what she means by:

"Too many women in the kitchen"

I have phoned numerous flats and apartments up but the majority fall into two categories: too expensive or already let. We have so far viewed two that we thought we could afford.

Number 10, Torquay.

corridor to the staircase. To the right of the staircase is situated the "laundry facilities"-a washer and dryer not suitable for dead rodents to be buried in let alone do laundry in. Walk through the main entrance door, along a long, dark royal blue decorated and uneven. Climb the endless uneven, dark, royal blue decorated stairs to the top. Right up the last, narrowest, steepest and most spiraled staircase and vola the front door. A sixty something year old man, snuffly dressed in ill fitting trousers and an old grandad jumper with bad teeth, some missing put a key in the door and opened it. There were two reasonably sized bedrooms with enormous closets big enough to almost live in, the worlds most beaju bathroom that was no bigger than a broom closet had a peach toilet with matching plastic towel rail hidden behind the door and the worlds smallest shower cubicle that not even I could turn around in. The kitchen was small and compact. The contents: a dirty hoboed cooker with a dirty sink and matching cupboards and work surfaces, and a junk yard ready fridge freezer big enough for a few says shopping at it's most. The lounge was of reasonable size with a god awful floral three piece suit. All the floors were uneven, the carpets had seen far better days and the whole flat smelt of sweat and old urine-certainly not for us or anyone to inhabit.

And then there was the perfect two bed roomed flat above a tattooist in Torquay.

Through the peeling black painted entrance and up two flights of stars freshly carpeted but in need of a hoover and past the one bed roomed flat. Open the door and enter the freshly painted hallway with facing toilet which was white and clean. The hall lead on to a long kitchen which was modern and clean consisting of: pine cupboards with chrome handles, glass top electric cooker, stainless steel clean sink and clean work spaces. There was optional washing machine and fridge that had seen better days but was decent.The floor was laminated but needed a sweep and the rest of the flat was carpeted. Adjacent to the kitchen was two decent sized bedrooms with period black steel fireplaces. Following to the end of the kitchen was the lounge which again had a period black fireplace. Just off to the right before the lounge was the bathroom which had a white sink and a glass and silver shower cubicle big enough for two, all was cleaned to a high standard. What really caught my eye was all the cute little windows with white painted wooden surroundings, they were everywhere. Everything in the flat fitted together and worked well.

So what's the problem?

The agent who showed us around on behalf of the elderly landlord dropped a bombshell. It would cost around £700 a month to run the flat inclusive of all bills plus £400 deposit, way more than we can afford right now. We both left feeling down about this wonderful flat.

I've come to the conclusion that we can not afford a flat on our own, we need help so I've contacted the housing council and they may be able to help up with their "rent deposit" scheme. I have to phone Monday morning to get an appointment.

Fingers crossed.

Fallen-Angel

How I despise you and your home

Time for another update on my pathetic little life.

In this post Burlington House and the boss from hell.

At some point in the summer mum and I were in Pound stretcher in Paignton when mum spotted Amanda (I know I don't normally use names but it's either that or "The bitch"), her ex boss. Mum asked Amanda, who was holding a boxed iron, weather she had any vacancies for me. Amanda and I chatted for a while about my experience in support roles and said she'd be in touch.

I started working at Burlington in September of 2007.

My first week was boring as I sat in the quiet lounge reading care plans for thirteen residents none of whom I'd ever seen let alone met.

My second week and the progressive weeks that followed I was shown how to do the day to day things like bathing, supporting, monies and toileting-yes, changing pads and watching clients use the toilet. I didn't sign up for care work, I was informed that the job was support worker and I know for a fact support workers do not toilet residents, that's the job of a carer.

The weeks and months that followed bored me, made me feel worthless, un-needed and low. Deep depression reared it's ugly head and once again I was plummeted back into the lows of life.

I had no passion, no will or want for this job. I would go as far as to say I hated it and just like Orhcard view dreaded going in each day but did anyway like a robotic, depressed moron.

It was like the long road to the death chamber on the green mile movie.

After a week's annual leave at the end of February I did my final shift. It was a Monday afternoon and I forced myself against all my will to go in. I told myself all the way there on the bus that I just need to keep faking it until something better comes along but there was no faking it anymore. As hard as I tried I just couldn't fake that I was happy there, it was crystal clear to all that I was depressed and on the edge of no return. I spent most of my shift either talking to another member of staff or outside trying to compose myself-trying to stop myself blowing up and walking out.

I texted Amanda that night and told her I wasn't coming back. We spoke the next afternoon and try as she did there was no convincing me to work there anymore. She went on and on about how I'd let her down and that it was in the terms and conditions of my job that I'm obliged to give a weeks notice to which I told her I wouldn't be prepared to do.

I didn't sign a contract to her or the company so what could she do?

Over the following days a huge weight lifted from my shoulders and the dark cloud started to lighten though it still lingered like a bad smell.

Fallen-Angel

A long time coming

For a longtime now I've forgotten about this blog, forgotten all these words I used to write of pain and sorrow but now I'm determined to post on a regular basis once again.

I had two teeth out under anaesthetic at Torbay hospital in December 2007.

The night before I hardly slept because I was anxious about the operation. My girlfriend reluctantly came with me though she couldn't stay awake to be with me mentally. You know sometimes just being there in the flesh isn't enough especially at a time like this.

A time when I really needed her to be there for me.

I went in for my assessments and consultations only I had three when others had one which I found very odd but soon came to realise they were concerned about my irregular heartbeat and the episode at McDonald's.

After I adorned the national hospital gown and robe and I walked alone to the preparations room as my girlfriend was fast asleep in the waiting room. I lay on the bed and watched as two women and one man attached a heart monitor, BP clip and band, an ECG machine and put a line of fluid into me. They aimlessly chatted to me pretending they were interested in what I had to say but were really trying to distract me from what they were doing.

Then came the time for the anaesthetic.

They talked some more to me until I pointed out that I knew what they were going to do and reverse physiology on me doesn't work. They stopped and told me straight as they administered the anaesthetic.

My stomach sank so deep into the bed I thought it was going to fall through the bed to the floor, my heart rate increased by almost double, I felt sick and dizzy, and then I was gone, asleep.

Just over an hour later a woman was calling my name over and over telling me to wake up. Apparently they were getting very worried because it had been twenty minutes since they first tried to wake me. The nurse said she was just about to get the doctor to give me the reverse drug for anaesthetic.

I was laying on my right side with the guard rails up. I could hear the monitors beeping and people talking but I couldn't see or hear clearly.

I started to cry: "I want my mum"

The nurse asked if she was in the waiting room, well, that really set me into hysterics as I cried:

"No, she's on holiday".

Strange as it sounds, which is was, the next thing I did was ask for a cup of tea!

Sometime passed and I found myself being forcibly sat up as some nurse pushed the top half of the bed into a up right position and drew the curtains around me. It took me a while to realise that I'd fallen back to sleep and was now in a recovery cubicle and not on the intensive care recovery room.

I'm not sure if I asked for my girlfriend but at some point she appeared through the curtains. She looked sleepy and started talking to me, something about a cash machine and that she'd had a cigarette. I asked her to get my clothes from my designated locker as I wanted to wear something dignified, something more than a gaping gown which kept falling off my shoulders revealing my all to whom ever opened the curtains.

I think I drifted off again shortly after I regained my dignity because I opened my eyes to a nurse placing toast and a plastic cup of water on the table. I had already pre-determined that I wasn't going to eat anything that day but when it came to it I just couldn't face it. The sight of toast when you feel very groggy, sick and have a face swollen like a hamster's filled pouches eating tends to be the last thing on your mind.

My girlfriend at first tried to persuade me but then she tried forcing me to eat the fucking toast saying as soon as I eat it then we'll be able to get out of the hospital. I turned my back on her, curled into a ball and cried my eyes out as flashbacks of being forced fed came flooding back- painful memories.

A doctor came round a while later to check on me and he took my drip out saying nothing about me not eating the toast. He said I could leave once my medication arrived. My girlfriend then tried to dress me/help dress me but I wasn't ready for that either. She said if I got dressed then we could go straight after my medication came because she hated hospitals and with that I got really upset and angry, I said to her that she didn't have to come with me and that she could leave anytime she wanted.

After my medication arrived I eventually got dressed and staggered out of the hospital and walked to some steps where I sat and had a cigarette. I know I shouldn't have but I wanted one, so I did. A taxi arrived and we went home.

I spent the rest of the day in a daze on the sofa in some discomfort and a little pain. I ate nothing and drank through a straw.

Fallen-Angel

The Wedding Of The Year

The once rebellious and troubled teen reformed into the perfect Christian (almost) and the guy from the youth club said their vowels today in the Rivera Christian Centre, vowels of love, devotion, worship and happily ever after endings.

My little sister who is nineteen years of age is married long term to the love of her life.

How strange it is to say that out loud.

My little sister and I have never really seen eye to eye, we're very different people and the only thing that makes us sisters is the fact we have the same parents.

We were all up early pruning ourselves: mum and dad, my little sister, Auntie and her son-our cousin and my girlfriend and I. The maid of honour was running an hour late so I accompanied my little bride to be sister to the hair salon at the end of our road. The maid of honour arrived, I was no longer needed or wanted so I walked home.

It was raining.

I spent the next few hours straightening my big sister's, her daughter's, my girlfriend's and my hair with my new Treseme straighteners.

At some point mum did her usual thing just like she did at my brother's wedding and went off in a huff because no one was paying her any attention. It's really quite pathetic for a grown a woman, a wife and a mother to act like a child to gain attention, attention she didn't get. Her longtime friend was at our house too but she chose to ignore her too which was very insulting and I felt bad for her.

The flowers arrived and we all set off in various cars to the church, my little sister and parents leaving last.

At the church we all took our seats and watched the service which to my surprise was short and nice, obviously mum didn't approve but she never does.

Will mum ever approve anything her children do?

After the service we stood in the drizzle trying not to get too wet for the photos. I hated that part but put on a brave face and did what I had to do.

The reception was in a function room down Paignton sea front. The room was nicely decorated, there was a buffet, balloons, place settings and a head table. Later on there were speeches and tears, more pictures and then some of us braver ones danced to the quite crap DJ.

We all left around eleven pm and headed our separate ways.

The following day Auntie and cousin went home much to the relief of everyone. Mum was still moaning and complaining about the whole wedding but one by one we tuned her out.

Fallen-Angel