Happy Sunday all. Well, it’s been a long week but we’re still alive which is what counts! Things could be worse, although if they were I guess I wouldn’t be writing my weekly post!
We’re going to get a new friend or 2 for Tom as even though he doesn’t show outwardly that he’s lonely, gerbils are social animals and rely on each other for grooming and security. We’ve been ringing Pets at Home, which is where Keri went to collect Tom and Ian in November 2017, and they get baby gerbils every few weeks. Their last litter of babies were female. As much as I love our gerbils, I’m not willing to look after a litter of baby gerbils if Keri is still refusing to touch them! Rayne spent some time with Tom for the first time the other night and of course she loved him. Everyone loves him so that’s not a surprise!
I’m not sure how I feel about this but Keri is being very careful with her suicide plans. Obviously I don’t want to die but she’s sorting out as many loose ends as possible which is taking time. Like I mentioned last week, she’s even written a Last Will and Testament which she’s now signed along with 2 witnesses. I think this is the reason she’s so desperate to get Tom a friend so that they’re together wherever they go. We’ve overridden the ‘wall people’ as much as possible and have managed to convince Keri that because suicide is permanent it shouldn’t be impulsive. The plan was that after several days she’d start to feel better and feel it wasn’t so much of an option anymore. That’s how it normally plays out. This time it’s exceeded what we normally deal with. She’s written letters to loved ones before to leave behind when she’s planned to do something but this is different. Our key worker asked Keri about things today. I’m very happy having her as a key worker as she’s worked with us so long that she knows Keri very well. Nothing gets past her. She clicked straight away about Keri’s suicidality as she did the math. I’m so f***ing glad she did the math because one of us was going to have to have a serious intervention otherwise. Excuse the swearing but I’m somewhat relieved that at least someone has clicked. Why hasn’t anyone else?
The math included:
*the fact Keri has made a will that’s now signed and legal
*that she’s been off of her medication and isn’t fully back on it (especially her antidepressants)
*that she’s been unusually upbeat for the last week or 2 (because of the fact she’s had her mind set on things, like it’s given her some relief finally)
*the fact she still has this delusion that she’s hurting people and animals via ‘demon transference’ and these voices she’s hearing that she calls the ‘wall people’
*because of all the loss Keri has gone through this year (two relatives have died, one of our gerbils has gone and our daughter’s 11th anniversary just passed)
Combine all of that and no one can really be surprised about all of this. I’m extremely surprised Keri managed to even get 2 witnesses to sign her will. If I’d been asked to do that (which I couldn’t do anyway as I’m not technically a separate person) I wouldn’t even consider it. I’d write “NO CHANCE” in big bold letters in black permanent marker on the wall! I’m hoping that because we’ve convinced Keri about the permanency of this decision, that the time she’s using to tie up as much as possible can be used by people to keep subtley giving her reasons to hold on. I don’t mean a lecture or a spiel. I mean general things. Previously when Keri has been suicidal, whenever she’s spoken to people about general topics it’s normally a random sentence that no one even considers relevant that starts getting her thinking. She has a strange brain. My brain runs on a different wavelength so I’m never entirely clear how she thinks, especially when she’s like the way she is at the moment. If it comes to it I’m going to be on Safety Duty again but if we have a host that’s set on killing herself there’s not much we can do, especially if Sally gets on board with the stupid plan. It takes months, sometimes up to a year to sort out a new host to take on the role of “the main person”, and none of us can stay out forever if we aren’t titled as the “main person”. It was mere fluke that Teen Keri was out for 3 months. None of us even know how that happened yet.
On the bright side, despite Keri talking “hypothetically” to our key worker, our key worker is smart as hell. Like I said, she did the math and she’s not stupid. She knows that what Keri said is serious and not “hypothetical” but she also understands that Keri isn’t going to disappear tonight and do something. This is the first time that it hasn’t been impulsive, or considered seriously for less than around a week. I mean a full plan, not just feeling suicidal. This situation is new to me and all of the other alters so we really don’t know what to do about it. For now I’m just glad that nothing is completely imminent and that at least one person knows about it now. If Keri still isn’t opening up and willing to talk properly by the time she sees her care coordinator again in 10 days then I’m going to speak to our key worker and get her to talk to him. I know Keri will hate me for it but I really don’t care. She only saw our care coordinator on Thursday and she mentioned nothing about it. I don’t think he even knows she’s written a will. But then, why would he? She hadn’t even told anyone. She didn’t plan to until she found out that to make it a legal and binding document she needed witnesses to sign it with her. Thank you to whoever does these documents as you may well have opened a line of communication in this situation what wouldn’t have happened otherwise! Not that any of them will ever see this blog but I’m writing that anyway!
Keri’s exercise has gotten excessive again but at least she’s still not drinking. Today marks day 12 without any alcohol! Despite everything that’s going on we’re very proud of her for doing this. I’d much rather she be exercising to excess rather than drinking herself into a coma every night. We can also cope with her bad self-harming as long as it doesn’t get too dangerous, like getting an artery or something. She’s been getting quite severe dizzy spells but they’re unrelated to her eating disorder which is strange. I’m wondering if it has something to do with blood loss and the severity of her ongoing anaemia. They’re happening even when she’s been sitting down and she’s had to decline some of her support due to the fact she can’t do anything during these episodes except lie completely still on her sofa until it passes, which can take more than an hour! We’ve managed to persuade her to make a GP appointment which she was happy to do as she thinks it’s playing into the public facade that she’s “focusing on her future” rather than her death. She’s going out of her way to put on this facade but what she doesn’t realise is that the rest of us alters are trying very hard to pretend to play along while also somewhat getting our way. Me, Mary, David and Nat are very good at subtle manipulation when it comes to Keri which is part of the reason we got elected to lead!
Keri spent an hour on the phone to her foster mum this evening which I was happy to hear about. All I know about the phone call was what Keri mentioned earlier about us hopefully going to see them this weekend. I’ve been wanting to for ages as I haven’t seen them since Christmas 2017! I would’ve seen them last year but because of Keri’s DTs and the fact Teen Keri appeared out of nowhere (she didn’t even know who our foster family were) we were at the flats for Christmas. Apparently our foster dad has been electrocuted and fallen off of a table. I’m not sure how accurate this is as I didn’t hear the phone call but from the way Keri was laughing as she told me I know that it’s not serious! They’re also going to be doing parent and child fostering now. I know nothing about parent and child fostering besides the fact there’s a baby involved so I’ll have to ask them about that when I see them!
I know not much in this post has been too positive but there are good bits! There’s times in the year when things look more upbeat (legitimately upbeat not fake upbeat) and I’m feeling that that will come soon. There’s got to be someone working with/seeing Keri that will say something unintentionally that gives Keri a bit of rope to cling onto that might pull her away from her current set path. We as alters are doing everything possible but we also rely on outside help. If we could all cope on our own we wouldn’t need 24 hour staff support.
I’m going to enjoy a couple of hours to myself. It’s midnight now and I’m enjoying my peace and quiet without having to hear those voices Keri hears. Tom is awake again as he had a nap earlier so I’m going to have cuddles with the little meatball! When Tom has his new baby friend/friends I’m going to enjoy it even more. I know I shouldn’t say this but Tom will always be my favourite no matter how cute his new companions are!
I’ll be posting next week. We will still be alive, even if I have to be fully out for a few days. I hate being out longer than a day but if it’s necessary I’ll do it. Tom says hello! He’s already waiting at his cage door looking at me with his big eyes as if to say “Fox! Where’s my cuddles???”.
Good night friends 🙂
Fox 🦊
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