ABBA - Head Over Heels.

Oh my god, I'm obsessed with this. It's camp as tits and Frida steals the show from Agnetha in a variety of hideous-but-amazing 80s fashions. And that spiky red hairdo gives me LOIFE.

On the NHS.

I'm currently undergoing a course of CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) and had my first appointment last week. I was on a waiting list for what seemed months but was likely only about 4 weeks. Because I have had suicidal ideation in the past, I was considered a priority patient. The session went fairly well, but at the beginning I was taken aback by my therapist telling that I would recieve 6 sessions, 8 at the very most. It's not ideal to be honest, but I'll take whatever help I can get.

As I got dressed this morning (okay, this afternoon- so sue me, my flatmate kept me all night walking in and out of the flat) I realised that a lot of the time I have been seen by mental health specialists, I'm never told how many sessions it will be when I make the appointment and I am given the impression that it is a long-term course of treatment. Then at the start of the first session the therapist or counselling always says something along the lines of "so, this is a course of treatment that will take between 6 to 8 sessions". Why is it impossible to be told this information at the point of self-referal?

The more I thought about it, the more I realised that I have never been offered a long term therapy by the NHS. The only exception I'd include would be when I was 16 and desperately ill, but after a couple of sessions, I realised I was nothing more than a guinea pig for junior psychologists- I was never seen by the same person twice and so I would have to go over the same thing session after session because it seems the junior psychologists are unable to add notations in a file.

The only option for long term treatment is to pay for a private psychotherapist or counsellor, which is less than ideal when you are a poor student whose student loan does not stretch very far. I did it once, while I engaged to the ex-husband (or as friend refers to him "psycho fuck bag"... but I digress) and while it was a relief to be able to see someone weekly, she was incredibly patronising. The one thing that sticks out for me more than anything is at the end of the first session she leant forward, looked me dead in the eyes and went "I'm going to ask that you pay me". Charming. No manners, just a demand.

But the worst part of this fiasco is that when you are seen- and regardless of whether you are on a short course, seeing a different psychologist or not being told that they only offer short term course- you are always spoken to in the most patronising and condescending manner. Just because you are ill does not mean that those treating you have the right to speak to you like a 5 year old. I'm not one for confrontation, so I've never said anything- but I am sick of it.

I just want to be treated with some respect. Is that too much to ask for?

A Messed Up Fairytale...

Once upon a time in a sleepy little town in North Staffordshire lived a little boy. He had a mother, a father and an elder brother and he lived above the pub that his parents owned. It was the kind of small town where everybody knew your name and your business. From a young age, this little boy knew that he was different to all the other little boys. When they would be watching cartoons, reading Harry Potter and playing football, this little boy would instead watch Star Trek, read Far From The Madding Crowd and avoided all kinds of sports as much as he could. He did try his best to fit in- he tried (somewhat half-heartedly) to like football and read the same books as all the other little boys- but he knew deep down that he was not one of them and he never would. Even his teachers didn't seem to understand him and eventually, they stopped trying to.

The little boy eventually grew into a stroppy teenager and he began to realise that while he was never going to fit in with the other stroppy teenage boys, he rather enjoyed looking at them. And that scared him because he had been told by his teachers at big school that if a boy liked other boys as something other than friends- they would go to hell (did I mention that this boy was raised Roman Catholic?). Oh sure, he kissed a girl once or twice- he even had a girlfriend- but he knew that it didn't feel right. Try as hard as he might, he knew that he was what the other boys called a "gayboy". And because he was told it was wrong and evil, he kept it to himself.

Then one day, as he approached his 18th birthday, the boy could not keep his secret any longer. And so one night, he joined his workmates for a night out at a local bar where others like him could go to feel safe and dance to the music he listened to.

And there, on the podiums, amid the thumping basslines and the sweaty- but happy- people, he felt liberated.

Felt as though, he finally belonged somewhere.

*

It's been a little over twelve years since that night on the podiums at the local gay bar (imaginatively called 'The Club') when I felt able to myself. I came out to my friends first, then finally to my family. I had convinced myself that I had done such a good job pretending to be straight that it would come as a heartbreaking shock to my dearest. To paraphrase from the iconic Hazel Tyler from Queer As Folk- I thought I was going to "explode out the closet". As it turns out, I was the last person to realise. Said my darling mum: "you think we didn't know... you like Cher and Kylie for goodness sake!". I realise now that my undying devotion to those two gay icons was just the tip of the icebergs when it came to clues about my homosexuality. At age 5, I was apparently fascinated by cousin's ballet tutus that I took to wearing one, I adored musicals (The Sound Of Music is still my favourite) and I was always effeminate. So in many respects, my explosion from the closet was a damp squib and I was the last to realise.

A few months ago, I realised that my coming out was only the start of my own personal acceptance of my sexuality. It took a long time to really feel comfortable with it. Case in point: I was so terrified of introducing my first boyfriend to my parents that I passed him off as a 'friend from the pub'. I had spent the first fifteen years of my life going to church with my mum and while she never told me it was wrong to be gay- plenty of other people in- or associated with- the Catholic church did: namely my R.E teachers at high school. Although I had admitted that I was gay, in almost every respect I didn't accept it.

And so, I decided that instead of coming to terms with it I would simply press the 'self-destruct' button. If I wasn't going to validate myself, I would find it from other people: usually in the shape of drunken one-night stands or unsuitable boyfriends. I spent a lot of my late teens and early twenties jumping from terrible guy to the next, becoming attached, getting let down and drinking away my problems. It was a destructive cycle and I didn't know how to get out of it. In retrospect, I don't think I wanted to.

About six years ago, I broke up with my first serious boyfriend. He a lazy slob who was just as damaged as I was and who used to alternate between downloading terrible R&B songs and drinking him into a stupor. The first time we met, we kissed and he threw up all over my t-shirt. It was a warning light that I ignored. And when he drank, it soon transpired, he turned violent. I lost count of the nights that he would punch or throw things at me- like beer glasses. 

Eventually after two years, I plucked up the courage to dump him. And then proceeded to spend that summer in a pot and alcohol induced haze. It would have been the perfect time to sort myself out- but now, come that winter, I was in another relationship with another unsuitable idiot. This time, he wasn't abusive, but I was so lonely that I proposed to him. He said yes.

And that's when it all went to shit.

Not even six months had gone by and I realised that this one was just as fucked up as my last boyfriend- and even more fucked up than I was. He wasn't physically abusive, but he would go out of his way to tell I was never going to be happy with anyone but him even though he loved another man. We ended up getting civil partnered. Even at the reception, I knew it wasn't going to last and that I was going to end up broken hearted again. I was right. He waited two and a half months (and until my fiercely protective parents had left the country for two months) to tell me he was leaving me and it was all my fault. By this time, I had realised I was a screw up and had been to see a counsellor who dealt with clients who were struggling with their sexuality- and I had recognised that I needed to break the cycle.

So I picked myself up off the floor, moved back in with my parents and went to university. Last summer I graduated with a Foundation Degree in Fashion Studies. It wasn't plain sailing, I had a brush with depression and suicidal thoughts- but I perservered and when I took the stage in my (very fetching) mortarboard and graduation gown, I was proud of myself for the first time in my life.

I decided that it wasn't enough. I wanted more and so I enrolled on another university course. Now I am 60 miles from that sleepy little boy and light years away from the little boy who was guilty for being gay. I still have my down days- and I am resitting my course so I can take the time to work on my lingering issues with anxiety and depression, but now I feel like the sky is the limit and for the most part, I'm settled. I have great friends here, a new job and a boyfriend who accepts me for who I am and isn't a clusterfuck of bad decisions and poor life choices.

I don't really know what this blog is going to be about- most likely my rantings and the music that I love (yes, my undying devotion to all things Kylie and Cher continues apace), but I hope stick by me as I work my way through life. One fabulous sequin at a time!