reading

Gary still sleeps through his alarm clock. Unfortunately, he’s a little too big to be ‘gated’ nowadays. He’s spent three years in the US Navy – in cramped quarters with his companions constantly going on and off duty – so he’s now even better at staying asleep. I wonder if they sell air-raid sirens at Costco?

Fortunately he has jobs that are flexible and allow him to juggle his hours around his college classes and his many other interests. He works part time doing criminal investigating, while pursuing a degree in communications and marketing at our local city college. A gifted musician and song-writer, he is constantly frustrated by the fact that there are only twenty-four hours in a day.

After a difficult start in America – she was homesick for England for years – Christy has found her niche. Now a certified massage therapist and aesthetician, she lives in a lovely city near the ocean, working part time for an exclusive athletics club, and part time for a chiropractic office.

I feel an ache when I think about the fact that she worked at minimum wage jobs for two years to help put herself through college. But, like Chris, she sets goals and stays focused until she achieves them. In the next two years she plans to open her own private practice. I’m confident she will accomplish this as well.

The move to California cost us almost everything financially, but we made the right decision. In the beginning we had to live on our savings while Chris studied for the California bar exam. He passed at his first attempt – I was so proud of him. He took a job in Fresno for a few years, to become accustomed to the practice of law over here. Then two years ago he opened his own law firm. It was a wonderful and exciting time. Gary left the company he was with to implement a marketing system for Chris, while Annette helped him set up his front office and billing systems. Chris was told recently that his firm has become one of the most respected in the city, in his field of law.

And me? For a while I worked for a bankruptcy attorney, running the front office and doing the filing. It was pretty scary setting foot in an office after nineteen years of raising children and running a household. I moved on to work part time for a calligraphy shop in the Bay Area for a while. Now I’m a freelance artist and calligrapher, and I display and sell my paintings and calligraphy in local galleries and shops in Fresno and the Bay Area.

As for my state of mind, that too is reason to be thankful. I have good days and bad days, just like everybody else. Occasionally, I get ‘flashes’ when I remember a sight, sound or smell, but I’m not overwhelmed by them. The bad things that happened are still there, but I can live with them. I’ve learned to trust that the water will be shallow, and the ground firm beneath it. I think we all have to stop and take stock of our lives at times. We need to make a conscious effort to see where we are going and what we need. And never be too afraid or too proud to ask for help.

When I began writing this book I saw myself as a weak individual who was falling apart and could never be a proper wife and mother. But after putting all that happened down on paper, I know I’m not weak. I’m actually a very strong person who took a lot of knocks before falling over for a while. And perhaps ‘falling’ was the best thing that could have happened to me. It forced me to stop struggling and trying to pretend I was all right, and accept help. Thanks to God, the love and support of my family, and the help of Dr Royston and Lu, I came through it all. There were many times during my stints at Ticehurst when I asked Dr Royston why he was so sure that I’d get better. His reply was, ‘Because you’re a survivor.’ He was right. I am a survivor!

I still have little recollection of the three years we lived at 5 Maple Avenue with my mother, yet I remember so much of what happened before that time. The gap has been filled by the ‘flashes’ which are like jigsaw pieces that still fall into place. It’s amazing how often I make a connection or find a new piece of the puzzle. In the past few years I’ve told quite a few people about what happened to me as a child. A lot of them are very sceptical – especially about the concept of repressed or blocked memories. I’ve done a lot of reading and I know that even the experts are divided over whether repressed memories exist.

I have no witnesses to prove that what happened to me was real. There are a lot of questions only my mother – and the dark-haired man – could answer. But my mother is dead now, and she took what secrets she had with her to the grave. All I can tell people is that I’ve talked to my siblings and cross-checked what facts I can. I may never know exactly how or why these things happened to me, but I am confident ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ that it all really took place.

If the sun keeps shining we may go camping at Bass Lake this weekend, in the mountains north of Fresno. I took Dr Royston there a few years ago when he came to visit. He was in San Francisco to present a paper to the Association for the Study of Dreams.

It was a beautiful day and the high clouds were reflected on the stillness of the lake. We paddled in the water with our shoes off and trousers rolled up. Every so often I bent down to pick up a smooth pebble from beneath the surface. I held it up to the light and watched how the colours changed.

‘You don’t have to call me Dr Royston any more,’ he said. ‘Call me Robin.’

He must have noticed my slight look of concern, for he added, almost immediately, ‘But Dr Royston will always be there if you need him.’

We had both stepped out of the past. Instead of being doctor and patient, we were now just two people – equals – sharing a beautiful day and a friendship.

Both of us love the outdoors and we chatted about wonderful places we’d seen. Robin talked about the Pyrenees in Spain and walking in the Pennines in the north of England, while I spoke of Californian redwoods and African plains.

I know that day was also special for Robin. There had been times, during the worst of my nightmare, despite all of his optimistic encouragement and gentle humour, when I know he doubted that I would ever reach this point. Now I am healed and happy, largely thanks to him and his refusal to give up on me.

Back in Fresno, before Robin left for San Francisco and then England, Christy made a point of telling him how she felt. She put her arms around him and said, ‘Thank you for saving my mother’s life.’

I knew this meant a lot to Robin, and I was so glad to see it myself. It was still all too easy to bring to mind the closed doors, the holes in the wall strategically covered by posters, and the bewildered, angry faces of my children as I left them yet again to be in Ticehurst. They had tried so hard to understand, but often it was easier to blame Robin, and I know there were times when Gary and Christy had resented and mistrusted him. They had seen him as being somehow responsible for my suffering. Now they knew the truth and Christy’s embrace was like a final seal of approval.

Gary was only five weeks old when I fled Rhodesia twenty-six years ago. I promised him as the plane took off that one day he’d go back. Three years ago, it happened. He discovered a new country, Zimbabwe, but it was just as magical and exciting as the place I remember. He went bungee jumping off the Victoria Falls bridge and white-water rafting down the Zambezi. He saw wild elephants and lions in Hwange and watched hippos fighting at Mana Pools. I’m so envious.

With the help of my brothers Brendan and Clive, Gary retraced some of my childhood steps. He visited my cousin’s farm in Bindura and saw the junior school that Chris and I had both attended. Chris’s old high school is now an army barracks. He also went to see 5 Maple Avenue. In a cement rainwater drain that my dad had built, Gary found a set of tiny handprints. All of us kids had made our marks more than thirty-five years ago.

I can picture Gary squatting down and measuring his own hand against mine as a child. He also measured the stories that I had told him of that time in my life. During the bleakest times at Ticehurst when I wanted so much to die, I couldn’t shield Gary and Christy from my pain. Chris told them certain things about my past and tried to explain how the sadness had suddenly overwhelmed me. Much later, when I was well again, they learned about 5 Maple Avenue and what happened to me there. Not surprisingly, it came as an awful shock.

Looking at my handprint, Gary found it difficult to picture me as a little girl. Only later, as they drove towards the Selukwe Road, did he finally make the connection.

‘That’s where Linda used to ride Prince,’ Brendan said, pointing to the stretch of scrubby land between the road and the railway line.

‘That’s when you came alive in my mind,’ Gary told me later. ‘I could see you there – racing through the trees on that wild chestnut horse. You were fourteen years old and you were flying. The train didn’t stand a chance . . .’

Where was I? Eleven years away,

When the wind caught your hair

And your horse beneath you

Gave freedom you alone could understand.

‘Prince’: what a fine name for a Princess’s release.

I could only imagine the view from your eyes,

As your horse took flight

From a world that in the moment could not catch you.

To know such peace, to feel such passion,

While your heart beat as furiously

As the hooves beneath you.

As I think of you, riding through these sunset plains,

I know, now and for ever,

That you will always be a Princess to me.

My mentor, my guide, my mother to be.

It is a mystery to me, that you, my mother,

Could bestow on me such love –

From a world which offered it so sparingly to you.

It is one thing to repeat a kindness,

Yet to give what you never had

Is nothing short of a miracle.

And that miracle is you.

About the Authors

Linda Caine is a self-taught artist and calligrapher. Her work is in private collections in Africa, the Isle of Man, England and the United States of America. To view her work, or contact Linda, please go to her website at: www.LindaCaine.com

Dr Robin Royston is a practising psychiatrist and psychotherapist who specializes in trauma-based problems stemming from childhood.

Out of the Dark

Linda Caine and Robin Royston

About the Book

Life for Linda Caine should hold no fears. As a contented wife and mother, she should have everything to live for. Yet a blackness has started to leak into her thoughts. Images flash through her head leaving her stunned and terrified. On the face of it, there is no rational explanation for the way she feels.

But Linda believes there is something bad inside her. At the back of her mind a voice tells her over and over again that everything will be OK. When it finally gets too much, she can always simply die. ‘How shall I die if that time comes? I need to know these things. They have to be planned.’ It must look like an accident. She will drive off a cliff on her way home from her weekly shopping trip. After all, who commits suicide with a load of groceries in their car?

The raw and powerful journey that Linda takes with her psychiatrist Robin Royston to discover what lies at the heart of her depression will leave you breathless. The secrets in her African childhood and adolescence are buried so deep that to reveal them may destroy her completely. Nothing is what it seems, no-one is above suspicion. Together Linda and Robin race to unravel the clues, before it is too late . . .

JANUARY 1988

Linda Caine

THE BUZZING IS too muffled to wake me completely but too loud to ignore. How long will Gary let it ring? I can picture him in his bedroom upstairs, buried in his duvet so that only his dishevelled brown hair is visible. I know exactly what he’s done – put the alarm clock under his pillow. That son of mine could sleep through World War Three. I wonder what dream he’s woken from this morning. Has he been slaying dragons, or scoring the winning try at Twickenham? What worldly wrongs has he put right since I kissed him goodnight? The sound stops suddenly. Gary has found the ‘snooze’ button and given himself another ten minutes before the alarm rings again.

Chris shifts beside me and I can feel the warmth of his chest against my back. I turn quietly and look at him. His face is pressed against the pillow and his lips are slightly parted. A few streaks of grey are visible in his black hair. We have been married for fourteen years but first met each other in primary school. Like most boys he didn’t think much of girls back then, but that soon changed. Now I could happily lie beside him for ever.

Upstairs, Gary’s alarm clock buzzes again. This time he manages to ignore it totally. Slipping out of bed, I pull on a pair of jeans and a thick woollen jumper. As I sit on the bed, lacing my sneakers, Chris opens one eye.

There are paint pots and throw rugs piled near the top of the stairs. Wallpaper samples stand upright in a roller tray, next to my spirit level and cordless drill.

Downstairs in the kitchen, I find Christy sitting at the breakfast table, studying the side panel of a cereal box. She is already dressed in her school uniform and has her dark hair in a ponytail.

Being lectured on healthy eating by an eight-year-old is fairly normal in our household. Christy is our moral compass – declaring which brands of tuna we should buy (to save dolphins) or insisting that we only eat free-range eggs. Sometimes I look at her and wonder if she hasn’t skipped a few years of childhood.

With the kettle about to boil, I yell up the stairs: ‘Gary Caine, if I have to come up there and drag you out of bed then you’ll be gated after school. Do you hear me? There’ll be no going to Stacey’s house or to the park. You have five minutes.’

I don’t bother waiting for a reply. Somehow Gary always knows how to judge his morning appearances to perfection, or at least to within an inch of being OK. How can my children be so different? Christy is always ready for school on time, homework done and school bag packed, whereas any moment now Gary will come leaping down the stairs, shirt hanging out, hair uncombed and school tie scrunched in his breast pocket. He’ll pour too many cornflakes into his bowl so they spill out when he adds the milk. Then he’ll wipe his mouth on his sleeve, scoff his toast in four bites and give me the most angelic smile imaginable.

As if on cue, he appears, slides onto a chair and reaches for the cereal box. He pours too many cornflakes into his bowl and I stifle the urge to laugh.

Gary is small for his age but if he’s like my two brothers he’ll suddenly spurt when he hits seventeen. I know he gets teased about his size, but he makes up for it with his boundless energy. In between each mouthful of cereal he beats out a rhythm on the table with his fingers. Chris looks up from his newspaper. ‘Do you have to do that?’ He disappears behind the newspaper again.

In mid-chew Gary taps the back of the paper as if knocking at a door. ‘Hey, Dad.’

Chris sighs in frustration and opens his wallet. Over the years he’s learned to go with the flow when it comes to Gary. Chris works as a solicitor in Canterbury and drops Gary at school on his way to work. I always smile when I see them leaving the house – one the image of orderliness in his suit and polished shoes, the other still combing his hair as the car pulls out of the driveway.

We walk out to the car together. In total contrast to Gary (and much to his disgust) Christy is tall for her age. She’s just a few inches shorter than I am and like Gary has a smattering of freckles on her nose, particularly in the summer. I think freckles look cute, but they both hate them.

My little dark blue Metro has ice on the windows and I let it idle for a while with the heater running. I hate the cold. When it snowed last December, we took the kids sledging on Chestfield Golf Course. When we got back, I tried to make hot drinks for everyone but my hands were so cold I couldn’t put my fingers together to pick up the spoon.

I keep telling myself it’s because I grew up in a hot country. I’m just not used to the cold. That’s why we bought such a big house. If I was condemned to living months of the year inside to stay warm, then I needed a sense of space.

Christy’s school is in Swalecliffe, about two miles away. The round trip takes only fifteen minutes – barely enough time for the ice to melt on the side windows.

Back at the house I put on my painting clothes – a pair of tracksuit pants and one of Chris’s old business shirts. The shirt is too big so I roll the sleeves up over my wrists. Then I make myself another cup of coffee, grinding the beans and pressing down the plunger. Too many people treat coffee like fast food. For me it’s an indulgence.

My favourite time of day is that moment when I sit on the staircase with a coffee, listening to the silence of an empty house and planning my day. First I’ll finish sanding the windowsills and skirting boards in the art room. I should have time to paint them before lunch. Then I’ll set up the jigsaw and start cutting the shelving for my art cupboard. I picked up the wood on Saturday.

I have great plans for my art room. I want an extra two desks and chairs, as well as paper and pens, so that Gary and Christy can come in whenever they want to be creative. And I want lots of room to put all the bits and pieces that I collect when they catch my eye or remind me of a particular moment. I can never go for a walk without coming back with rocks, flowers or pieces of wood. I tear pages with pictures I like from magazines, and collect pebbles from streams.

The world is full of pictures that imprint themselves on my mind, waiting for me to put them on paper. Things like the patterns on the petals of a flower, or the texture of wood or a creeper wound around a barbed-wire fence.

Ever since I can remember, I’ve been fascinated by patterns and colours. I love the way certain colours clash when put together by man, yet look stunning when found together in nature.

On wet days I can stare endlessly at puddles, mirrors in the earth, which reflect things perfectly on a clear day, but fragment them when it’s windy or rainy. I love the soft green moss that grows from nowhere on wet rocks and wood near waterfalls and streams. And how spears of new grass look almost fluorescent in the aftermath of a bush fire.

Most of the bits and pieces I’ve collected over the years have been lost or left behind when we’ve moved from place to place. But I still have a pebble from a waterfall in Africa and a stone from the ocean bed off the South of France. The water was so clear that day I could see my shadow below me as I swam. It made me feel like I was flying.

Whenever I fall in love with a place, I bring a piece of it home with me. I also press a few strands of my hair beneath a rock or let them loose on the wind. It probably sounds eccentric, but I love to know that a part of me will always be in ‘my’ places, and that I have a part of them with me.

A gallery in Faversham has started showing some of my paintings – mostly flowers and animals. Occasionally I get a commission, but to be honest I don’t like them. Whenever someone asks me to do a painting, I find myself getting anxious and uptight. The end result is always far duller and less inspiring than when I paint from my imagination.

As I finish my coffee I hear a whimper from the laundry. Poor Sammy, I’ve forgotten about him. I open the door and a ball of black fur comes bouncing into the kitchen, skidding on the smooth floor and back-pedalling furiously to stop colliding with the table.

Sammy is a poodle who thinks he’s a lion. He stands at the door, looking at me expectantly.

I sometimes try to trick him by using funny accents, or mixing up my commands, but poodles are pretty bright. We play the game for ten minutes until Sammy is exhausted. He curls up on the old sheet covering the art room floor, while I start painting.

Occasionally, he nuzzles my leg or puts his head in my lap. He doesn’t like the paintbrush in my hand. I think he remembers being accidentally speckled with white emulsion and having chunks cut out of his fur.

The house has been transformed in the past twelve months. Walls have been stripped, bathrooms retiled and carpets laid.

‘It isn’t falling apart. It’s just cosmetic. Get rid of the wallpaper, rip up the carpets . . .’

For a week I badgered and coerced him into coming back for a second look. ‘Just look at the space,’ I told him. ‘Try to imagine everything painted white.’

Eventually, I wore him down. Now he loves the space as much as I do. Sometimes I get downhearted at how much work still has to be done, but I love watching the transformation. The third floor has two huge bedrooms, which belong to Gary and Christy. Chris and I sleep on the middle floor, which also has a guestroom, study and my art room.

At first I concentrated on the back living room and the kitchen. For the difficult jobs, I had help from Mel, a retired builder whom I met through the church.

Chris and I joined the Swalecliffe Free Church in the early eighties. It was founded by the Baptists but is non-denominational and Bible-based. It has a wonderful free worship session on Sunday evenings, when anybody can say a prayer out loud or ask others to pray about something. Some people sing and others speak in tongues. If you start a song you never finish it alone.

Now I’m involved in the church youth group. I meet with the other group leaders every Wednesday night to pray and work out what we’re going to teach at Sunday School. I find it really challenging because the children are constantly asking me questions and I have to go looking for the answers. My life is really busy at the moment. Apart from the redecorating and church, I play badminton once a week and the occasional game of squash with friends.

When we first left Rhodesia and arrived in England it was a real struggle emotionally and financially. Chris had to study in his spare time and do his articles all over again. Now he’s a partner at his legal firm. We don’t have to worry about money any more. We can afford this house and school fees and the occasional holiday.

Chris works long hours and thrives on the challenges of being a lawyer. He has about twenty staff working under him. I’d be terrified by that sort of responsibility, but he gets excited about it. We are such different creatures. Chris is outgoing and gregarious, well educated and not intimidated by clever people, while I’m shy and reclusive, with a fear of standing out in a crowd. His world is full of lawyers, academics and senior clergymen (his firm represents the Archbishop of Canterbury), while I love art, poetry and nature.

It’s funny because Chris doesn’t normally like artistic people. He thinks most of them are neurotically ‘searching’ for themselves, with their heads in the clouds. ‘How will they see the meaning of life through all the incense they burn?’

That’s the sort of thing you’d expect a solicitor to say, but he’s just teasing me. Chris likes things to be structured and stable – just like the law. His childhood was like that and it has carried on. Not like me. I’ve moved house thirty-two times in my life. The sands shifted under my feet so often that I had no sense of security or stability . . . not until I met Chris.

After I finish painting the skirting boards, I make myself a coffee and a sandwich, and I sit on the stairs, cradling the mug in my hands, feeling the heat soak into my fingers.

My mind begins drifting. It just seems to float off and leave me sitting there. I look at my watch and it’s almost 3 p.m. Two hours have passed. Where did they go? It can’t have been a daydream or I’d have remembered something about it. The time has simply vanished and left no trace.

Still in my painting shirt, I grab my car keys. I pull out of the driveway and turn right, past the small post office and butcher’s, and head towards the main road, Thanet Way, half a mile away. I slow for the roundabout and wait for a gap in the traffic. Every so often I glance at the clock on the dashboard. There are puddles by the side of the road. When did it rain? What else have I missed?

Passing under the railway bridge, past Swalecliffe station, I signal to turn left into Herne Bay Road. Waiting in a queue of traffic, I have a sense that time has gone missing in the past. I can’t be sure. It’s so hard to know unless I have somewhere to be . . . like today. I pass a school crossing and the lollipop lady in a yellow dayglo vest waves me through. It takes me several seconds to respond. I’m still in a daze. What’s wrong with me today?

The road outside Swalecliffe Primary School is locked solid. Cars are double-parked as mothers strap children into the back seats. Bright yellow raincoats are shaken out, umbrellas are folded and windows begin to fog.

Christy has walked half a block to the corner of Kemp Road where I normally park. She’s been standing alone, waiting for me. She clambers in beside me and tosses her school bag onto the back seat. She gives me a hug and I squeeze her for a little longer than normal. As we go, she studies me closely.

‘You’re never late, Mum,’ she says, laughing. The rain has plastered strands of hair to her forehead, where her hood hadn’t quite covered her.

This is our Saturday morning ritual. With Gary at school for the half-day and Chris at the office or playing squash, Christy and I have the mornings together. We go shopping at Tesco’s in Whitstable and afterwards have cappuccinos and slices of cake in their in-store café. I love spending time with my children one-on-one. That’s when I hear all their thoughts and dreams.

Gary’s favourite place is a restaurant called The Barn, which has an enormous thatched roof. We always sit at the front window overlooking the street and each have a ploughman’s lunch. Blue Stilton for me and Cheddar for Gary. He loves the soft white middle of the French bread, while I love the crusts, so we swap chunks of bread. Gary has a knack of making life look easy. When he first picked up a squash racket or rode a horse, he showed amazing natural ability. Christy has to work harder and listen to her teachers, but her persistence pays off. She’s becoming a better rider than Gary because she works for it.

It had happened again. Time was slipping away from me. I can’t remember pulling up to the lights. It’s as though someone hit a pause button and I froze while the world carried on.

When we get home, Christy gets changed and I make her a snack. She dips digestive biscuits into her hot chocolate and tells me about her day. She can sense that I’m distracted.

‘Can I take my chocolate upstairs?’ she asks. ‘I want to listen to a tape.’

I go back to my painting. I have to wash out the brush because the bristles have gone stiff. That’s what happens when you get distracted.

Starting on a windowsill, I work hard to get a straight edge. The trick is not to put too much paint on the brush. There’s a noise outside and it makes me jump. I freeze. Looking out the window, I see a man put his ladder against the wall of the guest bedroom. My heart is racing.

I jump up and close the curtains. Running into Chris’s office, I pull down the blind and then draw the curtains in our bedroom. Afterwards, I press myself against the wall on the landing where nobody can see me. A voice inside my head is saying, ‘Don’t be stupid, Linda. It’s just the window cleaner.’

In the same breath I remember the top windows are open. Christy is playing in her room. I start to panic all over again. My voice is shaking as I call up the stairs, ‘Sweetheart, don’t get a fright if anyone appears at the window. It’s just the window cleaner.’

Taking a deep breath I try to calm down. Back in the art room I write a cheque for the cleaner. My hands are shaking so much that I have difficulty signing my name.

‘You are strange,’ he says, giving me a hug. Then he pours himself a drink and loosens his tie. Gary and Christy are in the TV room. I can hear the theme music of Home and Away. I strain pasta in the colander and watch the steam mist up the windows above the sink. I wonder if I should tell Chris about how I lost track of the time and nearly forgot about Christy.

He knows I’ve been struggling for a while. Some days are like swimming through mud. A blackness leaks into my thoughts and everything moves in slow motion around me. I have to force myself out of bed in the mornings and return to it exhausted at night.

What reason do I have to be depressed? I have a successful husband who loves me; two bright, talented children; a lovely house; my faith in God . . . That’s why I get so angry at myself. I have a great life.

Yet there seems to be a dark undercurrent – something I can’t fathom, or put my finger on. It’s not just about being depressed. I seem to be haunted by images that flash into my head and leave me breathless and struggling to cope. It’s as though a bolt of lightning illuminates a scene for a split second before the darkness snatches it away again. And that blast of light burns the scene into my brain.

Sometimes I see myself lying beneath the water, staring up through the fingers of a hand, spread across my face, over my mouth and nose. At other times, I see a pair of eyes staring furiously at me; eyes that want me dead; eyes that look straight through me as though I don’t warrant the space I take up. I’ve tried to draw these eyes. I have page after page of sketches, but I never draw the face, just the eyes. If I shade the background, the eyes seem to be peering out of the darkness at me.

As a child I was terrified of the dark and of falling asleep. Now I’m getting frightened again and I’m almost thirty-seven years old. Sometimes when I’m scared of falling asleep I lie close to Chris so that I can feel him breathing. It reminds me of when I was a little girl. If I had nightmares I used to run into Dad’s room and lie in the little ‘cave’ between the blankets and his broad back.

The flashes have been getting worse. It’s as though I’ve forgotten something important and I’m being dragged down by dark thoughts. Some days the bleakness is suffocating and I go through the motions from morning till night.

On Sunday mornings at church, I pray for things to get better. But even Jesus seems distant now. What’s wrong with me? Why do I feel so dead inside? Why am I jumping at shadows and having time vanish?

Ben takes me to a quiet corner and we talk about what might be wrong. Ben is middle-aged with a soft voice. He once studied to be a doctor before he felt called to the ministry.

He doesn’t answer. Instead he suggests that I come and see him every week. ‘We’ll study the Bible and pray. In the meantime, I think you should also see a doctor. Tell him that you’ve been feeling depressed.’

A wave of panic squeezes my throat. Deep down I know that I’m cracking up. What if they say I’m an unfit mother? They might take Gary and Christy into care. They might lock me up . . .

I don’t go and see a doctor. Instead, I keep telling myself how wonderful my life is, and try to pull myself together.

JANUARY 1989

Linda Caine

HOW SHALL I die if that time comes? I need to know these things. They have to be planned. Yet even as I ask the question, another voice inside me says, accusingly: ‘How can you do this to your family?’

I answer back, ‘What good am I to them when I’m like this? They’ll be better off without me.’

It has been a year since I started talking to Ben, and I have the makings of a plan. It has to seem like an accident. I can’t bear Chris, Christy and Gary knowing the truth. The idea came to me a few months ago as I drove home from Tesco’s in Whitstable with the weekly shopping.

Thanet Way is a busy road, notorious for accidents. Every so often a sad little bouquet of flowers will appear, tied to a streetlight, or left at the base of a tree. At one point there’s a steep drop on the left side of the road, down to a football field. The road is so high you can see the tops of the trees. With a good speed up, my little blue Metro would fly over the edge. Nobody would suspect. Nobody commits suicide in a car loaded with shopping. It will look like just another accident on Thanet Way.

But the worst part is the depression. It’s like a huge black suffocating cloud. I’m always exhausted and I can’t concentrate. I’ve tried again to talk to Chris but he has such an analytical mind: he deals in facts not feelings.

‘Nothing. I don’t want anything more.’ I know how lucky I am and that just makes me feel even worse. Chris puts his arms around me and I start to cry. Nothing seems to help. I don’t know why. At that moment, I almost tell him about my thoughts of suicide. Just as I open my mouth Gary appears at the door. He wants to know if Chris will come to his rugby match on Saturday. I turn my face away so that he doesn’t see me crying.

As he goes to talk to Gary I feel desperately lonely. I know that it’s not Chris’s fault. He’s a strong, practical man, who’s used to seeing a problem and finding a solution. He’s not used to dealing with depression.

I still have my weekly Bible studies with Ben and Joan White. These sessions are the best I feel all week. Ben and Joan understand depression. It’s such a relief not having to explain things to them. I told Ben about the flashes I get in my mind of being held under water. Since then he’s been even more insistent that I see my family GP.

I haven’t mentioned the time lapses. I keep making excuses for them. Yet deep down I can’t shake the fear that I’m going mad. I keep thinking about St Augustine’s – the local mental hospital. A friend of mine once went there. She said it was such a bleak place that her feelings of depression and helplessness were only made worse.

When I mention this to Ben he tells me to stop. ‘You won’t be put in St Augustine’s. Your doctor will probably just give you anti-depressants. It’s no different to taking pills for high blood pressure . . .’

I shrug. ‘He knows something is wrong, but he can’t understand why. That’s the difficulty with depression – unless you’ve been through it you can’t possibly know what it’s like.’

A few weeks later Ben asks if he can come and see me at home. He wants Chris to be there. He brings a book with him called Anxiety and Depression, written by Professor Robert Priest, a psychiatrist. I can see Chris starting to fidget. He’s uncomfortable with the whole subject and just wishes it would go away. Ben sits down next to him and I make us some coffee.

When I come back into the lounge Chris is looking at the book. Ben is leaning over him, pointing to something. I put the tray down and sit quietly next to Chris. I skim the headings of the pages. One of them says, ‘The Psychological Symptoms’. There’s a list of subheadings below it: ‘Sadness. Loss of Interest. Loss of Energy. Loss of Concentration. Morbid Thoughts. Guilt. Unworthiness.’

Over the next few days Chris reads the book and is totally absorbed. He keeps reading bits and pieces aloud to me at night when we’re lying in bed. I think it helps him enormously because he realizes that it’s not his fault. It also gives him a role. He can be supportive and understanding when I’m tired and struggling.

Day after day, I try to make a stand; to consciously count my blessings; to think positively. I keep rereading chapter three of the book: ‘Self-Help Ways of Overcoming Anxiety and Depression’.

Chapter four is entitled ‘When to Go to Your Doctor’. I can’t face that one.

Rational people don’t contemplate suicide but I’m no longer rational. I have become short-tempered, irritable, anti-social and almost agoraphobic. I snapped at Gary yesterday for having lost a sweatshirt. I really sounded off and I could see he was shocked. Later I found the sweatshirt in the washing basket.

It’s a small thing. Most of the time I simply don’t care any more. The darkness inside me is so complete that I’ve forgotten what the light is like. Death has to be better than this.

Ben knows that I’m suicidal. For months he has been counselling me and recommending books for me to read. Joan sometimes joins us and we all talk. We’ve been praying and reading passages from the Bible together but nothing has changed. It’s not their fault. I won’t go and see a doctor. I’m too frightened of being locked away.

‘Suicide is not the answer,’ says Ben. ‘It’s running away from the problem.’

‘Don’t you understand . . . I am the problem. It’s me. I’m poisoning my children’s lives. I’m dragging them down with me . . .’

Ben leans forward and fixes his eyes on mine. ‘You must promise me one thing,’ he says. ‘If you reach the end, you must call me first . . . before you do anything. Will you promise me that?’

On the drive home I feel happier than I have in months. It’s as though I’ve taken back control of my life. Suicide isn’t a fait accompli – it’s a last resort. And if it comes to that, it won’t be anybody’s fault. It will just mean that I can’t cope any more. The song on the car radio is the old Louis Armstrong classic ‘Wonderful World’. Maybe he’s right.

Christy helps me peel the vegetables for dinner. She wants to know if she can perm her hair. According to her, she’ll soon be the only girl in southern England who hasn’t had it done.

I wonder who she’d ask these questions if I was dead? Who would put her hair in a ponytail, or help her go shopping for clothes? There are hundreds of little things that Gary and Christy would have to learn to do themselves. I should get them ready . . . just in case.

Over the next few weeks I make a conscious effort to make them less reliant on me. Am I preparing them, or releasing myself? A bit of both perhaps. There are small things I can do, like leaving their washed and folded clothes on their beds so they learn to put them away themselves. I teach Christy to put her hair in a ponytail and how to iron her school uniform. Gary starts to polish his own shoes and put his dirty plates straight into the dishwasher.

When it comes to meals I know they’ll be fine without me. Christy has become a vegetarian and taken to cooking for herself. Gary, like his father, loves fast food and prefers pizzas or fried chicken to anything I cook.

My father recently had a heart attack and nearly died. Christy’s prayers concentrate on keeping him well.

‘God bless Granddad and make his heart strong so he won’t have another heart attack,’ she says. In her floral pyjamas and surrounded by soft toys, she looks young and vulnerable. ‘Is Grandpa going to die?’ she asks.

‘I know. But death isn’t really such a sad thing. It just means that one of us is going to heaven and will be waiting for the rest of us to arrive. It’s like when we all go into town and arrange to meet at the pancake place for supper. We might go our separate ways, but we all know we’ll meet up in the end at the pancake place. Heaven is the same – it’s where we’ll all be together some day.’

I tuck the duvet under her chin and kiss her on the forehead. She snuggles up with Noon-Noon and Nin-Nin, her toy bunnies.

Afterwards, in my art room, I sit and think about what will happen if I die. I picture their lives without me. I don’t picture their grief. I can’t go that far. Instead, I see them coping. Surely it’s far better for them to suffer a short, sharp shock and get on with life, than to be dragged down by me.

A couple of days later, I fetch Gary from St Edmund’s and find him standing next to the lecture hall, with his head bowed against the wind. He’s quieter than usual as we drive home. Gary isn’t one to sulk. His coat is pulled around him, with the collar up. He presses his chin to his chest.

I back off and leave him alone. He’ll talk to me when he’s ready. When we reach the house, I unlock the front door and Gary walks inside. A strap from his shoulder bag catches on the door handle. I see him wince in pain as the strap stops him suddenly. As he turns to disentangle the bag he lets go of his coat. There’s an ugly graze on his throat that he’s been trying to hide.

‘What happened to your neck?’ My voice sounds sharper than I want it to be. I know that several boys in his class have been teasing him about his size and pushing him around. Gary might be small but he doesn’t back down.

He tells me what happened. The bullies had been pushing him around all day – bumping into him or trying to trip him as he walked between classes. Some of the girls had thought it was funny and started to laugh.

I sigh and take a closer look at his neck. ‘That’s what they wanted you to do. That’s why they teased you in the first place . . . because they wanted you to react.’

‘I know. But it’s hard. I can’t do anything without them pushing me around or calling me names.’

His shirt is torn and grubby and the graze on his neck is raw. It looks like a burn. There’s also a bruise near his collarbone. I feel myself getting angry. I want to punish whoever did this. I hate bullying. With the right advice and encouragement, children can solve most problems by themselves, but bullying is something different because it’s the work of cowards and thugs.

First thing next morning I make an appointment to see Gary’s housemaster later in the day. Mr Barnard is a tall, good-looking teacher, well liked by the students. I’ve met him once before at a parents’ evening. He ushers me into his office and listens sympathetically as I tell him what happened. I want to say that Gary has enough to cope with at home without being bullied at school, but I stick to one problem at a time. I’m a little worried that I’ll be dismissed as an overprotective, panicky mother, but Mr Barnard is really nice. He’s noticed the problem already.

‘I’ve been thinking how best to deal with it. If I openly warn the boys responsible, it could turn other boys against Gary. Kids often have a strange sense of duty when it comes to sneaking on their mates.’

Contents

Epilogue

AUGUST 2002