Experienced on – May 2023 – Ongoing
Published on – 3rd March 2025
The months that followed the crash were tough. The best days were dull and tiresome, the worst were something entirely different.
I had to quickly come to terms with my new reality, to make aspirational adjustments.
A dream of travel, became a dream to go outside. Dreams of personal growth, financial stability, being a contribution to society had to shift, and it was now all about finding a way through.
When I got ill the first time, I was still able to leave the house and be around people. I spent a lot of time in my bedroom, resting, but I knew it was temporary.
But when my ME/CFS returned with a vengeance, I started to understand loneliness.
In my exhaustion I was unable to do anything. Reading would give me headaches, and just having a conversation would make me so tired I would have to go back to bed. So, I searched for something that would waste the hours, make me feel less alone.
I stared out my window. And in my garden, I found a friend.
A squirrel I called Lil’ Bushy.
Anointed Lil’ Bushy due to having all the confidence of a rapper, and you guessed it, a bushy tail.
The squirrel would occasionally run to the back door and give it a little chap, like a schoolmate asking his friend to come out and play. Though each time the door opened, Lil’ Bushy would scurry off back into the garden and onto his favourite perch.
Lil’ Bushy wasn’t alone though, no siree. He had assembled a little posse.
Now I know what you’re thinking, a bunch of squirrels? Nope. His crew included the black and white cat from next door and a magpie.
At various points in the day, I would look up to find them all standing on my garden fence, about 10 inches apart. Just shooting the shit.
But my favourite thing about Lil’ Bushy, the thing that would fascinate me each day, was his diet.
It started with pieces of bread, naturally. Then Lil’ Bushy moved on to tortilla wraps, then a piece of toast—which I thought was odd—but it would get much stranger.
Here is a list of all the items of food that Lil’ Bushy consumed in the nine months that I lived here:
- A block of cheese
- A banana
- A block of chocolate
- An apple
- A chocolate digestive
- A white Kit-Kat
- A chocolate Kit-Kat
- A Maryland cookie
- A Krispy Kreme doughnut
- A Scotch egg
- Some type of Easter egg
- A poppadom
- A Jammie Dodger
- A croissant
- A piece of watermelon
- An omelette
- Multiple packets of crisps (Doritos, Walkers, etc.)
- And my all-time personal favourite: a crumpet
My partner would come home from a tough day at work and want to let off some steam and talk about it. But I just wanted to talk about Lil’ Bushy.
‘Oh right, was Jemma a bitch at work? Well today Lil Bushy got his head stuck in a packet of Quavers!’
My daily Google search was ‘Can a squirrel eat…’ and the response was usually ‘absolutely not.’
I was consumed by thoughts of who could be feeding Lil’ Bushy. My garden was secluded, all our bins locked away, and we lived a seven-minute walk (on human feet) from a shop.
Was it the local school? Could this be Lil’ Bushy’s goldmine? Stealing Easter eggs and poppadom’s from the schoolchildren.
Nevertheless, wherever Lil’ Bushy was sourcing his food from, each day he would return to enjoy the spoils in front of me, just to make my day.
Watching Lil’ Bushy eat his chocolate treats was funny, but I always had the sobering moment when I realised no one was there to enjoy it with me.
Now I’ve always had a supportive network of friends, family etc. but when you’re at home all alone, with your sole aim of just surviving another day, it’s impossible not to feel lonely.
These feelings manifested themselves in a recurring dream.
The set-up was always the same: an incredibly mundane setting, like my old school canteen or a friend’s garden. There would be a group of friends, my brother or sister, and one random person who I hadn’t thought about in over a decade.
The dream would always be from my point of view. I’d slowly approach the group, and they’d never look my way. In fact, they wouldn’t even acknowledge my presence. I’d be hanging around—unable to interject, unable to interact—just stuck watching them talk about nothing.
I didn’t need a dream analyser to understand what it meant. I didn’t feel part of anyone’s life; my existence was fading away.
I was a ghost within my own dream.
There’s a Japanese concept called ‘Jōhatsu’ which translated literally means ‘Evaporation’. It is the act of disappearing from your everyday life and winding up elsewhere. In Japan over 100,000 people take part every year, running away to a new life.
There were various reasons why people did it, to avoid debt, to get away from violence or religious sects. Shame, depression, or just the desire for isolation.
These people yearned for a fresh start, away from everyone they knew. But I was desperate to do the opposite.
What’s the opposite of evaporation? Condensation? Well, that’s what I wanted.
I felt like I was locked away from everyday life and I wanted to be transported back. I didn’t want a short cameo occasionally, and back to seclusion, I wanted to be back for good. For people to rely on me showing up again.
But that’s not how things work.
I knew how fortunate I was in the grand scheme of this illness, fortunate to have a partner come home each night. But that didn’t make the daily battles with loneliness and hopelessness evaporate overnight.
LIFE IN A CRASH 