I escape, ashamed, to the comfort of my friends’ warm homes. Even then, anxiety stalks me: I know I could end up homeless
- This article is part of the heat or eat diaries: a series from the frontline of Britain’s cost of living emergency
I have a visitor that stops me sleeping, wakes me early in the morning and hangs around most days uninvited and unwanted: I am living with fear.
Each day when I open my eyes, there’s a few seconds of semiconscious calm before my heart sets off to sprint in this race without end. Sometimes I try to calm myself down with deep breathing, but mostly I simply flee from my bed, the cold biting deep as I descend the stairs to make tea and talk myself down. Breakfast is impossible with adrenaline coursing through my body at max strength.
Marin lives in the south-west of England and is in her 60s. Her name has been changed
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