How not to grow your own

I feel I have been uninvited to the party. I feel as though all the things that are barring me from being at my allotment are being done to personally harm me. I know that sounds stupid but let us not forget that I am mentally ill ~ it pains me to say it but that is the truth. On top of that I am psychically disabled by double vision and access down at my plot? ggrrrr - I swear, I give up.

I am not willing to put myself through another afternoon and night like I have just been through. I go to the plots to try and see beauty, to gain a feeling of usefulness and purpose, to feel embraced and protected my nature. There have been times in the past that being there, doing my hard work has lead to moments were I forgot to be afraid, forgot to hate myself, forgot that I was 'different'.

Yesterday I was there 5 mins and took the biggest panic attack; the paths are not safe, the main road to fields A, B and D are still not even tarmacked and there are whopping great big potholes that someone like me just can't see properly. (I don't know how a wheelchair user would get down there either), the grass paths STILL are not being looked after, so I am walking from one plot to the other (both my plots) scared by the sudden entanglement of my feet and ankles in the grass (so long now) and the worry of what lies beneath all that growth - did someone forget to put tools away, will I fall again and this time land on broken plastic or some nails that have been dropped or scattered by the wind, it wouldn't be the first time.

I am not able to go to my plots and thus there shall be no more reports of what is going on, no more boasting, no more spending time out in amongst the veggies and fruit I have tended for 5 years. No more photos of pure joy and amazement at what can be achieved. I have been very effectively, uninvited to the party. Me, one of the people to whom the allotments meant so much, they even helped me feel better and reduced the amount of medication I was on.

Unless things change and I have absolutely no hope that they will, my journey in Allotmentherapy will have come to an end. I sit here in tears as I was also in tears at the site yesterday. The place is a mess; it grew too quickly and the infrastructure was never in place.

It is with the utmost saddest that I am forced to stop. Maybe I can still gain therapy through continuing to write this blog (it has been one of the best things to have happened in my life) through the eyes of Andrew, I don't know. But after my bad fall in the town centre and my numerous trips and falls at the allotments in the past I simply feel that yesterday (surrounded by abandoned plots) was the proverbial straw that has broken my spirit.

I am too upset to continue writing but I am so glad that I have managed to get this off my chest, it has been crushing me.