Mental illness and I have danced the tango for many years.

By Rachel Brittliff

I’ve struggled with depression since my early teens. It manifested as anorexia, repeated incidents of self-harm and even suicide attempts. Achieving mental wellbeing has been a hard battle for me and there have been plenty of setbacks along the way. So when my younger brother died of brain cancer in 2019, I was shocked to find myself coping rather than falling apart.

In retrospect, years of working on mental health management strategies, and the security of having family, medical practitioners and a kick-ass psychologist on my side were key factors in my ability to take hold of my emotions, experience them and continue to function. I also chose to give myself a purpose.

Derek, my precious 35-year-old brother, left behind an incredible wife and a 4-year-old son. In the final weeks of his life, Derek’s wife, Tash, could no longer care for him at home. Even with 24-hour family support and an excellent community palliative care team, the mental and physical load were too much for her. She made the decision to move to a palliative care facility. It was a move that brought much needed relief but caused another problem.

Tash was determined to be by Derek’s side 24/7 for his last weeks but when we investigated, we discovered that there was nowhere that their son Cristian would be allowed to remain with them overnight. Tash was forced to choose between being with her husband at night for his last days or being at home with her frightened and confused son.

After Derek died, Tash told me she wanted to create a legacy for Derek. I immediately knew what we should do. I told her that there needed to be a place where families could go to stay and remain together at the end of the life of a terminally ill parent. I wanted us to build it. Tash loved the concept, and the idea of building ‘Derek’s Place’ was born.

The 18 months since Derek’s death have seen us register a charity, bring together a management committee and plan our first fundraising event, which is happening on 24 April. While having a mission helped me to stay sane in the aftermath of losing Derek, it has brought other challenges for my mental health as time has gone on.

As the mother of two primary school children, a professional working four days a week and being someone who finds it hard to switch off, I’ve frequently felt overwhelmed by the enormity of the task ahead of me. Overwhelm has led to bouts of deeply negative self talk, in which I ruminate on things like the time I’m taking away from my children to work on Derek’s Place and how that makes me a bad mother.

I guess it’s unsurprising that I’ve fallen into bouts of depression at various times. There have been days in the last 18 months where I’ve barely been able to function. I’ve made it out of bed and gone through the mechanics of caring for my kids and doing my job but the whole time I’ve been watching the clock, waiting for the time when I can tuck them into bed and fall into the blissful oblivion of sleep.

Other times, my brain has been in overdrive to the point where I can’t catch hold of the thoughts in my head, nor can I get to sleep to allow the chaos to settle.

Through all of this, my GP has been incredible. We have regular check-ins and discuss my medications and the coping strategies I’m using. We keep my mental health care plan up to date so that I can use the services available to help me get through the tougher days.

Building Derek’s place involves raising $10 million. We expect it to take 10 years to achieve our goals. There are going to be many challenges along the way, both with the charity and in my broader life. As the saying goes, this is going to be a marathon, not a sprint. To help me go the distance, I’m making sure that I keep my support team close because no one achieves great things on their own. Behind every champion is a dedicated team who is with them every step of the way.

Bio

Rachel Brittliff is the Secretary of the Derek’s Place Management Committee. She is a layer in the NSW personal Injury Commission and has previously worked for leading insurance and legal firms. In addition to her paid employment, Rachel has volunteered for Salvos Legal, Aunties and Uncles – run by Wesley Mission and presently volunteers as an ethics teacher with Primary Ethics.

You can find out more about Derek’s Place at https://www.dereksplace.org.au/

Photo Credit: Rachel Brittliff

Photo Credit: Dancers – Marko Zirdum