Greetings everyone,

I don't every come on sites of these type though I have suffered from various problems of the type I see here for about 10 years. I am an only child and lived with my father in the parental home. Before that I lived with my mother and father. I have lived in this house for close on 35 years now.

2 weeks ago my father who was 77 had a heart attack and passed away by the time he got to the hospital. He had had a drinking problem for about 8 years since my mother -who was his partner and best friend - passed away after a 13 month battle with cancer.

2 years before that my great friend from my childhood had died and I was having a hard time coming to terms with that when the double blow struck. Since that day my father has lived like a man with no hope; laughing little, not taking care of himself and drinking slightly more as the months and years progressed ( though I may add only in his own house at night )

I too suffered greatly. I began to feel peoples eyes on me at all times, hated the sun and bright lights and began to hope for dull rainy days where I could wear a hat pulled down low. I was in my final year at university and it was very hard making myself go out the door every day. I felt like I didn't belong anywhere except at home- no one would understand so I told nobody but withdrew into myself, losing all but a handful of friends through lack of contact or acceptance of offers to do things.

My doctor said I had PTSD and depression. I left university and retreated into my own world. Time had little meaning and I became surprised when I would look at the date and find a month had went past or a year was over and I wondered what had happened to the time.

I claimed sickness benefit for depression at first, then three years later I realised there were other things. I had an OCD about change of any sort; I feared and hated it like the worst type of ancient reactionary, rather than the outgoing young man who played football and was a drummer in dozens of bands. I always wanted to go new places and meet new people; it didn't matter what happened, I just wanted to get out and see it and do it all.

I became a pessimist of humanity in general and began to try and avoid any situation I was not familiar with.

There is more but I will try and explain it by the essay I wrote to the social when the 3 yearly medical interviews come up. ( I have never been forced to go in for one as yet which is a thought that brings a cold sweat out on me for about a month before the thing.

This is the original information I wrote. Three years later and two months ago I added to it and said ow things had gotten worse ( yes hard as that is to fathom ) Here is what I wrote- no word a lie.

My condition.
I suffer from depression and fear to leave the house, I don’t like any contact with people, even friends. I have no idea if its social anxiety or agoraphobia I suffer from but it means that everything stops at my front door. I have a fear and suspicion of answering the phone and so mostly turn it off for weeks on end. I haven’t seen any of the few friends I have left due to this condition for 13 months.

Days and months drift by now and it’s hard to remember time, lots of times I forget what day or year it is, wondering how time got past so fast with so little done. I live with my elderly father who is ill and this is the only contact I have with another person, sometimes for weeks on end. I hate to answer the door and mostly I spend all days in my nightclothes as I can’t find the motivation to get dressed or bath or shave, it doesn’t really matter as I never see anyone.

I get angry a lot and for no reason, though I think it’s at me for letting myself get to this stage. It’s like I could kill someone for no reason or myself just to get away from the pressure building in my head, but then it goes away and I’m ok again for a time.

Afterwards I am disgusted at myself for feeling this way and self loathing is something I feel a lot for this weakness. I don’t sleep well and my pattern of sleep is always changing due to staying up round the clock regularly. Things begin look very bad sometimes when I have been up for a long time and I feel the best time is when I tired enough to lose consciousness and sleep for a period.

I used to love to read about all things but I can’t seem to concentrate now on anything for any length of time and it bothers me greatly. I always feel an agitation of the spirit that life is going on without me and I am quite powerless to change the situation. Every year older I get, things seem to get worse and in winter I am very bad with depression. The festive season and January get to me and I feel an almost physical urge to get out of this place I am in, thoughts of suicide at these times are strong, though I hope it won’t come to this, especially while my father is still here.

I hate the situation I am in, but fear change and never make plans for anything because I’m never sure day to day what version of myself will turn up. To describe how bad this gets let me explain that one time I had toothache and stayed away from the dentist for 2 months in pain rather than go to face social contact and interaction with people.

I missed my best friend’s wedding through this condition and always refuse any offers to go places and do things or never invite anyone round. In the past I used to be able to get through situations like this by getting drunk beforehand but now I can’t even contemplate that as it is worse now. My remaining friends have known me for many years and understand how I am and hopefully don’t hold it against me but it gets to me immensely that this is the situation I’m in.

If late I have been thinking of going to my doctor to get something to calm me down but I never seem to get round to it, I try not to dwell on this illness of mine a lot as when I start to think about it the full disaster of this hits me and I just wish I could start again without these problems.
I would like to say things are getting better but I see things only getting worse as every year the sense of failure at not being master of myself increases. I have no idea what the future holds.

The future held more of the same and my father drank more and drifted and I stagnated becoming farther away from normalcy with every passing month.
I learned to use on-line banking and get food delivered from on-line. my father had his problems and I had mine but together we kindoff muddled by just and no more.

Now he is dead the house is empty and I have had to go out 4 times in the last two weeks to attend to funeral stuff etc.. every time being a nightmare of anxiety and pressure. Which if I am honest I only got through because I bought some tranquillizers of the internet. It's like an nightmare that keeps going. Forms for stuff for this and that, wondering how I will get by financially on just my incapacity benefit, felling scared most of the time and a sense of unreality. I should go to the doctors but its the old chestnut - I'd rather do nearly anything that go out.

One of the woman at the money matters place said I should claim for something called DLA but I'm unsure of where to start. I still have to change utilities and things to my name and have applied to have the house switched to my name on the book which the woman said would be no problem as I had lived here for 34 years.

So this is my story till the present I suppose it will not be an unfamiliar one here but there it is.