Wah - today was hard and I don't have anyone to tell about it so it's going here.

Art group was shit; I left feeling worse than when I arrived, which has never happened before - it's always been an oasis of wonderfulness in a sometimes hostile world. There was no member of staff in with us as she was on holiday and we'd persuaded them to let us use the room as usual rather than have no art group. Last week was fine - lovely in fact, very mellow and supportive, but today it spiralled suddenly into a conversation about suicide, with lots of people talking at once, one of whom was saying suicide was a valid choice, another of whom had found a neighbour's body two days ago, dead from suicide (she really had as she was with a friend who had been with her at the time), there was someone bipolar on an 'up' talking nineteen to the dozen even when everyone else stopped, there was the odd Canadian bloke that people joke has a crush on me, that I don't like, wanting to sit next to me, and it was all awful, just awful.

I went to a funeral yesterday and found myself overwhelmed with the words in the service about death and time passing and all that. I couldn't go to the pub with all the other mourners, but had to drive off, howling and wailing for my daughter and for all of us who have lost her, not really caring about the man my age who has died, husband of a friend that I've known for thirty years, then I got forced into the wrong lane by big lorries and into a big traffic snarl-up in the middle of the city, so I had to concentrate hard to try and work out a good route and then it was all flat and weird and I was on my own, driving stop, start, first gear, second, stop, neutral, first gear... and I am really scared about someone else who has cancer and it's all gone quiet and I'm afraid to ask and here I am with too much walking in the valley of death again.

Then today, there's my other bloody daughter, trying to persuade me to go back on anti-depressants as I'm 'too negative' and I 'bring people down' (her) and it must be my serotonin levels that need sorting out. She's right, up to a point - I was an optimist for fucking decades, half a century of getting knocked down and getting up again, boasting about being a member of the Bounce Back brigade, and now I'm not like that. It's the double whammy of losing my mother when I was too young to form a single memory of her (15 months), spending half my life fucked up over that, making a bit of headway then bang - daughter's dying. I'm done. I don't know what I'll be like after she's gone, when we're not hurtling towards it, knowing things will get worse, but right now I'm bitter and miserable. I don't weep and wail about Elder Daughter in real life much, or not around other people, but I'm mean and snitty about petty stuff, which feels to me like an offload, a release valve, pouring my fear and loathing into moaning about cunts on TV or what a shithole this town is. Not all the time, but for YD, any amount is too much, it brings her down, she doesn't want miserable bitch mummy, but steady as a rock mummy. Well, yeah, I'd like that too. I tried to gently tell her that this is the best I can do - honestly this is the best I can do, but she's walking the fucking tightrope herself, my darling Younger Daughter, so I ended up agreeing that I'd go to the doctor and ask about anti-depressants, but I've already spent fifteen years working my way through all the different types, for six months, a year at a time, giving them a good fucking go, and none of them had any effect - I'm in the ten per cent of people for whom they don't work. If she wants a happy mummy to deflect the pain of her sister's demise, well, I can understand that but I don't see where that happy mummy is going to come from. And I feel like all we have left is honesty, or maybe the word is congruence - I don't have to tell her how I'm feeling all the time - but I can't see anything good arising out of me slapping on a false happy face.

Maybe it'll look different in the morning. I spoke to Bloke about it and he received the information as if it was something factual, like, "They've opened a new greengrocer's,"
"Hmm, yeah, have they? Good. Nothing to discuss here, that's your shit, I do food shopping and putting out the bins."

Ach, it's late, I'm offski. If you're reading and you want to send me goodwill but don't know what to say, I'd be happy if you just left a hug or a xxx - that's what I do when I run out of words but want people to know I'm there. I've never not had comments or notes before and didn't realise how it would feel without them. It's awful - I miss you.

Grateful for: bed, roof, food, walking in the wind; living on the coast

Laters