Bryan is a retired public servant living in Canberra. This is his story.
Preface
This story begins with me being a sperm donor. I helped to bring life into the world. This aided breeding was nameless. Donor conceived people feel a hole in their family. An offspring wanted an up-to-date social history. So, this memoir begins at age forty. This was the cut-off age for donation. Being a smart person, I learned how to use the outliner software to write novels. I started writing about characters, time and place. A few months later, I signed up for a writing class. My story continues until I was sixty five. Now I am writing it. Some people suggest some editorial tweaks. The structure is around the main life stages. And my style is honest.
I started well educated, having graduated from several institutions, in the UK and Australia. I was well travelled, having lived on multiple continents, having studied and practised geology, thus acquiring a green ethic, and far from being a young earth creationist, unlike my boss. I have hiked in numerous nature reserves, and have been politically active, as well. I am a divergent thinker, and I have had many hobbies. Therefore, I did not worry about moral concerns when donating. I am an immigrant, therefore I travelled overseas, where I visited relatives as well as pen friends, and toured northern Europe and then the world. However, here I write mainly about mental health. As I broke down from public service work. This is about work related stress.
To sum up, this is my middle age story. Although I complain about the infirmity that builds up over time. I acquired the 4th most common mental illness as a result of a work injury. Workplace violence makes you ruminative. This happened in Canberra, ACT. The recovery process was a long one. This means getting control over your symptoms. Trauma make you feel like you have no control. I was sent around in public sector jobs for rehab. But mental illness leads to psychosocial disability, which is a social problem. I am single. It affects relationships. That's why I've lived in rented suburban granny flats. In 2010, I bought a house in a suburb further out of Canberra.
Company town
On my return from Western Australia, I joined the public service in the ACT, where the seat of the federal government is located. However, I had not been diagnosed as an aspie. I had poor diplomacy and interpersonal skills. I took everything literally and was blind to emotional subtleties. This could have led to bullying by my boss. This disruption opened up a mental wound in my diligent personality. I couldn’t cope with it. So I developed obsessive-compulsive disorder. OCD is a condition in which the sufferer tries to control their life. They often check all that may seem worrying. This excess of control is persistent and impairs daily functioning. The distress or illness defines the mental disorder. A friend calls me picky. And excoriation made my skin bleed! So I got therapies for aggravated OCD. I take medications. And I see a psychologist. A side effect of the medication, was weight gain. That’s a clinical management issue. My world collapsed. My co-workers fled. And I was moved around positions, I argued with my later soul mate. And Buddhists kicked me out for “psychopathology”!
I was technically educated, so my intellect was logical and rational. I went on to play tournament chess. I also took many short IT courses. I studied systems, applications and programming in those courses. I also studied two other programming languages. I wrote a form letter writing program in PROLOG. And I coded an electronics project in C++ as well. But the civil service required political acumen! So I went on to take union work relations training. Then I was tested at Canberra Institute of Technology. I took my experience portfolio with me. So I sat a 3-hour oral test at CIT. Thus I qualified in Public Administration.
Since then, I’ve improved. I’ve been helped by health care providers and by a female ally. I found her at a Catholic support group called GROW. She was a social adept. And she also qualified at CIT. Where she specialised in disability and mental health. She was my girlfriend for five years. And she believed in advocacy, so she helped me with disputes. I persisted with those, and was modestly successful. I learned from resolving such problems. A psychologist also sent me to community centre, where I played sports and took art classes. So I tried out artistic media. Art can be therapeutic. And I even won prizes with my acrylic paintings! Medical treatment allowed me to do various rehabilitation jobs. Then a psychiatrist recommended medical retirement. Since then, I've been a pensioner. I joined a couple of health consumer groups. So I’ve learned about the human condition. My post-traumatic stress symptoms have somewhat subsided. Those are flashbacks. They’re intrusive and involuntary.
My psychologist encouraged me to socialise, so I joined a peer support society and a community centre. The community centre was in the northwestern area of Belconnen, where I met other people with mental health issues. I also wrote to consumers overseas. I grew a small group of friends, both in person and as penfriends. Most of these people had brain issues, ranging from cerebral palsy, to schizophrenia. I learned how to manage conditions with treatments. These health consumers were tolerant. These relationships have helped me feel more secure. Purchasing a suburban house provided stability. It is in Canberra’s north Gungahlin area.
Employment
I came back to Canberra able. I was fit. I was smart. High IQ test scores proved the latter. I excelled in verbal and visual skills! I’ve impressed a psychologist by solving a complex visual test, the first time she’d seen anyone do it! My friends think I’m very creative. I’ve lived in Europe, the Arab world, and Africa. I’m multicultural. I have multiple degrees: honours, two graduate diplomas, and two master’s. I have taught and lectured. I taught in the ACT and its Territory. So I know Canberra.
However, aspie friends hate Canberra’s functional style. I see concrete eyesores. The city is in a rain shadow. The dry air gets worse with air-conditioning, making Canberra the ‘flu capital’. My work exacerbated an undiagnosed psychological problem. My OCD worsened. Which became a medico-legal matter. Then bosses avoided adapting to my infirmity. My psychiatrist added Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Neurotypicals thrive on conformity. But I was non-conformist. An insurance psychiatrist claimed that I had a personality disorder! I couldn’t adjust my working conditions. I kept daily logs of coming and going, along with those logs of time spent on tasks. I had hostile interactions with lying bosses who spoke charmingly--yet attacked my interests. I often endured their angry outbursts. That’s how I ended up losing my last office job. I lost my faith in authority. And my fortune declined. I ended up working as a gardener. I was retrenched to an outplacement centre. As a result, I found myself suing insurers. Which effort I found taxing. The stress of it all made me stutter and anxious. Stuttering makes it difficult to function in social situations. As a result, my self-esteem dropped.
But I have made progress. I have used statistical techniques. I have analysed car fleet usage. I have sampled the ACT Government’s eight thousand page Web site. I have done flowcharts of work processes. I have also planned operations with diagrams illustrating project schedules. I have also done business process reengineering. I have created databases. These were of plumbing fixtures, and of sales. I went online, volunteering for the Massachusetts institute of technology. I entered the data into an MIT research project. That was for artificial intelligence. Thus I added statements into a knowledge base. I also went to the Australian National University. I was a technical officer in its geology department. I was responsible for web publishing lecture notes. All in all, I have worked around the public sector. Of all these, horticultural work is what I enjoyed most. Gardening gave me access to open spaces and nature. As a greenie I also volunteered for a party, and won fund-raising prizes twice.
In the end, my gutsy ally helped me with the lawsuits. She’s great at arguing with insurance companies about her disability. That’s why I found her so useful when I was suing insurers! That was at the Administrative Appeals Tribunal. The AAT decided that I wasn’t seriously disabled enough. That meant I didn’t qualify for service with one insurer. That was the National Disability Insurance Agency. That operates the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). I received modest payouts from the second insurer, COMCARE. That agency administers compo. That agency administers compo. These sums paid for medical bills and lost wages. The latter was called "incapacity". I’ve calmed down a lot since then. So my anxiety has decreased.
Tenancy
Canberra offers a lot of room. Therefore, it's known as the "bush capital". Its suburbs are scattered among nature reserves. Indeed, from pasture, it's possible to glimpse Parliament House! I've resided in low density housing. As I rented granny flats at affordable prices. The Australian Capital Territory prohibits polluting industries. Therefore, the air is typically fresh, from the outback. So the air pollutants are dust, pollen and occasional bushfire smoke. I don't experience allergies to pollen, so that doesn't bother me. The community here is also active, which means I often encounter people who are in good shape while walking on hiking trails.
The ACT has cold winters and hot summers. The latter are bushfire seasons. I lost my cabled utilities in the 2003 bushfire. Then I lost my electricity, phone and cable TV. The smoke from the bushfire stung my eyes while I was outdoors. I also disliked an agent and two landlords. The agency needed Commonwealth Bank deposits, so I paid my rent to their Post Office agents who processed transactions manually. The agency considered my payments late. Their property manager’s references cursed me. My next landlord was a mechanic. He was always complaining about me doing art at night. My next landlord was a lawyer. Who wrote a lawyer too. He wrote an illegal lease! And a greedy neighbour tried to extort money from me.
Geology was part of my background, so I was used to hiking. I have taken my friends hiking through nature reserves, most of which are in the Canberra Nature Park. Namadgi national park has great walks too! I also qualified as a range officer. So I could run pistol club matches. I also got into hobby electronics. For instance, a home-made digital computer is in front of me! And I experimented with a solar panel. So I am technically talented. Despite being a mental health consumer.
Finally, I leveraged my global travel experiences. Therefore, I took a flight to the UK to visit my ageing mother, who was residing in the northern English city of Manchester. During my trip, I also had the opportunity to explore northern Europe, visiting family and a pen pal. This included stops in Sweden, the Channel Islands, and Ireland. Several months later, I returned to Manchester for my mother's funeral. Following that, I embarked on a journey across North America, staying in the USA and Canada. In this time, I met penfriends in Iowa and California. Additionally, I caught up with an old colleague in Alberta. Upon my return to Canberra, I indulged in cycling. Later I spent a maternal inheritance, upon a new modern car.
Ownership
My asset portfolio was small and varied. Some of it was in a pension fund. The rest was in shares. I found it difficult to keep track of my finances. My anxiety caused me to lose control of paperwork. At this point, a psychiatrist advised that I should be retired. That was because I had acquired disability. Consequently a super fund paid out. Then I decided to purchase a home. I sold the shares to finance the project. An inheritance increased my worth. I found that the cost of the home would exceed my funds. My buyer's agent told me to go to a mortgage broker. I asked for a fixed rate loan. I had prudently foreseen the end of the compo. I insisted on a short term loan. I was with Westpac, so I borrowed from there. I then felt crushed by how much the loan payments were! Then my insurance case became expensive. Unfortunately my pension was too modest. The bank refused me another loan. I settled my case! So I got paid back my medical expenses and lost earnings and used these sums to repay my loan early!
My friends told me not to buy a unit; they told me to look for a stand alone house. But I hesitated for years. What was I going to do? It’s a sign of anxiety! A close friend helped me make a wish list; then I got a buyer’s agent who took care of everything. That’s how I ended up owning a modest detached house, which backs onto a pleasant park with a cycle path. I moved ten kilometres further from the centre of the city. Hence, I live in ACT’s northern Gungahlin area. But I don’t exercise as much. My home’s back rooms are insulated; they have pelmets on the curtains. But I ran out of cash, since when the lounge still has no window dressing! The interior of my home is also sparsely furnished.
Inside the house, there is an Ethernet port. That supplies the National Broadband Network (NBN). So I had my computer desk in there. As I was into IT. But a helper objected that it made it hard to sleep. So a friend and I routed data cable along the skirting boards and door frame. Now my study is in the spare room next door. I later got more power outlets installed there. So my shredder also moved. In the master bedroom, the wardrobe has huge sliding mirrors. My bed is a futon, and above it on the wall is my acrylic painting that won an exhibition prize! There’s a little fan heater on the drab carpeted floor. The light is in a glass diffuser. Across the room from the painting, is a picture window. I love the custom curtains around it. There's an old low desk with casters next to the bed. On the desk, is a plastic alarm clock. There's a wooden side table by the door. It's got a drawer full of backup hard drives. There's a full magazine rack on top of it.
A friend said that I wasn't good at working with people. This could be why I had trouble staying in community organisations. So I left a community workshop, and a computer club. An art teacher disapproved of my mention of life drawing. And I lost membership in a political party.
To sum up, I fixed things. I visited Buddhist centres for mindfulness. That's keeping something in mind. I was attacked outside of one of these centres. The attackers were arrested. I then went to restorative justice, where I helped a young alcoholic, whose life was messed up. I also went to a men’s shed. And I took a woodworking course. So my garage has a custom tool board. I painted it and framed it with wood. Amateur woodworkers helped me with installation. I also joined a life drawing group. I have a great eye for form, too. I took a writing course. And I lead an autistic man exercising. I garden. Having done that even during a bushfire, by wearing a respirator! In the same way, for odd maintenance tasks, I have a masks.
Epilogue
Mental health recovery is misunderstood. Getting towards normal is a journey. I built my life to reduce stigma, because that limits opportunities and self-esteem! You can accept a healthy lifestyle. That’s why my home is detached, adjoining a park. Retirement allows me to go to art groups. Stressors no longer challenge me every day. These were situations I saw as threatening. As a result, my symptoms became more manageable. I could work on my fear of harm. Similarly, I’ve gotten calmer. It was possible to lower my anxiety. My flashbacks have subsided to be fleeting. Mindfulness and relaxation are helpful. The general public could learn mental health literacy. This is about recognition, knowledge, and attitudes.
I was picked on at work for having undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder (ASD). The bullying made my neurotic personality worse. I was subjected to relentless sabotage! Thus people with ASD are victimised. That aggravated an anxiety condition (OCD). This made my health worse. I considered the anxiety to be better than an overlapping depression. As In my distress, I became depressed. But I am trying not to sound grim here. Yet I was stigmatised, as community associations purged me! Because of the psychosocial disability, I am single. But the reports of professionals understate the disability. Whereby mental illness causes much disease burden. And such psychosocial disability becomes more common with age.
I’ve come to terms with my condition. It’s a process. That’s why I accept diagnoses, medicine and obesity! It’s normal for mental health consumers to be fat. I’ve also faced work and housing issues. I’ve adapted my lifestyle accordingly. By doing so, I’ve avoided the acute symptoms. These self-management skills can be learned. So I’ve tried to correct those maladies. Through this process, I have become more cognisant of my requirements. As a result, I’m now considered wise and a trusted friend! Mental health literacy is valuable. It involves recognition, knowledge and attitudes.
In this summary, I’ll mention that I’m moderately obese. That was a growing problem, as my weight increased. A couple of decades ago, I was medically retired. People on the spectrum are often out of work. Being retired, means that I don’t keep business hours anymore. So I became a night owl! My mood is now more serious and cautious. That shift may be related to my personality. I’ve resolved many conflicts with authorities. As I completed each of those tasks, my anxiety subsided. I hope that my membership in groups may stabilise.