03 October 2010

Coming Out

The title has a number of connotations:

- coming out of the fondue (see last post over a year ago);
- coming out of the house;
- coming out with one or more secrets I have kept in an imaginary closet.

Status:

Weight: 92.8kg
Bodyfat Pctge: 28.5%
HR: yes, it still beats
Last run: sometime in August '09 (I think)
Pace: you've got to be joking!

Even though it reads in the heading "Henry runs", none of that has been happening in the last twelve months.

I have done all sorts of things during that year apart from killing myself (although even that had been on my mind).

The Queen coined the phrase annus horribilis and that's what it has been for me. Am I over it? I really don't know, but when you're down the only way you can go is up.

I wandered on my very own event horizon and fortunately with the help of my family, my GP, my psychiatrist and last but not least, the pharmaceutical industry, I have been able to drag myself away from it so that, at least now, there seems to be little threat of being sucked into that black hole.

There are a number of reasons for that downfall, all too complex and in part too personal to mention, but one of them certainly was my obsessive nature and wanting to achieve all kinds of things in all sorts of areas, including running.

So whilst physical activity can provide release from stress, increase endorphin levels and so on, it can also cause illness.

I hope that this frightening experience has made me a better person. I don't think I am completely over it, nor do I think I can ever expect to be.

But according to my shrink I should get off the pills by 31 December, which is one sign of improvement.

Anti-depressants, happy pills, synaptic-tacs or whatever they are called have certainly helped, but overall for me they were rather mood-levellers, which can be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on which side of the happiness scale one sits on.

I definitely want to get off them.

And I want to get out and breathe in some fresh air and feel alive.