This article is a very personal one and it is 100% biased as I am so very, very angry about the price my loved one has had to pay because of the PM’s COVID-19 Captain’s Call.
There is someone in my life who I care for deeply. He lives in a house with flatmates and like us all has been under lockdown for many weeks. He and his flatmates all have special needs. They all are intellectually handicapped and have live in staff to help them live as full a life as possible.
While my dear friend has an adult body, his mind is a young child’s. His relationship with his mother in particular is very, very strong.
Before lockdown he was able to spend many weekends with his parents and would always visit his extended family as well, celebrating birthdays, sharing a meal and enjoying Mum’s home cooking and attention.
Once lockdown started and he was cut off from his family he stopped eating. He lost weight rapidly. Soon he was refusing to leave the house and then recently he refused to leave his bed or to have a shower.
Last weekend he became dangerously weak and his heart was racing. An ambulance was called but he refused to go to the hospital because he was so anxious and terrified as, you see, Jacinda Ardern had scared him silly. He has always watched the news, and the constant COVID messages had frightened him badly. He has been terrified all this time that his Mum would die and that he would catch COVID and die.
As someone who has experienced severe depression and panic attacks, I recognised his physical symptoms immediately as indicators of depression and severe anxiety.
This knowledge is hard-won as it was only when my regular doctor was away that I was finally diagnosed with depression all those many years ago by another doctor in the practice. My regular doctor had only treated the physical. I had even been sent to have a horrible procedure where they put a camera down my throat to look in my stomach. I had been given anti-nausea tablets as well and nothing worked. The doctor simply did not recognise that everything stemmed from my severe depression.
I will never forget the relief I felt when I was finally correctly diagnosed. To be fair to the other doctor I think she realised what was really wrong with me but she didn’t know how to handle someone with my personality. After putting me through all the physical tests she asked me if I thought that I was suffering from depression. I said no, I didn’t think I was (as I had no idea what depression was or that it could manifest itself in physical ways). She then said nothing more.
The other doctor’s approach was just what I needed. He told me that he knew exactly what was wrong with me and took immediate action. In no time at all I was eating again. The relief was enormous.
If there is anyone out there now suffering from physical symptoms since the lockdown please consider the possibility that they might be manifestations of what is going on inside your head. Do not suffer in silence. Anxiety can be crippling. Worry, going around and around inside your head, can affect your body in many different ways.
Ardern has put so many of you under considerable strain. I am not a doctor just someone who has a lot of experience with depression from having it myself as well as having a husband who has had it too.
Exercise and sunlight are a big help, and if needed the right anti-depressant can also make a huge difference. If you do end up going down that route I highly recommend that you first discuss the side effects with your doctor as some of them cause more problems than they fix.
The one that has worked the best out of all of them for both Cam and me is mirtazapine. The only side effect we have noticed is that it helps you go to sleep, which is why it is best taken before bed.
I am hopeful that my dear friend will soon find some relief from his crippling anxiety and that he will soon be able to eat again. As far as I am concerned Jacinda Ardern’s so-called “Kindness” Regime did this to him.
It was a Labour government under Helen Clark who took away my dear friend’s job as a toymaker. She did that by ignoring the heartfelt pleas from families of the intellectually handicapped. They explained to her that by changing the law to make it compulsory to pay intellectually handicapped staff (who need supervision and assistance) the full minimum wage they would all lose their jobs.
Under Ardern’s Kindness Regime my dear friend (now jobless) lost his freedom as well as his peace of mind.
Our PM certainly knows how to put the cruel in the kind.
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