Fear of mental poor health

I advocate for good mental health at work. My school has won awards but I remain afraid to speak freely of my struggles at school.
Partly because I know there are people who use 'stress' as an excuse and they make it so hard for the rest of us.
What is true mental good health?
So often I'm asked how health is, most people are only referring to VHL. How many of us suffer with pain in the mind.
We VHL warriors speak of life expectancy and the next operation. We arm ourselves with knowledge to try and fend off the growing fear.
A good woman told me she is only evangelical about pilates and mental health. Yet I don't feel it's something everyone sees as important.
Despite the positive changes in its depiction in society today we still have such a long way to go.
Proof of this is that one strong advocate of counselling asked me to keep her own battle with anxiety a secret. I will if course.
I'm pondering this because of the irony that I'm speaking to Governors about staff well-being.
The truth is that it isn't our school alone that's making teachers sad, lonely, depressed, anxious and stressed. It's our government and the hideous climate of fear surrounding all.
There are no places to escape.

Booked

I did it, I've booked it.
Terrified.
I need to actually go this time
Don't I.

Why am I afraid of therapy?

I'm lucky enough to have a coach. I need it. She is a fantastic woman and sees, enables me to see. Even the uncomfortable truths and helps me accept many things that others can't.
Today she changed mode and she told me she was worried about me and thought I needed help.
The fear hit, the anxiety of therapy hit. Through her recommendation before I'd got as far as booking an appointment only to cancel it.
I began to cry (as I do now) as I thought of sitting in a room letting go.
I just don't feel I can risk it, I confessed. I can't collapse. I feel like it would be giving in. Letting the disease win. I'm scared of what I will say. I don't want to listen to the voice I've spent so long repressing. I push it away, down and I distract myself.
I admitted to her all of this.
She reassured me it wasn't giving in, it was a way to fight. That I wouldn't collapse but instead learn how to be stronger and I would be safe. It would be the place I could safely collapse and then they would put me back together.
I know I should.
I'm just so afraid.
I want someone to do this for me.
I don't like who I am much.
I don't see happiness.
I feel completely sad and disappointed in myself.
I'm losing but I'm lost.
There is no quick fix.

Sleepless and Ofsted

The alarm will go off soon. I've been awake for at least an hour. Things are sad here in my head.
I'll go to work today and hope I don't fuck up. My confidence is so very low.
I'm thinking of how to escape rather than change this morning.
My husband held me a few weeks ago while I cried and told me ' you're good at your job.'
I don't feel like it... I'm good at some bits. What's the difference between being challenged and told off. What's the difference between being held to account and hounded? The leader?
I find myself absorbing what I can but it isn't working.
And I am working, hours and hours of over time. I feel guilty if I take a night off.

Ofsted looms darkly on my well being. It seems like a cancer diagnosis. Hovering in the background, will we be told we're in remission or that there are tumours to be cut out, or worse a long poisonous treatment of chemotherapy...

I'm a leader, I'm not leading... I hope I'm not because I'm drowning and I don't want to take anyone with me.

Oh and I don't know my data back to front.

What is coping?

I saw an old friend this weekend. We hardly ever see each other, barely contact one another but we slipped into the chat. The comfort of someone who knows you so well, for so long. She's never judged me, well not openly and she could see, I think she could, that maybe, maybe I'm just not quite coping.
The not loving my job was the clincher, I suspect followed by the eyes prickling with tears at times.
We discussed the possibility of post traumatic stress and we agreed it was possible.
I cope, but am I always coping?

2017 with self made family

What a lovely pleasant affair we had this New Year.
It would have been improved sightly if three women I love had made it to give me a kiss but they couldn't. One for reasons of travel fun and one for boring flu based reasons, and one because I didn't invite her.
But I saw other women I love and I felt very happy, all evening long.
It felt like family, because it was and because it was with newish lovely people who feel like my family.
I would very much like an uneventful 2017, one where I gain head space and get to be very ordinary. I know I need some calm, peace and quiet.
So my New Year resolution list...
Build happy memories with those I love.
No health scares for me or anyone else. No big decisions.
No change.
More of the same.
I'd like work to feel purposeful but not all consuming.
Most of all I would like my little girl to be happy and feel loved, all the time. She is my most important bit of family. She is what counts.