Whilst we’re on the subject of my anxiety/panic attack issues (as we were in the post ‘Bulls’ below), there’s also this to say: on the face of it, I’m probably a terrible person to have as a partner if you suddenly get cancer.
Not only do I suffer from anxiety (OK, nearly everyone suffers from anxiety, but I’m one of the relatively few people who’ve bothered to get a diagnosis from an NHS psychiatrist for it), I’ve also been NHS-psychiatrist-diagnosed as having OCD. This means I do things like obsessively check the house locks every night (yes, people with OCD actually do things like that)… and, more generally, I desperately (obsessively) yearn for order in my world. Also, like many OCD-sufferers, I can’t bear sudden, dramatic change.
So… why would you want to be shacked up with someone like me, if you get a major illness?
There’s probably some truth in that. And if you ask Lizzie, she might say I’ve not always been brilliant at remaining calm in the last few months… and dealing with all the life-changing disruption.
But there’s a flip side to this.
The flip side is… I’m kind of used to feeling anxious and stressed. Whether warranted or not, it’s become part of my long-term psychological make-up.
So when Lizzie got sick… and being anxious was actually warranted… it’s not like I suddenly went from never feeling stressed to suddenly feeling totally stressed.
It’s more like I went from 60mph on the ‘feeling stressed highway’ (sorry, that sounds like a terrible Eagles song) to, say, 90mph. Or maybe 100mph (I don’t want to downplay the impact of Lizzie’s cancer, here).
I guess, what I’m trying to say, is that – on the stress front – I’d already had plenty of practice.
So maybe, in a weird way, that has helped me to hold it together… and be a better support for Lizzie.
I hope so. But, to be honest, I don’t really know.
You’ll have to ask Lizzie.
P.S. Regarding my OCD… I did try writing about this further, in this journal, but it didn’t feel like the right place. It was as if the huge, dark, weighty subject of cancer pushed this other subject off the page completely, like a tumour shoving aside another organ (the organ in this case being the brain?). Don’t get me wrong – I’m an ardent believer in the seriousness of mental health issues. But I feel there might be another time, in my life, to write about these.
Anyway, I guess there is at least one good reason to flag my OCD here. If you’ve been reading this blog and thinking my tone is a little bit off-kilter at times – obsessive even – now you have a reason why.
P. D. Clifton 
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