****Trigger Warning****
****mentions of blood and self inflicted injuries and attempts that may trigger others! ****
Hello everyone hope you’re all well.
I’ve been a carer before as a job for 3 months caring for the elderly, i part cared for my nana before she went into a care home.
But this time I’m caring for a neighbour/friend who is a transgender woman, I’m 23 she’s 25, and she’s had an extremely traumatic life, abused in the worst kind of way by someone who was supposed to protect her. Along with more traumatic things along the way.
She can’t get the past out of her head and is dead set on getting out of this world and if she can’t she will self harm to release emotions.
This week has been a bit traumatic… she took an overdose while I was there, only found out because I called her flatmate/friend home from work because she admitted she had self harmed in the bathroom and had it locked. He released that she wasn’t right, she is usually dosed up on all sorts of medications and only has prescription sunglasses so I couldn’t tell any difference so if he hadn’t of come home…
she stayed in hospital all night, me and my partner went to visit and bring clothes up and while we walked into the major unit at the hospital the alarms were ringing so I ran to her room and she was on the floor and moments earlier had tried to wrap cords around her neck, which she has done many times at hospital.
It was so hard to see her choking and retching while the mental health worker who can decide if she stays at woodlands (mental health facility) was saying she will cancel the referral because she wanted 10 minutes to stop crying and coughing. The nurse stepped in and said that’s not the solution, they waited, wouldn’t let me in the room to help speak for her as she was in a state, and discharged her. I heard the condescending way they both spoke to her and had to come in the door and tell them to go easy twice.
They discharged her like they always do.
Watching the stages of her overdose was also very traumatic as i was with her the entire time from being at home doing it to leaving her in the unit.
She has self harmed everyday since and I am struggling to hold it together.
It’s mostly the tiredness I feel the next day and feel bad when I don’t go over early as it seems when I don’t she thinks too much and self harms and I feel so guilty as I can’t help this fatigue.
My partner switches between being a carer for a day, then being exhausted and not wanting to go out the next day at all (understandable) but he can get frustrated with me when I spend all day there when her friend has come home from work and I still stay there, it’s because I don’t want to think, but it makes life even harder.
I do have my own mental health struggles I’ve always had since a child, and have a friend who died of suicide while me and her girlfriend were out picking up something so I absolutely refuse to give up on her.
I’ve applied for a free carer course as luckily I’m eligible for my age for that to help me.
I think I just wanted to vent.
I’m not looking for amazing advice or anything like that just a listening ear and maybe if anyone has any similar stories they’d like to share or even just their own problems and feelings I would really like that. It’s a very very hard job.
Many thanks if you got this far 