The Ingratitude List

The Meanwells

There is a performer I love called Victoria Melody. She is fascinated by ideas of contemporary tribalism. She is enthusiastic about enthusiasts. Over the years she has immersed herself into the lives and practices of different tribes and then created shows about them. She has explored everything from Northern Soul to undertaking. I too am fascinated by the things people love. There is something infectious about passion, even if it isn’t your own.

There is one tribe however, that I could really do without. I like to think of them as the Meanwell people. These are the people who see something you’re experiencing and then absolutely have to ‘help’ you, particularly when you haven’t asked for and don’t need their help.

I have had cause in recent weeks to get up close and uncomfortably personal with a few things that have triggered the living shit out of me. I have been exploring what these triggers are in the hope that I can do something about them that doesn’t involve burning everything to the ground and starting again.

It appears that quite a few of them are being inadvertently triggered by the Meanwells. It is not, and I cannot stress this enough, their fault. This, however, is part of the problem. A Meanwell is almost always someone who is kind and generous and caring. They are only trying to help you and find it distressing to watch you suffer. Their greatest wish is for you to be at peace with yourself again. It is ironic therefore, that their behaviours make me want to punch a wall.

Because they mean well, it is not appropriate for me to stand nose to nose with them, staring into the whites of their eyes screaming: ‘Take your breathwork/macrame/breadmaking and shove it up your arse.’ They really don’t like it. To be fair, I don’t like it either. When I’m feeling like shit, the last thing I need is to add; 'moustache twirling villain’ to the list of things I am ashamed of. My rage is both disproportionate and inappropriate, yet when I feel it I can’t unfeel it. It has to go somewhere, which is one of the reasons I get a lot of migraines.

Ironically, migraines is one of the things I get Meanwelled about the most. That and my mental health. Before my hysterectomy there were also lot of Meanwells who were keen, amateur gynaecologists. Most of them, men.

There is always someone, somewhere who watched their girlfriend endure stomach cramps and forced them to go on a twenty mile route march in the Brecon Beacons to cure them and ALL WOMEN, FOREVER. There is always someone, somewhere who once had a headache and eradicated it with the power of open water swimming and now evangelises that it also cures brain tumours. There is always someone, somewhere who once had a panic attack and now believes that bipolar can be managed if you breathe hard enough into a paper bag.

Once I have been handed a ‘cure,’ in the manner of one of my cats presenting me with a half chewed mouse carcass, I then have the extreme trauma of having to figure out how to dispose of it safely. Unlike one of my cats presenting me with a half chewed mouse carcass, I am not allowed to throw it in the bin whilst shouting vociferously and threatening them with the RSPCA.

If I say that I have tried whatever it is, they usually have a reason why, even though it didn’t work for me, I should give it another go. While they think they have been helpful, it just feels like my experiences have been completely invalidated and that the person isn’t listening to me. Two things that are guaranteed to make you feel better about everything.

If I say that what they have said is very interesting and I will look into it, this gives them carte blanche to repeatedly message me about it, or send me useful articles or, at worst, buy me stuff. Recovery becomes a two man sport. Suddenly, I, who can barely look after myself, am responsible for someone else’s welfare and I didn’t even push them out of my vagina.

If you say that you don’t want to take ice baths or learn the harpsichord, there is often an unspoken backlash. The other person feels that you’re not trying, or that you can’t really be suffering that much or you would try ‘everything.’

The conversation, energetically speaking is very much: ‘Have you done it yet? I mean, have you? Now? How about now?’ It enters you into a contract which is akin to meeting the devil at the crossroads and selling him your soul, except that you can’t build an award winning career in rock ‘n’ roll off the proceeds. Also, the devil keeps ringing you up to ask if you’re better yet, and if not, why not?

All of this is a lot when you’re suffering. The thing about suffering is that it’s extremely tiring. You only have to look at Jesus’ face on the cross to know that. He has, quite literally, nailed it.

When I am mad, I can’t sleep properly. It takes me longer to do everything because I am operating in a thick fog. The sleep that I do get is awful. I had a dream a few weeks ago where I was trying to get a man to put his email address on a form. He kept doing it wrong. It was the most stressful and boring dream of my life. I woke up knackered and with a mouthful of blood where I had accidentally ground my cheeks to pulp with my teeth.

There is no respite from being mad. It’s all in my head and unless I become a revolutionary, I take my head with me wherever I go. Because of this, life is exceptionally trying. Even the simple things make you feel like you’ve accidentally wandered into the MENSA headquarters and are being tested.

It’s so noisy. I might look like a swan (bedraggled coot) but I am paddling very hard underneath, just to keep afloat. I’ve already written about the doom voice that accompanies me everywhere I go, but it’s not the only one. There’s a multiplicity of voices and all of them second guess whatever the dominant voice is saying. They’re all me. It’s not like I think I’m Napoleon. It would be a lot easier if I did. He seemed like a decisive chap who got a lot done.

I went to the beach last week. I needed to be by the sea because it often helps. One day I had entirely to myself. I went for a long walk. The sun was shining, the sea was bobbing, the beach was crunching. I didn’t drown anything out with a podcast or music. I just tried to be.

On Saturday I was in the garden. I spent hours, weeding and planting, pruning and plucking. I had my hands firmly in the soil. I communed.

Only on both these occasions I was not at one with nature or finding tranquility in the vastness of the ocean. I was talking to myself. All. The. Time. And it wasn’t restful or meditative or peaceful. It was exhausting and frightening and loud. If I add the Meanwell voices to this and their esoteric to do lists, I just hear more noise and become more exhausted.

I spend a lot of my time at the moment in retreat from myself and the things my head wants me to do or say. My life, meanwhile, is moving forward at a rapid pace. I’ll let you imagine the ensuing mess.

So when the Meanwells come knocking with their spirulina and OM, it’s really, really difficult to deal with them. I understand that they think they’re giving me a lifeline, but most of the time they’re mistaking drowning for waving and handing me a boulder, not a float. When I try to deflect them, they just keep on coming. It’s relentless and upsetting but if I show it, they get upset themselves. That upset becomes my fault and suddenly it becomes my responsibility to make them feel better.

I share a lot of things about myself. I always have. Because I do that, people often get the wrong impression about me.

They think I share everything. I don’t. It’s just that my personal boundaries are much further out than most people’s. After thirty years of gynaecological intervention, just because I’d sell tickets to the opening of my vagina, it doesn’t mean that I want to talk about my deepest fears with you.

I write about these things because I have to. I need to. It’s not because I particularly want to and what I write about, I am not always comfortable talking about. Writing is a solitary affair. I sit alone and organise my thoughts in a way that makes sense to me. I publish them to hold myself accountable. It is being private in a complicated and very public way.

And I edit. There are things I don’t write about. There are so many things that are not up for discussion and which have a massive impact on my life and mental health. So when people think they have ‘solved’ me or ‘saved’ me, they are looking at a sore finger and diagnosing the whole body of work.

This post is ungrateful. I know that. I sound like a whiny bitch. I AM a whiny bitch, but sometimes you just have to let the bitch whine because it’s better than the alternative.

And the most upsetting thing about the Meanwells?

I see myself in them. I am a person who spends a lot of her time either trying to save the world, or being broken by having failed to save the world. I am a reluctant member of the tribe I hate. Over the years though, I have learned a few things about being a Meanwell. The most important things:

• Don’t mistake your own experience for that of others.

• Listening is a powerful, healing gift.

• Asking people what, if anything they need and doing that, even if it’s fucking off over there, is another powerful gift.

Now I’ll fuck off, over there.