would?”
“God. I thought that’s what she meant. Miriam spoke about God as if he was a real person, like he was in the same room, really there. She’d often talk about Him and mean God.”
“What else?”
“I tried to calm her down. She just kept on, a lot of it was garbled but she kept saying she couldn’t hide from him and she didn’t know what to do.”
God? Or the grey haired man? Could it have been him?
“What did you think she meant when she said she didn’t know what to do?”
“About the state she was in, about getting help. I told her to go to the hospital, that they’d make her feel safe but she wouldn’t listen. But I was only guessing. It was hard to understand her. And I told her to get a taxi and come here. I’d pay the fare.”
“Do you know where she was ringing from?”
“No. I assumed she was at home. Then she rang off. I tried ringing but there was no answer. I even tried to ring Connie but I couldn’t remember which school she taught at. If only she’d have come here, I could have got help and then ...”
“You never told the family about this call?”
“No. I thought about it. When I wrote with my condolences. But I couldn’t see what good it would do, to hear that she’d been so distressed. They knew that anyway, given what happened. Do you think I should have?”
“I don’t know. I’ll be telling them now. It tells us quite a lot more about how she was.”
Connie Johnstone had found it impossible to accept that her mother had become so dramatically unstable that Now I had testimony from one of her oldest and closest friends that she was suffering from delusions by the early afternoon and was incoherent. It was the first evidence I’d found of her changing state of mind. The decline had been rapid. By the end of the afternoon she’d reached the point of no return. I wondered what would trigger that sort of episode. Something external or was it just part of Miriam’s make-up, the black dog of depression poised to rear up with no good reason to devour her?
“If only she’d come here,” Hattie repeated, the firelight flickering in her tear filled eyes.
If only.
Chapter Twenty-four
Over the years I’ve built up a network of contacts, some friends, some acquaintances, who I can ask for help in the course of my work. People who have their own expertise and don’t mind giving me a little time.
Moira, our GP is one, and also a friend. I hadn’t seen her for some time but that didn’t matter. I rang and asked her who she knew that I could talk to about women and mental health; she referred me to Zoe Roberts and gave me a number.
“She’s involved with MIND, and various community mental health schemes,” Moira said, “but she’s also done a good few years in hospital so she’s a good all-rounder. And she’s still publishing research.”
We left it at that.
Zoe Roberts was happy to talk but not available till later in the day. “Ring me at home,” she suggested.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, it’s fine.”
I rang back as arranged and described to her what I knew of Miriam’s mental health history and explained that the family were resistant to the scenario that she’d gone from being apparently well to suicidal in a matter of hours. Could it happen like that?
“Well, it did in this case, didn’t it?” Zoe pointed out. “Medicine is as much an art as it is a science. Changes in mood, response to drugs, social context, cultural mores; they all impinge on our health and they are all impossible to measure in neat scientific units. How we feel is hard to quantify, it’s subjective, it has to be. We can point to statistics or patterns or probabilities but there are always exceptions, lots of exceptions. What you’ve described isn’t the most common story but nor is it unheard of. And it is definitely possible. Everything’s possible.”
“And can you usually find something to explain why someone becomes suicidal one day when they’ve not been
“God. I thought that’s what she meant. Miriam spoke about God as if he was a real person, like he was in the same room, really there. She’d often talk about Him and mean God.”
“What else?”
“I tried to calm her down. She just kept on, a lot of it was garbled but she kept saying she couldn’t hide from him and she didn’t know what to do.”
God? Or the grey haired man? Could it have been him?
“What did you think she meant when she said she didn’t know what to do?”
“About the state she was in, about getting help. I told her to go to the hospital, that they’d make her feel safe but she wouldn’t listen. But I was only guessing. It was hard to understand her. And I told her to get a taxi and come here. I’d pay the fare.”
“Do you know where she was ringing from?”
“No. I assumed she was at home. Then she rang off. I tried ringing but there was no answer. I even tried to ring Connie but I couldn’t remember which school she taught at. If only she’d have come here, I could have got help and then ...”
“You never told the family about this call?”
“No. I thought about it. When I wrote with my condolences. But I couldn’t see what good it would do, to hear that she’d been so distressed. They knew that anyway, given what happened. Do you think I should have?”
“I don’t know. I’ll be telling them now. It tells us quite a lot more about how she was.”
Connie Johnstone had found it impossible to accept that her mother had become so dramatically unstable that Now I had testimony from one of her oldest and closest friends that she was suffering from delusions by the early afternoon and was incoherent. It was the first evidence I’d found of her changing state of mind. The decline had been rapid. By the end of the afternoon she’d reached the point of no return. I wondered what would trigger that sort of episode. Something external or was it just part of Miriam’s make-up, the black dog of depression poised to rear up with no good reason to devour her?
“If only she’d come here,” Hattie repeated, the firelight flickering in her tear filled eyes.
If only.
Chapter Twenty-four
Over the years I’ve built up a network of contacts, some friends, some acquaintances, who I can ask for help in the course of my work. People who have their own expertise and don’t mind giving me a little time.
Moira, our GP is one, and also a friend. I hadn’t seen her for some time but that didn’t matter. I rang and asked her who she knew that I could talk to about women and mental health; she referred me to Zoe Roberts and gave me a number.
“She’s involved with MIND, and various community mental health schemes,” Moira said, “but she’s also done a good few years in hospital so she’s a good all-rounder. And she’s still publishing research.”
We left it at that.
Zoe Roberts was happy to talk but not available till later in the day. “Ring me at home,” she suggested.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes, it’s fine.”
I rang back as arranged and described to her what I knew of Miriam’s mental health history and explained that the family were resistant to the scenario that she’d gone from being apparently well to suicidal in a matter of hours. Could it happen like that?
“Well, it did in this case, didn’t it?” Zoe pointed out. “Medicine is as much an art as it is a science. Changes in mood, response to drugs, social context, cultural mores; they all impinge on our health and they are all impossible to measure in neat scientific units. How we feel is hard to quantify, it’s subjective, it has to be. We can point to statistics or patterns or probabilities but there are always exceptions, lots of exceptions. What you’ve described isn’t the most common story but nor is it unheard of. And it is definitely possible. Everything’s possible.”
“And can you usually find something to explain why someone becomes suicidal one day when they’ve not been
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