Hospital: not a great place for an anxious person

...unless it gives you a chance to reflect on your life choices. That's what Rhys does here

Rhys and Milo: reunited

MARK: So, Rhys, bring us up to date.

RHYS: Since our last blog there have been a few ups and downs. I took a much-needed break from employment. Since then, I applied for a job – successfully. I was incredibly excited. Unfortunately, I had to check myself in for an extensive stay in hospital for acute pancreatitis. I didn’t realise that I had it at the time as I was only checking myself in for two massive panic attacks, so that was shocking to say the least.

I am much, much better now, still counted as an outpatient, clean of alcohol (again). Since coming out of hospital I applied and interviewed for another job – and I’ve got it!

MARK: We should stress that this is a blog about anxiety, not addiction. They can of course be related. But I’m not sure that’s the reason you returned to heavy drinking, is it?

RHYS: You don't really need an excuse to go back to drinking. Take my very first night out of rehab. I won't lie. I was very anxious, scared that even though I had these new tools to use to stop myself from wanting to pick up that first drink. The fact of the matter is I wasn't strong enough, even then.

MARK: A final one, before we return to the real subject of the blog. When you were in rehab, did they talk much about the horrible things that happen to your health when you drink excessively? I mean, if you’d have known what acute pancreatitis would be like – if someone who’d recently been in hospital talked to the group about how uncomfortable and just how damn frightening that condition is   – would you have gone straight back to drinking on your first night out?

RHYS: This is how bad it was. So, the thing is when I first rang 999 and 101, I had experienced two large panic attacks, the last one I was convinced my heart was going to stop. By the time I was in A&E and talking to doctors, that's when they caught the pancreatitis. My GP had guessed it before because of certain aches and pains but now it was confirmed.

As my hospital stay went on, the more serious it got, I wasn't able to keep any food and drink down, so I got put on a drip that fed me nutrients and vitamins as that was the only way for my body to get the food it needs. That could only get me so far as I would eventually need physical food which I eventually got.

Then I developed a cyst on top of my pancreas which had to be closely monitored. I had a CT scan recently and they're still yet to give me those results, so who knows if it's still there.

To also be told that if I went back to my own ways it could result in pancreatic cancer – that was incredibly scary and worrying. I am not afraid of dying. But the thought of it happening by my own hand is extremely troubling.

You do, of course, get told in rehab that using/drinking again in the future will kill you eventually, but there's something about being shown medical facts and experiencing the reality of what it does to you. Of course there are temptations. But I don't want to put my life on hold anymore just for the sake of having that one drink.

MARK: And you had panic attacks while you were in hospital?

RHYS: I had one at the start of my stay. I wasn't myself and I wanted to leave, I'm ashamed to admit I became aggressive when I got told ‘no’. Thankfully, I don't remember a lot of this and don't want to go down that road, I just remember having to be calmed down in bed. I had another one after one bad day where I was still on the feeding drip. I was desperate for actual food and wasn't being given it just in case it made me sick. I had also just been told about the cyst on my pancreas, so I felt like I wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Cue the attack.

And the last one was on my last day. You know how things are when you get told you're being discharged and you have to wait around for paperwork and your medication to take home. I was anxious to go home and just sat around waiting all day. Towards the end, I started to panic thinking, ‘What if I don't go home today? What if they decide it's too late in the day?’ I snapped out of it when I got home but it did wipe me out that night.

MARK: Let’s talk about more cheerful subjects. You’ve applied for two jobs, done interviews and been accepted by both. That’s brilliant. I’d have guessed that the interview process would make you off-the-scale anxious. But apparently not?

RHYS: It's more being anxious before and after for me. For someone who has chronic anxiety I am a people person, believe it or not. There are the nerves preceding the interviews – any social interactions – and obviously, waiting to hear about how I did. Luckily with the last interview I only had to wait an hour before they called to offer me the job. Thank God.

MARK: The new job sounds…appropriate?

RHYS: Yes, very much so. It’s for Maximus, a company that works alongside the Job Centre. I will be advising people who are struggling to find employment, struggling financially and struggling with their mental health. The reason this job is appropriate is because I’ve been there since I left my job in February, so I can really put myself in their shoes.

MARK: We all know about the links between depression and unemployment. What has it been like, those days at home with not much to fill them?

RHYS: It was really nice at first in the first month. My general mental and physical health got in the way of me working, so for me to have the rest I was desperately craving was great. I only ever felt really depressed in the two to three weeks before I landed myself in hospital – not crying myself to sleep, but I certainly wasn't happy. At that point I was looking for jobs so I became quite down that I was losing this quality time to myself. Then before I knew it, I was in hospital. So, I finally let myself be just sad.

I'm a big believer that there is no shame in letting yourself feel physically what you're feeling emotionally, so if you feel like you need to let something out emotionally you should get it out, whether that be by talking to someone, having a cry, or damn it, just having alone time with your own thoughts. I feel it now quite a bit, that feeling where you feel sad but you can’t put your finger on why.

MARK: There’s a lovely old English word for that – ‘mubblefubble’. Everyone gets it sometimes. It’s part of what’s called the human condition.

Let’s talk strategy. Is there a gap between the way you’d like to live – how you want to eat and drink, cook, exercise, stimulate your mind, look after yourself – compared to what actually goes on behind your front door?

RHYS: Spending time in hospital really made me appreciate how much I had let myself go with my diet, eating and drinking habits: especially the importance of three solid meals a day and staying hydrated.

When it comes to being stimulated and keeping my mind occupied, reading and filling out a wellness journal is keeping me on track. But is still a work in progress. I forget sometimes that it's only been a short while since hospital, so I still need to go slow. I'm not running marathons any time soon. I wish I could do more to better myself, my start date for work is approaching (July 22nd) so I'll be doing plenty of running around then. I would like to better my diet before then, as it's not fair that my cats have been eating more regularly than I have this year.

ANXIETY ROLE MODEL (ARM): STEVE BAKER, MP

MARK WRITES:

We’re publishing this on General Election day. I’d like to do something unusual and thank all the MPs from all parties who have served the country during this Parliament.

I keep hearing things like ’they’re all as bad as each other’ – and the surveys reveal we have never had a lower opinion of our Parliamentarians.

Well, there is an alternative. We are part of a mere 28% percentage of the planet that doesn’t live under authoritarian rule. That’s your alternative. The increasing number of hard men, dictators and generals in power around the world love it when we whinge about our democratically-elected politicians. But if not locking up people for whingeing is a sign of our weakness, I’d rather be in a weak country like the United kingdom than a strong one like, say, Belarus.

We assume, with good evidence, that MPs are exceptionally thick-skinned humans. But more and more, politicians are talking about the incredible stress they live with all the time. They inhabit a world of plots, pressure and crises, where abuse, some of it just nasty, some terrifying, is a daily part of life.

Many become enthusiastic self-medicators, which is why alcoholism and politics are close allies. But now, at last, some MPs have begun to talk about their own mental health.

One of them is Steve Baker, at the time of writing the MP for High Wycombe. He confessed – actually, that is not a good word to use – he spoke about the mental health crisis he suffered a few years back. He put it down to the pressures of Brexit (he was a serial rebel) and COVID.

Now, I disagree with Steve Baker on just about everything. I am expecting to wake up tomorrow and find Baker has a much reduced influence on things that matter to me. I’m good with that. In fact, I’ll be delighted.

But I admire him for speaking up. This past five years has seen mental health become a much more central part of our national discourse. Whoever’s in power, let’s hope that continues and that the professionals get the resources they need. Because as Rhys’s words this week demonstrate, if you neglect treatment and support for people living with mental health problems, sooner or later they are going to take up one of those much-needed hospital beds .