Everyday Conditionality

Well that was a complete waste of time. Unsurprisingly.

It seems I have reached the limits of what our system can offer. The appointment with the Primary Care Liaison offered nothing. According to them I do not meet any criteria for a diagnosis. Well that may or may not be true, but it's the reality that now exists. What seems clear is that the system is only prepared to recognise a certain level of conditionality. Consequently, what might be described as everyday conditionality - the pressure from society and the system that oppresses us - is ignored. 

This has long been a problem that's been ignored: as those pressures increase, the effects become more normalised, especially in lieu of any solution addressing those pressures. Since there's no chance of that happening people are left to sink or swim in a situation where the waterline is constantly rising; that waterline is the normalisation of every day stress anxiety and depression. All those things represent perfectly rational responses to an unfair exploitative and oppressive system.

I tried explaining the reality of this situation to the nurse, but it was for nought. They have nothing to offer, the system doesn't allow it. What we have is triage: people are expected to continue producing in this economy and the little help that does exist is prioritised for those that are really up shit creek. I guess I can be fortunate I don't suffer anything as severe as, for example, schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. But then I'm not interested in competing for the provision the capitalist ruling elite deems an acceptable expense. That provision only exists to get people fit enough to get back on the production line, that's the purpose of CBT (and it's interesting I read that the effectiveness is decreasing, thanks to a recognition of the placebo effect being active).

What is frustrating is the usual lack of administrative care. I asked if the GP had sent over all the details of the discussions we'd had prior to her contacting the Primary Care department. Of course she hadn't (the nurse referred to my GP as a male, which means the only reference she has comes from several years prior when my GP was male). This was frustrating for a couple of reasons: firstly I felt that, haphazardly, the GP was starting to understand my position. She had asked for evidence of the online tests I had done in pursuance of aspergers/neuro diversity, I provided that. None of this information was passed on. 

More importantly it means that I had to try and explain the difficulties and issues I have afresh, which is something I find difficult. Having all this discussed and, presumably, recorded by the GP, and subsequently forwarded would have helped immeasurably. The nurse claimed they liked to have the patient describe their symptoms afresh and 'in their own words', but actually I don't. This is because, when you're in the storm, so to speak, it's hard to think clearly. In other words, I find that my thinking is clouded, because of the issues I talk about, and so appealing to it to explain it is not easy. I only get one shot with the nurse and so if I fail to explain things properly that's my loss. I don't get another chance at this point. They aren't going to think differently without a good reason to do so.

This appointment came about after the Attention Deficit Disorder people responded to my GP's request for an appointment saying that my anxiety needed addressing first. I'm not sure how they have decided (not incorrectly to be fair) that I have anxiety since they have never seen me. I can only assume this conclusion comes from the aspergers diagnosis, which itself was conducted by someone who was dishonest (she said she'd speak to the ADD people then didn't and lied about saying so - I put this to the nurse but of course she wasn't interested in hearing that sort of thing). However anxiety was not brought up in that diagnosis.

So the end result is I have no way forward with any of this. The support structures that society and those with everyday mental health conditionality need do not exist. There is no help for people like this, me, to move forward, so if you don't have people that can help you out, don't know anyone that can help you - you're fucked. I have to accept the diagnostic conclusions that have been presented to me, however haphazard, and so I have to accept I don't have any mental health problems. It's just a shame my head and my heart say otherwise.

New Year Post

I keep meaning to write more, but I find it difficult. My concentration is shot these days and reading screens is extremely difficult due to shitty eyesight (so it's great to see the Universal Jobmatch* system making no effort, still, to fix up it's approach). But who reads this whiny auld shite anyway!

So it's another year. Same old society, same old problems. A few years ago I joined the Socialist Party; I'm not entirely sure why since they have no chance of winning an election anywhere.  But it turns out there's not just one 'socialist party', aside from them, and the always-infamous Socialist Workers Party, there's another Socialist Party. Not exactly a rousing vote of confidence for an ideology already viewed with absolute disdain by the establishment when those espousing it can't seem to agree. I joined because I thought I might be able to make friends and useful contacts in perceived struggles to come, but they are not based locally and so I can't really get involved. 

Recently I've been considering leaving them. Not that I disagree with their opposition to capitalism, but that it doesn't go far enough. Trying to change that system by participating within only serves to validate the questionable and unjustified authority it assumes. We need not just to remove capitalism, but to remove hierarchies such as capitalism altogether and make decisions for ourselves. This way we can properly do away with the institutions that, despite all best intention and hopes, continue to exploit us. The dismal result of the general election and the continued public infighting within the shell that is the Labour party demonstrate this. Consequently I am searching a more potent ideology than mere political party membership. After all the Socialist Party and it's affiliated union group, TUSC (Trade Union Socialist Coalition), have achieved fuck all of note - and that's before addressing the issue of how the unions have let people down and are themselves hierarchical authorities.

More on this to come.

Next week I am to meet with the Primary Care Liaison person previously mentioned. I have no real confidence this will ahcieve anything, but one has to be seen to participate in the 'help' that is 'offered' otherwise one has no leverage at all. This alone is proof that the system fails utterly since help shoudl be not just available to begin with (it isn't), but proivided on the basis of need, not dangled like a carrot with conditions attached.

My main concern is that, because mental health support is so lacking and what exists is isolated from all other avenues of personal support (such as becoming independent or even employed/provided with a means to live), it will focus on extremes. I fully anticipate being asked if I intend to top myself as the only means to determine support: if the patient says 'yes' then help is likely to be offered as a perceived emergency. If 'no' then nothing will be offered at all. These are stark extremes that define just how hollow I think the system is. 

What does it mean to feel 'suicidal'? What are the actual consequences if one admits this? Will they be pumped full of happy pills, kept under observation for a few days until the doctors are finally convinced they are happy enough to be discharged and abandoned anew? Aren't people that admit suicidal tendencies merely masking a cry for help? That's always been the conventional wisdom, but what good is that cry for help going to be if there's no other help available than being dosed up to be artificially happy? How will this address the real issues at hand? Of course pills won't change a brutally oppressive system and the society at large's complicity in their own exploitation.

This, I fear, is what awaits me. That ultimately the Liaison person, whom I assuming is a clinician or doctor of some kind, will have an approach boiled down to these two questions, because this kind of triage is all that modern mental health in Britain permits. No, I do not want to kill myself, but that does not mean I do not feel frustration, within and without. We have a system that does it's best to keep people oppressed so they can aspire to nothing more than wage slavery (just ask that nice Mike Ashley, who's probably, right now, being knighted), and isolated so they cannot commune with like minded people; finally they are bombarded with aspirational propaganda to buy the means to cure the deficiencies they are programmed to believe they possess.

(* I still look on this site. It is, without exception or peer, the worst website design I have ever seen. It is completely and utterly broken, but does anyone in the DWP care? Of course not!)