I had always been a very sickly child. Born at 35 weeks, following a cessation in growth at 30 weeks (sending my poor mother into a 5 week hospital stay), an intubation period of a month, and an asthma diagnosis at 3 months, its safe to say that my immune system has never exactly been robust.
My childhood was littered with hospital admissions, following infection and asthma exacerbations. It was when I was nine that I think I became fascinated by my illness. This coincided with the permanent breakdown of my parents relationship.
Home was not a safe place to be. My dad was an alcoholic, though I didn’t realise it at the time. My mum had anger management issues, mainly taken out on my father. They owned their own business, and worked from home. This only intensified their issues. By 10 years old, I was used as a pawn between them, one which they could use to target each other. By 11, my mother had moved out of their shared bedroom and was sleeping on the pullout bed in my room, later the sofa after I told her (rather insensitively) that her snoring was keeping me awake. By 12, I had been interviewed by the police after witnessing my mother throw my father down the stairs. At 13, my dad had passed away from untreated stomach ulcers (due to the drinking) and sepsis.
My ill health meant frequent trips to the Whittington Hospital in Archway, where I was on first name terms with most of the nurses. To this day, I’m convinced that the increase in asthma attacks (I had been more or less okay between 6 and 9) was due to the stress of my home situation. Somewhere along the way, I realised how much safer I was in the hospital, and how much I needed the attention of the hospital staff to feel loved.
Between the ages of 9 and 10, I believe that I was hospitalised around every two months, spending time on the children’s ward, effectively by myself as neither parents wished to stay with me (Mum said she couldn’t stand the noise, Dad was a lost cause). It was good, I felt safe. I learned about my asthma, the sort of things that they looked for when admitting patients. ‘Salbutamol being taken more than once in 4 hours, wheeze or crackles in the chest, increased heart rate’. Deliberately breaking my four hour rule allowed me to increase my hospital stays. At age 10, I managed to drag out an admission to last a week, simply by inducing a wheeze every time I knew the Doctor was doing their rounds. I’m somewhat sure that the staff knew what I was doing, but let me off because I was 10, and they felt sorry for me (an awfully big-headed assumption on my part).
I was referred to a specialist hospital; Royal Brompton (South Kensington), as someone with ‘difficult asthma’. I think they were able to see through me, lung function tests evidenced one of my tactics for worsening my asthma; I had not been taking my preventer inhaler at any point since it was prescribed. I was able to get round this once I knew that they knew, I would take it in bulk the week before my appointment, hoping that it would even them out. I don’t know if it worked, they never said anything.
My lowest point came at age 10, where I found myself in the High Dependency Unit a week or so before Christmas. This was the straw that broke the camels back. I woke up on a Thursday morning with a cold, needing my inhaler more than ever. I told my mum I was fine; I had a drama performance at school that I didn’t want to miss, and I was going shopping with my friend (more frenemy) after school. I did the whole day; my lessons, the performance and the shopping trip, buying myself my first pair of heels. My grandparents saw them, hit the roof and demanded that they return them for me. I was so embarrassed, and proceeded to have a spectacular tantrum, crying until I fell asleep.
When I woke at 6 am, I was firmly on my way out. I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t talk, I was shaking and vomiting. My mum had to carry me downstairs to the ambulance, who blue lighted me to the hospital (I found this quite thrilling). In A&E, I was informed that had I left it an extra half an hour, I would have died. I was high on pain relief and oxygen, and for years after was convinced that I had seen an angel come to take me to heaven (I am dubious about this). I wasn’t able to eat, was drifting in and out of consciousness, and for the first time in my memory, had experienced what it was like to nearly die.
I was in the HDU alone for the most part, my parents were almost too scared to come and see me. There were no other children. I was discharged the day before Christmas, much to my relief that I wouldn’t have to spend the day in hospital. I enjoyed the day, thinking the ordeal was over, and resolved to be more careful in the future.
The episode, however, had alerted the staff. They were convinced I was being neglected, and my parents were placed on the watch list. We were referred to Social Services, and my mum was almost interrogated into how she allowed me to become so unwell, heavily insinuating that she was an unfit mother. I was floored; this was my fault! I had deliberately not been taking my medication, I had deliberately concealed how unwell I was. It was nothing to do with my mum.
We were under the observation of Social Services until I was about 12 (somewhat unclear). They were around through the domestic abuse, my illness, keeping a very close eye on my family. It was so embarrassing for me at that time (I still struggle to think about it). It felt so foreign; this sort of thing belonged in a Jacqueline Wilson book, not my life! This didn’t happen to middle class children in London, it was characteristic of people of lower income backgrounds! My view was incredibly rooted in North London classism, naivety and a blossoming superiority complex. People of all backgrounds are affected by the issues that were harming me, hidden behind closed doors. These things are not determined by class, or family unit or socio-economic background. We are all people, who have the capacity for great evil alongside great love.
Despite the extremity of this episode, my self destruction via illness did not stop. I spent the third week of secondary school in hospital, having induced an attack, and allowed myself to get sick beyond beyond help before telling my mum early into my dad’s ICU admission. After my father’s death, I stopped on the self-destruction trip through my asthma, preferring to allow my mental health struggles to take the forefront. However, this was the birth of my extremely unhealthy coping mechanisms, ones that I am still trying to shake to this day.
Dorothy Douglas 