Jersey, written in 2011, continued

My summer job ended, after all it was the end of October now, and after a few weeks I was offered another job, this was an unusual job, the employers ran a bakery, but they had a massive organic vegetable plot, the woman was my boss and she was a highly excitable and temperamental lady, and the house and bakery were full of shouting, her mother in law lived on site and she and her mother in law hated each other. So it was a tense house, I felt sorry for the husband as he was not a naturally angry man, he was quite gentle and depressed.

Anyway, my job was to tend this massive vegetable plot under her instruction, it was not easy, Jersey soil is mainly sandy but this was thick clay, and it rained all winter, she got me to work this heavy clay soil while it was wet, and it compacted, it was a nightmare to work, she wanted things done in odd ways, her way, it was useless trying to do things the sensible way, because it didn’t suit her, and as a result the growing vegetables suffered, it was hard to look after this great big plot because it was organic and the weeds thrived while the plants struggled in the compacted soil.

 And I became scared of her and her criticism, she was a terror, her husband just plodded along ignoring her nagging unless she went too far, and then there were rows, she told me her mother in law despised her, but her mother in law was lovely to me and I liked her, she urged me to get help for my depression and ‘get to the root of the problem’, but I couldn’t really get help, Doctors cost money in Jersey £35 per time, and there was scarce counselling or psychological help, I will explain later, the costs are sky high for therapy privately, much worse than England.

(14/01/14 I did find and work with a counsellor but apart from her telling me that the churchwarden was crossing boundaries and that he should get a slap on the nose each time he did, like a naughty dog, she and I were not able to engage well, and she often tried to get me to use imagery to override the depression and flashbacks, which I could not do, plain counselling does not work for me)

My adoptive dad paid for me to see the dentist, this is another extortionate cost in Jersey, dentists and vets are mind bogglingly expensive, imagine £100 for one filling? But my adoptive dad added the costs to the loan so I could pay him back later, but it was a bit as my teeth were neglected since ***** (14/1/14 where my teeth were damaged by bad dentistry).

(14/1/14 people I knew in Jersey used to get their teeth done in France as it was cheaper)

There were tensions at the adoptive parents house, the adoptive mother was not happy with me being there(ever), and I overheard a row early on, she was shouting at him about me and saying that they should have let me just move on. This shouting anger from her was in the middle of the night and I sat on the stairs crying and went to their door and tapped on it, she came out but I couldn’t speak, she got him to come out and he took me on his lap on the stairs in pyjamas, he comforted me while his wife went back in their room saying nothing. He told me that I was loved and wanted and that everything was alright, so I trusted daddy and was upset with mummy, she got upset too and was crying and depressed and he said that mummy was ill because of me (although he contributed to her stress by playing her and me against each other and telling her I was in love with him and telling me she thought I was a burden), I felt terrible, she stayed like that for a few days until one day she was all smiles and hugs and had got me a big bar of chocolate, but I was wary, I gave daddy the chocolate. She would pray for me as I left for work every day, with tears in her eyes, and this would remind me of Jill and terrify me.

(14/1/14 just to explain the above, I had only intended to spend the summer in Jersey before moving on to the grape harvest in France, the church warden and initially the Vicar and his wife, had persuaded me to stay in Jersey, the churchwarden’s wife had some history of depression and breakdown due to the churchwarden being sacked from his previous church and she had never liked me being around, poor woman, I didn’t know any better than to go along with his plans to keep me there and she couldn’t cope with my oddness, a lot of people find my autistic ways strange, and I have to do my best to verbalise why I do things the way I do these days as it helps people to understand).

I spent Easter at JM’s house as she had invited me, it was ok, I decided though to go up to ****** to see my brother and his family, my car developed a problem though which spoiled the visit and caused me stress as I had to get the AA to bring the car back to Hampshire on truck and it was repaired on Easter day, which wasn’t ideal, and then my brother and his wife decided they were coming to Hampshire to see my sister on Easter Monday, I felt stupid and hurt because I had put the effort in to go all that way and it had damaged my car, and then they decided to come all the way to Hampshire to see my sister when they could have saved me the journey by arranging for me to go to my sister’s to meet them, I went there to see them as well, but the time and money wasted was really bad for me. And this was how it was with my family a lot. (they are mainly on the autistic and other spectrums and troubled from our upbringing, hence them not being able to help me or be my family, they have their own problems)

Daddy(churchwarden) continued to love me with great affection, too much affection, he would get me to settle next to him on the sofa while his wife sat alone in her armchair, he would get me to settle my head on his lap, but I would only do that with my head facing away from his body, as when he got me to lie there facing him I did not consider that appropriate, but I was restless, I would roll my head up and down his leg and make him laugh.