I realise I’m way behind on the Roughly Chronological Re-Read. I should have put it on hiatus a few weeks ago, but it wasn’t my intention to let it lapse for this long. So why has it? A combination of freelance life (I’ve written three and a half scripts since 1 January, plus a number of short pieces) and troubled headspace.

I was doing fairly well – or at least thought I was – until mid-March, when we went to Rome. Then while we were there, a stupid small event hit me right in the PTSD and triggered the worst panic attack I’ve had since about two weeks after the car crash in 2005. I haven’t properly settled since. I’m still very jumpy, I’m having a lot of nightmares, I’m finding it difficult to be out of the house and dread being out of earshot of Mark and the cat.

The silver lining to this particular cloud is that I was already due to go back to the GP to check in regarding the headspace, and it turns out that doing this when I’m rattled and my defences are down is quite a useful thing. It made it harder to downplay the symptoms that form part of my daily experience. This led to my opening up to the GP about things beyond the trauma, which led to her referring me for further treatment. An old diagnosis needs to be re-examined and possibly brought up to date. It doesn’t seem to be something I can manage unassisted any more.

I know my usual policy is to speak quite openly about the Crazy on this blog, but at the moment I can’t. Putting what’s going on in my head into words just now seems like an exhausting challenge, and I feel like if I do I’ll run out of words and won’t have them available to use for work.

The Re-Read will resume shortly, and I’ll be fine. The headspace may be challenging but this is just the latest iteration of something I’ve dealt with all my life. I’ll talk about all of this in due course, when it’s processed and I have useful things to say.

Until then.