Many A Topic

IN WHICH GLEDWOOD talks on many a topic in a far happier way than yesterday... Then Barbra sings "Memory"...

I DIDN'T GO to the brainwashing meeting. I only rant, interrupt and express my wonderful opinions when I'm manic. Then I come down and can't face the meeting again. So I'm too depressed and paranoid to go. So I stayed in bed all day and got up at 4pm. I wasn't lying there skulking by the way, I was fast asleep and ignoring my phone. I've learned to ignore it's chirps over the few days I've had it. This phone has the loudest ring of any phone I've ever had. But it's a flip phone AND you have to press the button to pick it up. So I miss loads of calls just by fumbling with it. And I'm too stingy to ring anyone back. Or in too much of a bad mood (today).

I have to go down Morrisons to get a 54p 2-litre bottle of cloudy lemonade. It's what I'm drinking these days instead of alcohol. I did have yet another black cherry flavour cyder today. That makes 2 drinks in 2 weeks ~ oooh. Yeah so I had this drink. The cherry flavour was my attempt at switching from strong drink to soft drink. It was meant to be a crossover. Unfortunately I loved the taste so much I think I was addicted to that more than the alcohol. So now I'm on cloudy lemonade. The acidity of the lemons matches the acidity of cyder. So my teeth don't miss out on being rotted through the lack of drink.

I'm really pissed off with Buta my old drugs worker. Buta was the titration nurse. Titration is chemical torture where they "cautiously" give doses far too small and leave you in withdrawal for days on end at the beginning of your script. Methadone takes three days to reach a therapeutic level (meaning that your blood level is twice as high on day three despite no elevation of the dose) ~ this is yet another bad thing about methadone. It takes days to "go in". But it also takes days to come out again. Making it far, far harder to detox from. Now if heroin is notoriously hard to come off, why on earth give heroin addicts methadone which is EVEN HARDER to detox from? Somehow I get the feeling nobody cares at all for drug addicts. Soon as I can I'm going on Subutex. But yet again we have a problem, because methadone is too "sticky" to transfer over from without doing two days methadone-free ~ ie two days climbing the walls. With heroin you just need 18 hours clean. Everybody who has done it says you basically go on heroin for four days and switch off that. The only other option is dihydrocodeine (DFs), which is so weak it must be dosed four-hourly. I've found a source of dihydrocodeine, so I'll get enough pills for four days and use those. Why on earth the clinic won't switch you to dihydrocodeine I have never understood. But it's just more proof that they don't give a damn about their clients. They only care for their own jobs. I already have two copies of the "how to make a complaint" leaflet. The way things are going, that formal complaint will go out sooner rather than later.

So I'm depressed today. I think sleeping has a lot to do with it. As soon as I heard that loss of sleep is a "symptom and a cause of mania" and that excessive sleep counts the same for depression, I have been sleeping as little as I possibly can, so I can be happy. Also sleeping is the biggest waste of time out there. I was hong-donging to Chinese until the early hours. I've learned to tell the time. I do know the numbers, but I hardly know them fluently. And they're not pronounced the way their transliterated. Yī 一 one is pronounced "ee", wǔ 五 five is actually "oo", qī 七 seven is "chi"... Surprisingly I managed to follow Mrs Li telling me the time on CD. I was really shocked. I was so depressed when I listened to it this evening. I must have felt how "normal" people feel, who don't truly believe they'll ever get far, when hearing a person blabbering on a Teach Yourself Foreign CD. Utterly hopeless. I'm only abnormal because I believe in myself, at least as far as picking up blabbery foreign tongues is concerned. Like I said, intelligence doesn't come into language acquisition; perseverence does. Half a BILLION Chinese speak Mandarin as their second language and they learn it through immersion. If immersion isn't possible, persistence will pay.

Anyway they say you learn a language by it being babbled out around you, but I grew up in Welsh Wales and got nowhere with Welsh ~ mainly because the teachers at school had never learned a langauge in their lives; they merely grew up speaking Welsh from the cradle. So we were never told "this is a feminine noun; that is an irregular verb" just "it goes like this". Which is like teaching mechanics without ever naming parts of the car! Teach Yourself Living Welsh (as it was called) explained all this to me and I got an A grade at GCSE. Had I relied on our teacher I doubt I'd have got better than a C. It was always my ambition to join the mother tongue set in Welsh but I never managed it. I was too thick.

The beginnings of my decline set in when I was doing my A Levels at school. These are the exams you take age 18. GCSEs are usually age 16. I did try and concentrate but my language skills were awful. Essays riddled with mistakes. Years of "tuition" and yet I still couldn't remember which words were masculine, feminine or neuter. In English I did OK essays on the "texts" we studied, but it was only poetry I was truly any good at critiquing. Already I was getting depressed in this period. During term time I felt fairly OK; it was during the holidays that it hit me. Every exam I took I got a grade lower than predicted. Then I took a year out. Rather, wasted a year out. Was more depressed then. And when I did finally go to uni, I was very quickly depressed out of my mind. The shrink I ended up seeing asked me constantly whether I was hearing voices. That should give you some idea of the impression I made on people, because I wasn't going into that office trying to create any kind of impression good or bad. What he saw was what everyone saw. I felt so dire when on my own that I ended up sitting in other people's rooms. I had nothing at all to say. My presence was only accepted because as soon as I got into cannabis (which happened very quickly) I brought a lump of hash with me everywhere so everyone got a smoke. That didn't make anybody like me, but they at least tolerated me.

It took twenty years from first seeing a psychiatrist to getting full bipolar symptoms. In the beginning I only got depressions. Then I started over-reacting to antidepressants, so I got called "manic" by somebody with two manic-depressive relatives. Eventually my mood started swinging on its own. Only the depressive swings were vicious. The highs were really nice. But then I went on heroin, which blanketed my mood to a flat-line so I thought my depression was cured. Then I went on methadone. But the methadone days were so intolerably low I continued using heroin for years while being scripted methadone. Eventually mania did break through so voraciously that heroin would no longer stabilize me. (Though I have to say this only began when there was a drought in the heroin supply and so no chance of scoring anyhow.) Ever since I went manic last December my moods have been all over the place. Deshane says I have the so-called "negative symptoms" of schizoaffective. It means I just cannot engage myself with many aspects of life. Yes I can do Chinese obsessively. I can do things obsessively. ButI cannot do many things normally. As a plate-spinner I'd have one plate going better than anyone else. But the other six spinners wouldn't even have plates on. Let alone wobbly ones. So this is how I run, or rather don't run my life. It's still in utter chaos but I won't go on about that. How did I get back on to mental health? Oh yeah because the clinic are trying to damage it by forcing me into abusive coercive brainwashing bullshit groups. Well I'm not going. Bar one next week which comes directly after my appointment I've had it with their punishment group.

Buta did tell me there was a way I could go to rehab for stabilization, not detox. Which means I could cut down my dose down to 70mls in about two weeks. I'd be up for that. In order to do this I would need to do their rehab group. I don't mind the idea of that one. Hopefully it wouldn't be full of people on a prison-swerve. The bog-standard group I was pushed into attending was for people who had been caught shoplifting. They only went under duress, because if they failed to attend more than a couple they'd get chucked in prison. Well they're lucky. I'd rather go to prison than do those groups. But what option do I have? The ways things are going I'm going to end up in the nuthouse anyhow. Guess what that CRAP they were prescribing me was actually CAUSING my anxiety. The anxiety I took street-bought Valium for. (Very infrequently, it has to be said; but one pill dirties up the test for two weeks.) So I'm OFF the pills and paranoid and depressed as a result. ALL I NEED IS A DOCTOR TO PRESCRIBE THE QUETIAPINE I WANT. But the NHS has let me down yet again. I don't even have a psychiatrist. They have transferred me from a consultant I knew and respected to no-body. My paperwork appears to have fallen down a black hole. So I'll probably only get quetiapine in the nuthouse. I could do with a break anyhow.

Why they just won't prescribe it to me I have no idea. Oh yeah because I used to have a doctor and now I don't. Will someone explain that to me please.

Well I've got to go. EastEnders is on. And they're doing prison scenes on Coronation Street. I love women's prison dramas. Why on earth did they cancel Bad Girls. When I lived with Lona, who kind of had mental health "issues" of her own, the two programmes we watched together (apart from EastEnders) were Bad Girls and Footballer's Wives. Footballer's Wives eventually got Joan Collins then they cancelled the entire show! It was the only thing about football (apart from the World Cup final) I've ever enjoyed watching. And the world cup final was more entertaining for France getting boo'd and Italy getting cheered. Because the French and the Brits hate each other ~ in a loving sort of way. Britain and France have almost equal populations. They have about five times more land. We have a superior language. They have high taxes for the rich, spectacular natural scenery and far better food. We have London. They have Paris. The best parts of London are far superior to Paris. They have Galleries LaFayette (all perfume and women's clothes). We have Harrods which sells just about everything. Harrods' pets department sells axotlotls and fishtanks connected by swim-through tubes. Their hifi department is amazing. It's the stuff you'd buy naturally if you had a proper income.

Did South Africa win the last world cup? I thought the African teams were only in there to make up numbers. World football is usually Europe vs South America. I feel sorry for Americans having to watch American football (a very camp version of rugby) and baseball (glorified rounders). Football is more versatile than American football because it can be played on just about any bit of flat ground with a ball. No special equipment required. I was actually quite good at football. When I troubled to make an effort at playing. Which I did about three times in my life. The main reason I hated it was that I was "supposed" to like it. Also I loathed all team sports in childhood. And I hated ballgames. Rounders/baseball is the worst. You're supposed to hit the stupid thing with a glorified pea-stick! No wonder I always missed. Most exciting thing about playing football at school was deliberately running to the opposite side of the pitch and avoiding the ball at all costs. The only sport I enjoyed was crosscountry walking (though we were supposedly running). The only sports I was any good at were the hundred metres sprint, the high jump, long jump and triple jump. Everything else I was crap at.

I can't remember where this post was going. Why am I watching Coronation Street? Oh yeah because of the women's prison. Best women's prison drama of all time was Prisoner Cell Block H (known by other titles in other countries; it's the 80s Aussie drama by Grundy Television). My favourite episodes were when Meg Morris (formerly Meg Jackson, until her husband was murdered with a pair of scissors by Chrissie Latham) and the governor (both the kindly witch old one Mrs Davidson and the lesbian gym mistress type... Ann Reynolds (not that I just looked that up on Wikipedia).

Oh cripes it's late I've got to go. Dà hǔ tóu fēng 大虎頭蜂！

(Say that to a Chinese person, I dare you. They'll laugh aloud. It means "giant tiger head wasp!")


Illustrated: beautiful sleep; "green" ~ yucky noxious methadone; the Welsh language; not tits and bums but manic-depressive mood swings; Joan Collins and Zoë Lucker in Footballers' Wives; cockney Chrissie Latham from Prisoner


MEMORY

I'm not sure, but this might actually be a real Barbra Streisand pop video...
Barbra's vocal knocks Elaine Page's effort out the window!



HOT NEWS! DANCE DRUG ECSTASY TO BE USED AS CANCER THERAPY!

The Michael Jackson of Literature (truly BAD!)

IN WHICH Gledwood speaks of health and social issues and the Chinese language yet again as well as:~~~~~~~

MY INTELLECTUAL BOOK is brewing in me like finest beer. I can't reveal ANY points of plot, character or setting but suffice it to say it shall be the finest and most amazing book ever written. I have to big myself up. Let's face it if I levelled my ordinary standard of self-esteem at my book I'd think it the worst thing since unsliced bread! I am taking inspiration from Michael Jackson and Barbra Streisand. Two entertainers at the top of their game. When they perform a song, everybody else's version becomes redundant. I've always seen my writing as the way of turning the sour old lemons of my personality into artistic lemonade. And the sour grapes of my past into finest wine.

There shall be NO heroin in my children's book. No social problems. No divorce. No lesbian single parents battling the social worker. No miserable children passed like an unravelling parcel between parents at mind-wrenching "access" weekends. I might one day write about an unhappy child because I was one myself. But it won't be my first go.

Duta my druggieworker asked me the secret of my plastic surgery-style skin improvement. I admitted to her it's just a £3 tube of "soap with bits of sand in it"... Otherwise known as Facial Scrub. Use it five times in a row after not bothering to wash your face properly in months and the effect is as drastic (if not more so) than dermabrasion or a chemical peel on a rich and overpampered female. I would have imagined that exfoliants work better on male skin than female as men have tougher skin that needs smoothing. Take a look at a middle aged woman, compare her soft skin to a craggy old man's and you'll get my drift.

The recent London riots were fuelled by Facebook and Twitter ~ so Channel 4 News was claiming tonight. I'm a bit behind the time as regards both of these social networking sites I'm afraid. Twitter appears to be like Blogger with an extraordinarily stingy words limit (how could someone like me blog in 150 characters?). As for Facebook that is not a "blog" at all. A blog is an account what one ate, of one's bowel movements and what colour toilet paper they buy. A blog is linear. Not spider-shaped, as Facebook appears to be.

A 27 year old man died after being sprayed in the eyes with chili pepper then shot and tortured three times with an electrocution device. Now this is why so many people have grievances against the police. Not necessarily that they have been abused and nearly killed in this way, but that they know that in the wrong circumstances they might be. CS spray and Tasers are used against the mentally ill with impunity ~ usually in the name of bringing a "disordered" person to a "place of safety"! Torture them first, then give them the psychiatric care they need. And wonder why they have lingering paranoid ideation and issues of trust! Mental hospitals chuck people out far too early. I remember meeting a manic woman my doctor's car park. We were both pacing frantically. I because I was detoxing off heroin (on nothing) and so was slightly "agitated"; she because she'd just been discharged from hospital following a bout of psychotic mania. If this was considered fit to go home, what on earth was she like when she was "ill", I wondered. I heard an Indian doctor, who practises in India spouting off on the benefits of care in the community. But did anyone ever ask the patients what they want? Most long term mentally ill ~ and I'm talking of severe ongoing conditions here ~ actually prefer being in hospital to the cold wide world that shuns them so cruelly. But does anyone ever ask the mentally ill what they think? I think not. Tht's why I'm only half joking when I talk about a nice retreat to the nuthouse being easier to arrange and cheaper than a CitiBreak to Paris or Brussels!

By the way I found out my local psyche unit (and I have no idea where it's actually located) is a building on the grounds of a general hospital. I'm far less put-out about the prospect of going there now. It means when I go out for a ciggie break I can go for a wander amongst the population with broken legs, drips and haematomas and those who have just given birth. I once saw a man take his drip down to the smoking area. He looked like a troll dragging a parrot's cage.

Today I learned the numbers one to ten in Chinese they are: 一二三四五六七八九十 that's yī èr sān sì wǔ liù qī bā jiǔ shí. I had problems with wǔ, liù and qī especially. I am not very good with numbers, days of the week or months because there's little to visualize when you learn the word. I don't have a numbers brain. That's why I never pursued a career in medicine ~ my absolute ideal vocational job. I cannot describe how much pleasure I would get lancing and draining abscesses, cleaning wounds, not to mention banging up old ladies with morphine! Seriously I adore medical stuff. But I'm just too thick by far to get accepted on a medicine course because not only do you need A Level biology and chemistry (and if you don't have biology you need MATHS ~ ukh! ~ but A Level PHYSICS is a necessity. I'm absolutely lost with physics. The only subjects I was any good at were English literature, modern languages and law. Law, interestingly, was the only subject I was outstanding at. I'm only averagely good at languages and literature. I persevere with the language studies because they motivate and inspire me. You are, after all, only learning to speak, listen, read and write. I know I will succeed in Mandarin Chinese, not because I'm brighter than anybody else, but more persistent. Just remember that 500 million Chinese speak Mandarin as a SECOND language and you realize there really is no excuse for calling Chinese "difficult". Different would be the operative word. German, on the other hand, is not that different but extremely difficult. As is French. Every single word is male or female in these languages and the Germans have a neuter gender on top! Now THAT is HARD. Learning pretty pictures to go with every word inspires me to eat more Chinese food. And I love Chinese food.

I'm eating Asda's own Chinese chicken curry and egg fried rice. They've made the mistake all the supermarkets seem to make; they douse the curry in five-spice to make it Chinese. This is NOT what takeaways do. Why can't they just copy the takeaway? Every single time I buy frozen takeaway-style supermarket food I have to add my own monosodium glutamate. Indian food and most especially Chinese food without MSG is like nonalcoholic beer: a total waste of time. I absolutely love MSG and have just finished a half-kilo packet. I also heard somehwere it could have triggered my manic episodes. As mania and psychosis are linked to dysregulation of the brain's glutamate receptors. So whether Chinese food drove me potty or not, I'll probably never know in this lifetime, but it does make an attractive theory...

WITH ONE LOOK




NIGHT OF MY LIFE (Freak Brothers mix)




Illustrated: Michael Jackson ~ didn't look so terrible with the original nose, did he?; the taser: officially sanctioned torture; Chinese chicken curry always contains onions and peas and lashings of monosodium glutamate!

Bipolar disorder and glutamate: research link
"The gene, GRIK2 (glutamate receptor, ionotropic, kainite 2), encodes for a glutamate receptor, specifically glutamate receptor 6 (GluR6). Glutamate is the predominant excitatory neurotransmitter in the central nervous system."

Ill in an ill city

I WAS FEELING TERRIBLY ILL TODAY. I couldn't sleep until well past 6:30am. Woke in terror just after 7, thinking I'd overslept and eeked out my sleep until 9:45. Then I flew up the road, drank my methadone, which frankly doesn't seem to be holding me as I get up feeling like a block of ice every morning and got the bus to the drug clinic. I was dressed in full winter coat and my pajamas (which are a pair of jogging bottoms and a crusty old jumper). No way was I going in a shower the way I felt. I crawled up the road to the clinic with chills, nausea and fatigue. Of course as soon as I started talking my head was going quickly yet again and I was in an "elevated mood" (I'm starting to get sick of that phrase, but it's better than being depressed, hey). It's now 1814 hrs and part of me could sleep now but I don't want to sleep. Considering I didn't get a lot more than 2 hours last night I feel pretty good.

I called in on Valium Marilyn on the way back and was instantly struck with terrible wind. I ran to the toilet. Bullets of constipation came firing out, followed by a slithering serpent of diarrhoea that got sloppier and sloppier until eventually it was like melted chocolate ice cream spraying out of my arse. It got all over the round-the toilet rug, all down my leg. Then I tried to flush the toilet and it blocked nearly spilling my diarrhoea water all over the floor. Valium Marilyn said "aww don't worry about it we all get the shits sometimes" but it was like a scene from a Ben Stiller film. You know where the rodent prevents him flushing the loo or whatever it does.

Tomorrow I'm hitting my dr for sleeping pills. I desperately need some zopiclone 7.5mgs. They are the only sleeping pill I find truly effective ~ equivalent to over 40mg temazepam. Temazepam just makes me watch late night TV feeling relaxed and rubbery. Zopiclone actually makes me drop off just like natural sleep. Within an hour I'm usually out for the count. Even when severely manic I got to sleep within 2 hours of a single pill. I did only sleep 2.5 hours a night but would have stayed awake for days on end without it. That stuff about your body "getting the sleep it needs" is a damn lie. Yes it might be true as regards MILD insomnia, which isn't worth worrying about. But if you're sleeping less than a quarter of your normal ration with no end in sight it just hypes you up more and more and more and causes severe irritation. Actually I have FOUR separate issues for my GP, so I'd better write them down.

Duta my drugs worker laughed aloud when I ranted on about my farts but she said the chills and malaise were probably down to alcohol withdrawal. I haven't drunk anything since Saturday morning latest. Possibly Friday afternoon. (I don't want to know when my last drink was: frankly I don't care). It's true gastrointestinal distress, nausea and diarrhoea, sweating and malaise are symptoms of alcohol withdrawal but I thought you usually got the shakes and I haven't had any shakes... So I don't know. Also I feel worse today than any other day. Yet I'm not craving drink at all. Does this make any sense to anyone out there? Could it be drink withdrawal? I have been drinking fairly heavily for about ten years. Though the consumption was little above the government's recommended limit in the end, I did used to drink three litres of white cyder a day for a long while. At one point my consumption exceeded a bottle of Scotch a day ~ when converted into spirits. That's when I realized I had to stop. I literally could not remember what I had done for days on end. Tiny scraps of memory remained, like a blowtorched photo album.

RIOT NEWS: London's police cells are all FULL. There have been disturbances North, South, East, West and Central. Imagine riots in every borough of New York City, including Manhattan and that's how widespread this trouble has been. Most of it is mass looting but homes and businesses have been burned out. Many attempted carjackings have been reported. I've seen no rioters who looked North European or Asian but you're not allowed to state this obvious fact. Tonight the Met police promise 16,000 officers on the streets ~ most being busssed in from other forces. Though those other forces may soon be needing their personnel as there are copycat events in Birmingham, Bristol, Liverpool...

The government promise rioters and looters will "face the consequences of their actions". This probably means 50 hours community service each! Construct a mass pillory I say and let the populace get their own revenge with rotten eggs and dogshit!

I'm focusing my attention on learning to speak Chinese. Astonishingly my accent is pretty good ~ considering how different it is from English. I had it blaring through the telly at top volume last night ~ between Amy Winehouse and Yentl ~ and replicated vowels, consonants and tones pretty faithfully. Wow.

Wish me luck at the doctor's tomorrow. If it's not a lack of alcohol I have some weird disease... whatever could it be??

By the way, the BBC are calling the riots "the worst in British history"... ooer!

A CHILD IS BORN
a beautiful song... the visuals are from The Little Mermaid ~ no connexion with the song, which comes from the album Color Me Barbra



This is stuff I keyed in last night:~~~~~~~

ps that Classical Barbra cover (Japanese version) says in katakana: Kurashikaru Baabura ~ that's the nearest the Japanese language comes to it! And her name in Japanese is Baabura Sutoraisando! (the syllables are run very quickly together so it sounds more like Baabra Storaisando. You learn something new every day doncha know!

0352 hrs I cannot sleep. Haven't tried. I feel too hyper. I just did an online entertainment test "are you manic?"; it's supposedly a clinical evaluation. I scored 15 "you are severely manic, see a doctor immediately!" I'm not "severely" anything I'm just a bit manic that's all. Severely manic is when the stairs talk to you as you run down them and nobody can follow what you're saying. That's severe. I'm mild. Bloody internet drs. Get a life!!

RIOT ALERT: the civil unrest has spread to Birmingham, Liverpool and Bristol. London is burning North, South, East, West and Central. Nothing like this has ever happened here before. Previous riots were confined to small areas: Brixon (where I used to go clubbing; it also happens to be a notorious centre for hard drugs, which I wasn't into at that time) and Broadwater Farm (very dodgy housing estate where I nearly died ODing on heroin (I was in hospital for 2 or 3 days afterwards). I've been back once since then and it makes my blood run cold...)

Here's some Chinese:
妈骂麻马吗 （ma1 ma4 ma2 ma3 ma) "is mother scolding the hempen horse?"
you just say ma ma ma ma ma ma that is ma with a high tone, ma with a falling tone, ma with a high rising tone, ma with a dipping tone, then ma with no tone ~ it's a kind of Chinese pun. Note every single ma except ma3 (which means "hemp") is written with the horse radical 马. A woman and a horse 妈 means mother (ie sounds like horse, means woman); two mouths over a horse 骂 means "to scold" and a mouth next to a horse 吗 means it's the ma particle, which just means "innit"! See: Chinese is easy. Easier than French or German BY A LONG WAY. And none of that irritating "English with spelling mistakes" phenomenon of European languages. No grammatical info that can only be expressed in tabular form (I loathe that). No verb endings. No plurals as such. The Mandarin accent sounds most peculiar (much more foreign than the Cantonese most people know from Chinese restaurants) with retroflex r (like the American r) and even a retroflex shhh sound. Retroflex means you turn your tongue backwards to pronounce it. I'm getting the accent pretty good now. Having practised via the DVD player and TV at top volume. My housemates already think I'm crazy so I'd rather be thought of as crazy and industrious than plain nuts. Wouldn't you??!?

Summer's day prattle

IT'S A BEAUTIFUL SUMMER'S DAY and I'm trying to stay calm. Anxiety came back. I think it has something to do with the risperidone pills I take. Or maybe not. I'm doggedly not doing gear. Can't afford it this week anyhow. But I sat myself down yesterday and decided now this is what I'm going to do and why. I'm not taking any heroin at all. And the reason why is that I hate being addicted to anything, hate cavorting with criminals, don't even feel at home in a room full of addicts any more and have had enough of the whole scene. Confounding factors include the horrible druggieclinic wanting to give some sort of psychological gold star for testing clean, which I'm not interested in. And stuff like that. I'd rather be thought dirty and BE clean than the other way about. Maybe my thinking had become confused but I had to remind myself what I'm doing and why.

Otherwise I would repeatedly give in to the urge to use, which does hit me from time to time. It never hit me before. I don't know why. The summer is the most horrible season to any junkie. Due to excess perspiration. Once it's over I have much better chances.

I'm more into Valium these days than heroin. Even that I haven't taken in 2 weeks yet somehow managed to test positive for. I only take benzos when I can't sleep or feel panicky. I have felt very panicky of late. Every morning I wake up thinking of the horror of suicide. You know, the actual visceral feeling of pressing your neck down on a vibrating rail or pressing blades very hard into bumping arteries or how sick you feel after a whole bottle of pills has been regurgitated yet you're still puking up.

I've managed to distract myself with Other Things today. And I think I'm much better off using one of those professional clinics in Switzerland where there's zero survival rate, when I do do myself in. It gives me something to work towards, even if I'm just walking towards death.

Ukh sorry for being morbid: just being frank. Drugs clinic are doing my brain in. NOT reducing my dose. No idea why. Well they're to blame now for it being so high. They can't somehow blame me, like Duta was doing before.

I've been chucking stuff out of my house. 2 chairs and a plug-in radiator yesterday. Eight records and a manual typewriter today (charity shop). I've endless books I'd really like to get cash for but also just want shot of fast fast fast.

I wish I had hamsters then I could tell you a furry hammy story instead of this boring truth. O yeah and GOOD NEWS I found out I'm hep B, hep C and HIV negative!!

I was convinced I was positive for one of them. Hep C especially. Being positive to that would just give something else not to get treatment for. Know what I mean? I'm taking the antipsychotics again as prescribed as I don't actually enjoy being mad, wondrous as the experience is. Something about sanity appeals to me. I can't say what or why. But it does.

And that's it for today!

In which Gledwood says some more ratty things then tries to change the subject in order not to be too dismal

I WAS TRYING NOT TO SLEEP in order to reset my sleep pattern. It didn't really work because I ended up really tired lying in bed, woken by two people on my idiot phone, neither of whom I wanted to deal with. So I didn't deal with one and did deal with the other. Both probably wanted to borrow money but I don't mind lending it: I get it back next week ~ meaning I cannot spend it between now and then ~ and all is fine and dandy.

I missed the Horror Recovery Group Meeting this morning as I couldn't face it. Couldn't face the world. Couldn't face anything. I told my friend I was a manic-depressive and he said "yes, I know". I have been told I was bipolar since the mid 90s but I never believed my friends' diagnonsense. What did they know except having a mother and a sister with the disorder in one case, actually having it in another, and having spent over a decade in various mental units with depressive schizoaffective in the third. Most experienced nutters can not only spot another nutter at one hundred paces, but usually distinguish what flavour of madness they are customized by. And probably have a better grasp than doctors on what is real, what is exaggeration, what's a lie and what lurks hidden. Because mental states are far from straightforward. I call myself a manic-depressive now as I fit the descriptions in Emil Krapaelin's 1920 classic Manic-Depressive Insanity and Paranoia for "delusional mania" (though I was hallucinating heavily, not delusional as such), even "delirious mania" (when you get so excited you go into frenzy and automatic behaviour takes over. This is when I was so out of it I was losing the ability to speak English and this is why the neighbours gave me a wide berth for weeks afterwards. Because I expressed what I felt. Loudly. And what I felt was loud, loud NOISE in my head. Like a road drill of manic euphoria perseverating through me. It's quite depressing to know you have gone mad and yes I will talk about it again because it's an issue still ongoing, still unresolved and not being treated. The one bit of consolation I found in that book was that I'm not the only one to have been depressed enough into believing ~ or more to the point, feeling that no method of suicide would ever kill me; that I was immortal. That even when I did finally submit to that train, I would lie by the trackside cold, wet and naked and in pain with trains rushing past me for ever afterwards.

This is what Kraepelin writes about "fantastic melancholia" (page 93)

The ideas of annihilation, alredy indicated in the foregoing pages, may experience a further, wholly nonsensical elaboration. The patient has no longer a name, a home, is not born, does not belong at all to the world any more, is no longer a human being, is no longer here, is a spirit, an abortion, a picture, a ghost, just only a sort of shape. He cannot live and he cannot die; he must hover about so, remain in the world eternally, is as old as the world, has been already a hundred years here. If he is beaten with an axe on his head, if his breast is cut open, if he is thrown into the fire, he still cannot be killed. "I cannot be buried any more," said a patiet, "when I sit down on the weighing machine, it shows zero!" The world has perished; there are no longer railways, towns, money, beds, doctors; the sea runs out. All human beings are dead, "poisoned with antitoxic serium," burned, dead of starvation, because there is nothing more to eat, because the patient has stuffed everything down into his enormous stomatch, and has drunk the water-pipes empty. No-one eats or sleeps any more; the patient is the only being of flesh and blood, is alone in the world.

I used to be obsessed with the idea that The End Was Nigh. That only suffering and death awaited us. That Armageddon was coming soon. And let's face it, something is drastically wrong with the world so there's some truth in that feeling (and these were feelings, not "delusions" that I had). I'm quoting the book at some length because finally, at long last, I find I'm not the only one to have thought the way I have thought, to have felt the way I have felt.

And people wonder why I continued taking heroin!!

The only food I can bear to eat these days is live yogurt. So my insides are very clean indeed. I felt as though I had no sense of humour at all this morning. But a couple of drinks and a shot of heroin cured that. The day is now tolerable. I don't know what I would do without my drugs. And I do want to live without drugs, no matter what you feel on the matter: I know. I only find it so difficult because my motives are mixed. Like I said I want to die clean. I want to die. We all want to die sometimes. Old people ill in hospital want to die. Young people, lost and abused, often want to die. We all want death at some time. Addicts are famous for their unwillingness to live life on life's terms. It's not death they're scared of: it's LIFE. So when I say I want to live, I'm not lying. My problem is, I just don't know how to. It would be so much easier to die. And the lower you go, the more death seems like the only sensible option. I've heard suicide described as an escape from pain. But I think if I killed myself I would be doing the world a favour. I'm only a drain on the state for money. I am a manic-depressive junkie ~ and this is the point I was making earlier on when I got distracted. A manic-depressive junkie. The lowest of the low.

Maybe that's why heroin addicts invariably crave death while undergoing withdrawal. Even the supposedly gentle taper at detox units is enough to induce severe melancholia in the susceptible. Ie me. Which is what annoys me about an African nurse, who has no experience at all of opiate addiction and probably none of mental illness telling me with a wide smile that the detox and rehab group session would be really good for me. This clinic I have no option but to go to, really sucks. I am never listened to. There is no dialogue. I wish the staff would do what they're effectively paid to do. Dispense methadone scripts and let you go home. The NHS could save a great deal of money if they would only install a swipe-card activated machine on the wall. It could spit out our scripts and then let us go our own way to sort out our own lives. The way we have to do, every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every week that we are not in this clinic with its bullshitty group therapy and Nazi nurses.

You know why Buta was angry with me the other week? Because I came in, stone cold sober but zombified. I don't know whether I was depressed or not but all I did was act the way I felt. And I know now what that bitch assumed. That I'd been using gear. So she was persecuting me for being ill. Doing something no kinder than tipping a man out of his wheelchair and trampling all over him. That's what she was doing to me and I would love to be Christian and forgive her for it, but I never can trust her again. I always knew this clinic's agenda was to cut me off the methadone on the highest dose possible, to do all they can do to push me into suicide. That is what they are about. That is what they're there for. I want to make a formal complaint about them to the local Health Authority. If racist and homophobic language is forbidden, so should persecution of the sick be, and that's what they're doing to me. If I'm not sick then I'm simply a wastrel and I should die. This is the truth of the matter.

I need to get OUT Of this fascist drug clinic and ideally into one that is privately run. Or else I'll just get my script cut down as swiftly as possible because I would rather be off methadone and ill than on it and ill. I'm going to feel ill whatever way; whether I actually am ill or not.

Then I need to write all these amazing books. Problem with writing about myself is what you read here and what you've read for days. It puts me in a bad sour and aggrieved mood because I do not like myself. But I don't mind writing about other things. I never intended to be a memoirist though I did consider penning memoirs to make cash. What I'm doing now is following a passion of mine and writing for children. I looked around the kiddies' section of WH Smith, the major bookseller in the UK (though they actually sell more stationery and magazines than books). I looked through the childrens' books of the ilk I want to write. And was disgusted on the one hand and heartened on the other that NOBODY appeared to be writing anything remotely similar to my ideas. Nobody at all. So the field is wide open. I have bovver boots at the ready and I'm willing to give this nasty world what it fully deserves: I'm going to KICK IT'S FUCKING HEAD IN. Long as my book achieves sales into eight figures I'll be happy. What am I saying: nothing will make me happy, I know that. But I'm angry enough to be all loving and kind and spin enchanting webs of mystery and illumination for the inner child in us all and to spin this luscious entertainment forever on in glorious ever changing forms like shadow puppets playing the Play of All Ages against the wall.OK so I’m bracing myself again. To kick the world’s head in yet again. O Gledwood just write this fucking thing and stop fretting about it. All I can think is how I’m not going to children’s schools, not giving interviews. I think I’ll be like Lemony Snicketts or the other one and be a recluse. Better to put your energies into producing masterpieces than to do the rounds of primary schools full of screaming brats. Ukh. And can you imagine what the parents would think if they knew the author of this amazing non-wizard-oriented book was a dirty HEROIN ADDICT? Ukh! Beyond the pale!

Well I’ve said enough. Sorry this is a ratty post. Maybe I should start blogging about the world in general or just anything else bar my self self self; know what I mean?... Will anybody ever comment or are my posts now un-comment¬¬¬¬-on-able...?



CYBERNAUT: BOO MERINGUE (HYDROPONIX)



HALLUCINOGEN: LSD
unreleased "official short film" accompanying the track...



ETNICA: MOON INFLUENCE

Canary Craving

I'VE JUST COME OUT OF THE DRUGGIECLINIC where the local petshop is now selling brown-and-yellow varigated canaries for fourteen pounds each. Considering I have a large convertable hammy cage which with the removal of shelves and addition of perches would make an ideal home for Mr Chirper (see I've named him already: bad move!)... I'm highly tempted. I love songbirds. So to have one chirping its head off at top volume in my own home would be the most amazing thing. I know they're not the calmest of feathered critters, but I'd also really like to make mine hand-tame... Does anyone see any reason I shouldn't buy one? The shop's right round the corner. I have the dosh on me. I'm very tempted.

I just had a long talk with my Drugs Worker. I'm going to change her name from Buta to Duta. Buta, you see, means "pig" and she isn't a pig. She was just in a bad mood with me for coming in depressed to the point of zombification. Which I understand is going to be interpreted in a certain way in a drugs clinic.

The staff behind the counter couldn't believe it was me. The fact they remember me even though I've only had two appointments in the past month says something. I was a walking trainwreck. Or more to the point a haystack. Complete with scurrying creepy crawlies when you lifted the straw!

Duta was well impressed with my new look. She said I'm like a ray of sunshine. I get treated totally differently in shops. People I don't know talk to me on the street. Occasionally I catch someone gazing in my direction and think "what are you looking at, fucker?" then I remember how fantastic I look and my bad mood turns to good.

I said I was going to make an effort with Duta, didn't I? The effort has paid off. It woudln't surprise me if news of my distraught phone call to the manager got back to her. I think the effort now is mutual. We get on OK. And like the lady said, Duta is a nice person. We just failed spectacularly to hit it off on our first two sessions...

I woke up at 2 in the morning and couldn't sleep so I did a spot of cleaning, then I washed my hair. My fingernails were permanently dirty up until Sunday - with muck from my mucky old hair. Now they're perfectly clean. I can now wash my hair in two minutes flat. Wet it looks a pale lemon yellow colour. The new style dries off completely within 5 minutes. I absolutely hated having straggling long dirty dreary drippy hair. I hate long hair on men. I only let mine get that way due to a total lack of self esteem. Do you understand what I'm saying now when I say I just wanted to curl up and die? I had no interest in any aspect of life whatsoever, bar heroin. Yes I liked hamsters. Yes I posted music I liked. But without grains in my veins all this was meaningless to me and a lot of the time I really was depressed enough for life to feel vastly empty and utterly meaningless. The new meaning comes from me. By the grace of God I put it there by loving myself. The meaning of life is the energy of life. God is energy. God is love. God is the meaning of life.

Now I've got to go and daydream about little birdies...

Sun is shining.... expensive new optical wear required...!

YOU KNOW if I deleted everything that might embarrass me at some time afterwards, I'd barely have any blog left.

What was all this crap about me being pushed into lying in front of a train by the bitchy Buta? Ridiculous!

I was in a right tizzy earlier. Then I spoke to somebody else from the clinic, who calmed me down.

Now my mood has switched and I've been feeling slightly manic all afternoon. And it definitely is mania (or hypomania, to be precise). I feel like I've drunk an enormous amount of black coffee and it's kicked in all at once. Or I've taken a tiny dose of speed and it's there, perking me up all the time like a hamster's perky ears... I'm also having mood swings. One minute I'm high, next I have an unaccountable sinking feeling. Then I'm hyper. Then I want to cry. Exactly what happened before when the mood went UP!

I'm quite happy being UP. It's FAR better than being down. I was reflecting on how this is supposed to be a mental illness and thinking what a crazy place is this world we live in. I hope I stay up like this. I think I deserve it. I've been depressed for far too long. I also want some Transitions or Reactions lenses for my glasses. I didn't want photochromic lenses in my only pair of glasses, as they always darken when you go outside, no matter what the weather and I'd only want that in summertime. So I'm saving another £69 to get the trendy frames everyone says suits me in Reactions brown. To be frank, I prefer grey-black to brown, but my frames are bronze so grey would look like a mistake at the factory. What do YOU think?

I was going to get contact lenses (mostly so I could wear sunglasses) but I'm too old for contacts these days...

Ukh you know what, I wish that Buta woman hadn't put pressure on me the way she did. I'm now fantasizing about going into rehab. And to do that I need the rehab seminar. See this is what happens when you cajole and coerce against people's will. They wont' even do what they WANT to do, because you're forcing the point. I would have thought Buta, being a mental health nurse, would understand that aspect of human nature. But then again, she does seem a bit stupid, so who knows....



20:30 hrs The News of the World, Britain's most salacious tabloid is to go out of production as of next Sunday. The 168 year old publication, which sold 5 million copies in its heyday had become mired in a giant phone hacking scandal. Royals, celebrities and even murder victims' families' mobile phones were hacked into resulting in a scandal so great that the newspaper lost nearly all their advertisers ...

After The Phone Call ...

I JUST SPOKE TO A SENIOR CARE PERSON at the druggie service. Buta, apparently IS the Titration Nurse. (A titration nurse is a Senior Torture Operative, somebody specializing in giving subtherapeutic doses of substitute medication to opiate addicts).

Bloody hell if that's what a nurse is like I'd hate to run into a 100% unqualified person.

I agree with the Senior Care Person that, having used on top of my script, I'm not totally stabilized, so I'm going to the stabilization seminar. That was the only one that really appealed to me anyhow. I didn't go to the rehab one as I don't want to go to detox/rehab ~ except as a very last resort. I want to cut down methadone "in the community" and then either switch to Subutex or simply tail off methadone to nothing. I don't mind which. But detox and rehab are heavy going options. I found their reduction programmes too steep for me. My insomnia was so bad, I didn't sleep at all in those places, which wouldn't bother me if I could just get up and start the day at 2am, the way I usually would ~ but you were supposed to stay quiet for the benefit of everybody else who was sleeping (including the night staff). So I was depressed with "suicidal ideation" with nobody to talk to. "Ideation" really is just ideas so talking probably does help. If I ever go to such a place again I'd pick one specializing in "dual diagnosis" (addicts with mental health "issues"). At worst I could end up the sanest person amongst a bunch of loonies. But at best I'd be in the right place to have a "breakdown".

My risperidone is kicking in. I know this after a man wheeling a toddler in a pushchair muttered, "Bleedin' 'ell, mate. Wake up!" as I zombied past. I felt like a zombie last week (which is probably what irritated Buta so much) ~ and that was without risperidone. With it I'm like the walking dead. One of my coping mechanisms is to disengage. I do it naturally. The "thousand yard stare"... that's me.

I don't know why this is but I seem to get MORE psychotic-like phenomena the first few days back on that stuff. That's happened twice before. Does anybody know why that could be? It's not giant, technicolour visions I'm seeing. Just voices talking random words now and then. Like thoughts pushed sideways into my mind. I don't know whether this stuff will ever go away. Good job it doesn't bother me too much. What bothers me most is 1. anxiety 2. depression 3. agitation 4. paranoia 5. mood swings. But I think all the stuff now I get is very low-grade so I cannot complain.

Well I've got to go. I DID NOT TAKE that Valium I was talking about (last post). I forgot to do it. Then remembered. Then reminded myself "if you're able to forget about it, it cannot be so overwhelmingly pressing" so I avoid avoid avoided. I think Valium is strictly for emergencies only and Buta doesn't deserve the Honour of being Valium-worhy.

The Senior Person I spoke to mentiond that Buta was a nice person. Now this isn't something that had to be said. So maybe it is true. What I picked up from Buta wasn't horribleness it was Bemusement. There's a mental block that separates us. Possibly I was doing a lot of "thousand yard stares" without noticing... Who knows? Unfortunately as she's Titration Nurse, there's nobody else who can "work" me apart from the doctor. That is, until I'm Stabilized.

So my goal now is to stabilize as fast as possible, never to use any heroin ever again and to go to this one group that sounds OK. You never know, it might be really good fun. I quite liked group work in rehab. It's being forced into groups I disagree with. So I will try. I will try. I will try ... Wish me luck. I might well need it ...

Waiting on my man

MIDDAY: I'VE just called the Drugs Clinic asking to speak to the manager. A "senior practitioner" is supposedly calling back so I'm waiting.

Ever since I transferred clinic, this new place seems to occupy about 50% of my thoughts. Surely that's not healthy.

If they won't give me a new worker I will put in a written complaint.

O please ring back soon. I want this over ASAP.

Framed and hung on every wall is a massive list of behaviours we, the clients, are not allowed to engage in. Yet this Buta bitch says whatever she pleases to me. I know what's happening. It's all about getting me to break one of these rules so I'm cut off methadone and lie in front of an express train.

I'm having a Valium.

Patronizing Pig Problems II

I DON'T KNOW HOW TO HANDLE BUTA THE BITCH, my new druggie keyworker. Of the ten workers I've had prior to Buta, there was only one who I seriously had a problem with and that was Maple Syrup. I handled Maple Syrup by nodding and smiling yes yes yes and then going off on my merry way doing exactly as I pleased. But this one's different. We've only had 2 sessions and things are already bad. She uses exactly the same lines as Maple Syrup. If you don't go to these groups, I'll know... I won't give you your script unless you go... She's even more bullying than Maple and far ruder. And I thought "service users" were supposed to be treated with dignity and respect..? So I'm finding out who's in charge of this new place and putting my complaint in writing. I'm fed up of drugs workers who barely understand methadone dosing, let alone mental "health" issues... Ideally I want a dual diagnosis specialist, but I doubt the new place even employ one.

I'm trying not to let this get to me, although I am back on the Valium. Surprisingly it made me feel better. I had to take 2 pills. One to cure the post-Buta blues; the second to sleep on risperidone. Risperidone doesn't put me to sleep but once I do sleep, it keeps me under. I slept so long last night I would have missed today's meeting anyway. I'm going to try the detox/rehab meeting. I wish Buta hadn't pushed the point the way she did. She's killed what little enthusiasm I had for these seminars. If they're any good I will go again (I'm not cutting off my nose to spite my face). But the main reason I'm going is to be able to say I've done your meetings, I've done endless ones at the old place. I've done six years of counselling outside that. My psychiatrist doesn't think counselling is the appropriate treatment for me (he said that). If Buta has issues about this, she should take them up with my doctor. Whenever I think about this I feel wound up. I've started using heroin again. I don't think Buta cares about my welfare at all. I think she's uncomfortable dealing with "psychiatric" cases. And I don't think she wants to work with me. So I'll be doing her a favour when I insist on a change.

Does anybody know how these druggie clinics work? Surely I have the right to change workers if my present one is rude and objectionable?... Advice, please!

No other news. I've got to go; I need another Valium. In fact I'm thinking of taking my risperidone early so I can go beddy-byes.

I'm taking the risperidone again because I found out it is used as "monotherapy" in schizoaffective depression and psychotic depression. I don't think I'm really "psychotic" but I do feel depressed and cannot break out of it.

I'm not sure I want mood stabilizers. At worst they would turn a choppy sea into an inland lake. I like my waves. Or rather: I like the ones that take me higher. I sometimes described heroin as a mood stabilizer in this blog. It did indeed seem to have an antidepressant effect that methadone lacked. But like the "official" psychiatric meds which commonly lose efficacy over the course of time, heroin doesn't seem to work any more. I feel pretty much the same on methadone. The other effect of heroin seems to be that it kills joy. How many joyful junkies have you ever seen? The gear appears to put a lid on happiness. I don't want a lid. I want a floor below which depression will not sink. I want to get off this nasty methadone. Many of the professionals believe methadone does have some mood stabilizing or antidepressant effect, which means without it I'd be more unstable than ever. But I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. And like I've said before, I'd taper myself off at a rate of a fraction of a milligram per day over the last few weeks. Of course the clinic wouldn't understand this, much less prescribe for it. But I understand it. It's my body and I'll do as I please.

The only good thing I have to say about this new methadone clinic is that they are at least cutting down my juice every single week. Buta refused a 1mg a day reduction then wrote up a 10mg drop ~ which is steeper ~ so much the better! I have a tiny stash of spare juice in case I do ever feel withdrawals but I don't expect to feel anything until well under 50mg.

Nothing else to put today. If anyone has anything inspirational to tell me, please comment.

Bitch Worker II

ME AND BUTA MY NEW DRUGGIEWORER DO NOT HIT IF OFF. She's cut from the same cloth as Maple Syrup ~ bitch-faced drug worker of yore who I fired. Does not listen. (Yet accused me of not listening to HER! So much for being client-centred!)
All she did was bang on about these amazing groups and how I need to go into a detox unit. I told her I've been in detox twice and had a terrible time. But already she wasn't listening. She grabbed the Group Therapy Timetable, cicrled three: alcohol, detox/rehab and "stabilization". She absolutely insists that I go.

Until she said that I was quite open to going. Now I don't want to go at all. I'm not bothering with the alcohol group on the basis that I'm drinking 28 units per week. This is within the UK government's health guidelines and hence I have no need to sit in a room full of drinkers lying about their consumption because they're under the clinic's roof and know anything they do say might get back to their worker.

I said I would go to the detox/rehab group because you can't knock something until you've tried it. I have no intention whatsoever of going into inpatient detox because they cut you down too quickly. My plan always has to be to taper my methadone "in the community". The end of the taper will be very drawn-out indeed. I don't really care what the clinic thinks about my plan because by the time I'm on 10mg, I'd just buy spare methadone on the street as an when it was required. I'd only consider detox/rehab if I were unable to go on taking methadone "in the community" without using on top of it. My resolve is far stronger now than it's been for a while. So I don't think I'll have that problem.

As for stabilization: I'm fully intending to pee out heroin-free piss next week, which means I will be stabilized. I'm looking forward to this group the most because I know most "clients" will be lying through their teeth about how stable they actually are and how much drugs they use. I envisage lots of opportunity for being mischievous and truthful at the same time. So I'm really looing forward to that one.

So I'm going to these two groups and won't be bullied into any more NHS-run groups again. Difference between these groups and NA is that NA has an atmosphere of Recovery. Most NA members are drug-free (that means methadone-free too). Whereas the addicts at these clinic-run events are almost all still using and trapped in the mentality of a crackhead looking forward to their next pipe. That's why I found the last lot of group therapy so insufferable.

I don't forsee any improvement in mine and Buta's "relationship". She seems to think I'm mentally retarded and speaks to me like a 3 year old. Because I don't feel "well" I am not engaging with anything or anyone very much. I'm not putting on a nicey-nicey happy-smiley act for someone who doesn't respect me. I know the woman's problem: she doesn't know how to handle me, so she patronizes.

One big advantage of attending those awful groups is that you get to know other members of staff. Once I have found an ally I will put my complaint forward, the same way I complained about Maple Syrup. I was rid of old Maple that very morning.

So that's that.

I have heard nothing from this supposedly amazingly integrated mental health care approach team plan malarky. As I write, I have a risperidone pill lying on top of my coleslaw pot. Yes I am going to submit to the chemical cosh once more. I've taken a Valium in readiness. Antipsychotics are so rough you NEED Valium to take the edge off the concussion-like effects of them. I am supposedly meant to continue with these pills, even though they're "antimanic" agents, when I'm depressed. But really I need some kind of antidepressant. I know they won't want to give that, so it'll have to be a dreaded mood stabilizer. Part of me would really like a bit of Elevated Mood. What I could do without is my my mind going into such overdrive I'm falling to pieces. It took weeks and weeks to recouperate from the last "episode".

When depression goes away the worst I've been left with has been some lingering self-esteem issues and occasional automatic depressive thoughts. Mania on the other hand put my brains into meltdown. I couldn't remember simple things. Words. Names. Appointments. I lost the ability to do multitask completely. I even had trouble typing. Words consistently appeared backwards. Occasionally I could glance at a page of text and see meaningless wiggles ~ what an illiterate tribesman would see. Nothing seemed to make sense any more. I didn't know where I was going or what I wanted from life. My attention span was so fractured I had to watch DVDs 5, 6, 7, 8 or more times to get the gist. So that's about all I did. Watched endless DVDs. Because my mood was elevated, not depressed, I felt OK. Like a car crash victim, stoked up to the eyes on morphine feels OK. Totally disabled but not too bothered about it. Every evening I felt a distinct rise in mood as the last pill wore off. On a couple of occasions I went into full-blown mania before I took the antimanic pill. Then I'd potter about totally lost in my flight of ideas and racing thougts, unable to sleep because of the cinematic images I saw whenever I closed my eyes. Sometime in the early hours my energy would briefly lull and then I'd run to the bathroom cabinet and knock back the pill.

Those days are gone now. I need some of that energy back.

Only good news is, my methadone has been dropped another 10mg. I knew they wouldn't countenance 1mg a day.

And now I have this bitch-features hacking away at my mental health. I don't now whether she's trying to give me another breakdown, but that's where I'm heading.

By the way, 豚 Buta is the Japanese word for "pig".