I set my alarm to go off at 7 but it’s unlikely I’m going to get any more sleep. I went to bed at 10pm so it’s almost 7h. I woke up briefly ar 23.30 due to someone banging doors quite repeatedly. I found my earplugs (Howard Leight Laser Lite, the best that I tried so far), put them on and went back to sleep.

So at least I’m sleeping ok here. Apart from that I’m not very well. I feel quite vulnerable I’d say. I can’t get my head around the fact that someone who is there to serve you (like a bank employee) just takes your money like that, like if it was their. It reminds me the situation with Home Group (aka The Company), when I had no control over what’s happening to me and then, at the end, didn’t even get an apology. I guess they were happy that I dropped my claim so the fact that their actions caused me psychotic episode will never come out and they could focus on their business: supporting people with mental health problems.

When I had my second episode I got sectioned and I got absolutely petrified that I’d be put to Home Group property to recover. Thank God, after a month I was sent straight home where I had to tidy up all the food I was throwing at policemen. My beautiful, patterned tiles got stained in a couple of places and the door had a big crack in the middle, plus, I wasn’t exactly a tidy person before the episode. That was when I was fighting with pregabalin withdrawal and was constantly exhausted. The exhaustion lifted quite suddenly shortly before the episode and I guess that was the reason I got it: I started thinking normally again but had no coping strategies for stress and no medication. A few misunderstandings at work and it was like someone flipped the switch: I was constantly ruminating on what happened and couldn’t sleep. Possibly if I continued as normal or at least try some relaxing activity like going to the cinema, I’d finally relax and the episode wouldn’t happen. But when I was in psychiatric hospital in Poland I was told that in case of any stress at work I need to call in sick. No one said what I had to do when off sick and it just sounded to me like I had to stress at home instead. So that’s what I did.

During those couple of days I saw 2 doctors and 3 nurses, I was complaining to everyone that I’m worried I’m going to get another episode. And yet, I got it anyway.

I was prescribed diazepam and zopiclone and neither of them worked. I don’t know how they didn’t, how come 7.5mg zopiclone didn’t make me sleep when I was exhausted? I don’t really know. But because it didn’t work I become convinced I was given placebo (can you blame me for that thinking?) and from then everything happened very quickly.

Currently I’m not on any long term medication. I tried another antipsychotic, arpiprazole, around the time I published my petition (it only got just over 200 signatures) as short term meds are not ideal: olanzapine can knock me down beautifully as stop my thinking from going in overdrive but I have nothing to regulate my emotions on a day to day basis. But then, inability to regulate emotions is an autistic thing, so should I be taking antipsychotics for that?

Perhaps pharmaceutical companies come up with meds for Asperger’s one day, something that helps us keep calm but doesn’t dull our thinking process. I’ll be really happy to test it, I’m not against meds at all.

So the arpiprazole didn’t work for me. It was making me really anxious.

Doctors wanted to try another mood stabilizer as well, I’m happy to do that but for now I’m not on anything, and I’m coping.

But when the issue with the bank goes to court, I don’t know how I will feel. First of all, I’d need to come in here again while being unable to stay at home.

Why, oh why, did I let it happen? Possibly because I was on meds that were dulling my thinking process. However, who knew, seriously, that from all the bank employees in the entire county, my mum will get this one who’s up to no good.