When emergency strikes...

"It turns out that I had been so focused on the fact that I’d had a meltdown during hour four of Andrew being stuck on the floor of the bathroom that I’d failed to notice my strengths..."

A note before I dive in to this week’s letter: I’m going to record November’s podcast Q&A this week. Please send me your questions using this link by Wednesday evening (GMT)!

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Hi fellow human,

Wow, that was quite a week. A few unexpected things happened, one of which was particularly challenging to deal with. Basically, my husband had an accident. Let me first reassure you he’s ‘okay’ now, but at the time it happened I was extremely worried. After getting a bad back during the afternoon on Tuesday, he blacked out and fell over in our bathroom - so hard that he cracked a floor tile! Thankfully he hadn’t locked the door so I could get in. I never want to see him like that again - passed out, white as a sheet, not moving.

Fast-forward a few hours, he’s awake but still on the bathroom floor unable to get up and I’ve been on the phone to 999, 111, and our GP intermittently. It felt like none of them were willing to help us! 999 said it wasn’t serious enough to send an ambulance, 111 said they’d call back but it took them 9 hours to do so, and our GP referred us to 999 (so the cycle continued). I was mainly concerned about the fact that Andrew might have hit his head, and that he had hurt his back so badly he couldn’t move from the bathroom floor for 3+ hours.

Eventually, a solid four hours after he blacked out and fell, we managed to roll him over and I helped him crawl out of the bathroom. Within minutes of him being safely tucked up in bed, I heard a knock at the front door. Two paramedics were standing outside with the blue lights of their ambulance on. What a surprise! Four hours earlier we’d been told an ambulance wasn’t available, so we weren’t holding out hope.

The paramedics assessed Andrew and reassured me that he was not in any imminent danger. He didn’t have a concussion or back damage more sinister than a very painful back spasm, and therefore he could go to sleep for the night. Once they left, I made sure Andrew was as comfortable as possible and left him to sleep. But the night wasn’t over for me. My mind would continue to replay the evening’s events down to every minute detail into the early hours of the morning.

Over the coming days I was clearly in a stress response. My anxiety was through the roof: I was thinking only about Andrew, how I could help him and how I could mitigate the risk of any further injuries. Nights were spent dreaming about the night he fell. Days were spent meticulously planning his medication, meals, and (after day three) little walks around our bedroom. I had become a rather excellent nurse, if I do say so myself.

But I can only say that with retrospect after talking it through in therapy. Because, of course, my shitty committee was out in full force and criticising every single decision I made to look after Andrew. Before I went to therapy I was in the process of convincing myself that I am not resilient enough to deal with these kinds of big challenges and that this had been evidenced by the meltdown I’d had after I realised that no-one was coming to help us.

With the help of my therapist, I later realised that I actually have certain traits that make me excellent at looking after people. For example, I quickly synthesise information and look for the holes (which means I ask the ‘right’ questions of health professionals to get the full picture), I quickly assess all possible risks logically and pragmatically, I communicate directly, I quickly make routines and records to track progress, I am relentless in the pursuit of help when I think it’s necessary. Many of these things are often seen as ‘too much’ in everyday scenarios, but in an emergency they are commended.

It turns out that I had been so focused on the fact that I’d had a meltdown during hour four of Andrew being stuck on the floor of the bathroom that I’d failed to notice my strengths (hello black and white thinking). I am definitely prone to emotional dysregulation in these scenarios (I’d assume most people are) so the meltdown was not a surprise to me. I’d also had a meltdown earlier that day, so I was extra susceptible. But at the time I couldn’t help but think that having a meltdown was me failing. If I think about it logically now, with a clear head, it was a release I needed in order to be able to carry on with looking after Andrew (which was my main priority).

I think there is a lesson to be learned here. And that is that my shitty committee is still so well versed in being horribly mean and cruel to me, even when I’m busy potentially saving someone’s life. It makes sense that after years of focusing on and hiding my ‘weaknesses’ that they are glaringly obvious to me everywhere I look. But this week I wanted to give myself a pat on the back by taking a moment in this letter to reflect on how well I coped with this very stressful situation, and the traits that allowed me to take such good care of Andrew. Perhaps this could be an opportunity for you to do the same? With a less extreme story, I hope!

Of course, the aftermath is another story. The fatigue I feel now that I know Andrew is okay and is recovering and able to start looking after himself again is hefty. I need a lot of rest, a lot of time with my interests, and as much time as possible to process everything. But that’s okay, I’d pay that price any day of the week to know that Andrew is safe.

Send you so much love,

Charlie ♡

P.s. Another thing I find fascinating is that when I am the one going through the health scare I fall to pieces. I shutdown, meltdown, or find that my executive functioning gets so bad I can’t do anything at all. It’s like, the stress response that helps me to mask through it all when someone I love is in trouble doesn’t happen when it’s me! Does that resonate with you at all?

P.p.s. A reminder that I’m going to record November’s podcast Q&A this week. Please send me your questions using this link by Wednesday evening (GMT)!