MVC The Next Chapter

I started Uni in 2024 and did great for a year, passing with flying colours. During the second year I not only took on too much (too many modules) but I got triggered by some of the content.

So what did I do?

I ignored it.

As you do.

Then I reached that point, as my marks came in (dismal) when I realised something had to change:

I had to pivot.

So I emailed the Uni (Open University – excellent) and discussed it with a student advisor and I decided, instead of taking a year out, to pivot from the heavy dyscalculia-challenging statistics and triggering stuff in the BSc Psychology to the less triggering BA Criminology and Psychology.

I dived into the content and was so absorbed and delighted by it that I completed my first assignment two weeks before it was due to be submitted.

I.

Was.

Loving.

It.

You know that feeling when you finally feel normal? After a period of stress, anxiety and trauma clearing? That moment in time when you not only can exhale, but you feel like you can again begin to tip toe forward?

This was it.

It lasted exactly five weeks.

Then I got a bailiff’s letter.

Once upon a time, I was admitted to a suicide prevention unit after council tax enforcement.

The Council was Manchester City Council.

A year or so later, after recovering from the crisis and then being in recovery from a breakdown – related to debt and finances – I was then triggered into relapse by another council tax enforcement – and bailiff action –

this time the council was Trafford Borough Council.

All councils have identical, deliberate, council tax enforcement procedures and they care not about vulnerability. They deliberately, calculatedly, push you to the very brink in the hope and knowledge that you will do something really stupid to pay that bill – even take a loan out or sell your car that you need to get to work.

I am serious in this – it is intentional, callous – psychopathic.

So…. This bailiff’s letter – it retriggered me. Big time.

I need to pivot.

Again.

What will this pivot be?

This pivot is different, I have joined a men’s mental health group, increased my therapy, upscaled my daily breathwork and taken the practical steps of serving the relevant legal Notices on the latest council who I shall not (yet) name – because this time:

I am going to blow the lot of them out of their corrupt callous psychopathic water.

I know safeguarding and vulnerable adult/groups legislation like the back of my hand:

So I have successfully staved them off.

Now… the pivot comes:

To heal, yet again, from this trigger.

To re-remember how to have fun (being in survival mode all the time pushes self-care and enjoyment way down in the priorities so much that we forget it completely).

I want this pivot to be multi layered. I want and intend it to be about my healing first – but then to actually make a difference so that this kinda crap stops happening to vulnerable people.

The debt collection industry is huge – and it is based on fear.

Did you know that the debt collectors are afraid? Anger is a symptom of fear – think about that.

Their letters and calls and texts and emails are anger-based. Designed to freak you out and make stupid decisions. I have in the past used food banks and paid council tax.

How ridiculous is that?

I have been so terrified of council tax enforcement that I have paid them – and not eaten.

A few years ago, I would make a chomp chocolate bar, costing 25p last me three days, having a bite each day, to trick my brain into thinking my body had eaten.

And I was paying council tax to Trafford Council.

I then lost my shit, sent a nuts email I cannot to this day remember writing – and oh how the council were ‘concerned for my welfare’ and sent an alert to my GP.

The employees of Trafford Council made me unwell.

It is important to know that human beings send those emails, letters, press ‘print’ on the computer.

Therefore – those human beings, those employees, should be held accountable for the damage, harm and suffering they cause.

It will take a battle – but if enough of us come together to tell our stories – this will in itself be an act of healing, recovery – and expose the dangerous actions of the people responsible (and guilty) all at the same time.

Want to join in?

Send me a message and we will, er: pivot.

This is how we take that struggle and suffering – and turn it into a positive action that in the long run – could save lives.

And if anyone working for a council is reading this – remember that there is a human being, who’s veins flood with blood and toil just like yours – at the end of every letter and demand you send.

Big hugs, Me xx (all text by me, featured image by Grok).