Rachel from north London: Last year I killed a man

Rachel from north London: Last year I killed a man . In this post Ms. North links to an article in The Guardian written by a train driver whose train had 'on a perfectly normal summer's day' mown down a man who had stepped onto the tracks and calmly waited for death.  Last year a friend of mine took a large overdose of her prescribed medication and lay down to die.  Someone found her and she was taken to hospital.  On the way there one of the paramedics told her, 'You did not really intend to die.  If you had you would have thrown yourself from a building or jumped in front of  a train'.  Damned if you do, equally damned if you don't.  Perhaps someone should send this compassionate paramedic a copy of the linked article.

In case you're wondering where I have been, I am now sovereign of this kingdom.

Marginally Less Parasitical

I thought about jumping from the top storey. I told my doctor about my impulses. Hospital was mentioned but I resisted. In the end I emerged from the doctor's with extra meds. Doctor S has perused The Mail on Sunday article and had been as disturbed by it as I was. 'For what it's worth, I think Daily Mail journalists are only marginally less parasitical than the drug addicts and the alcoholics the newspaper is targeting.' His words, not mine. Make of that what you will.

And The Mail on Sunday...

...excels itself once again. My response: (which won't be printed)

I receive supplementary disability living allowance* for a psychiatric disorder but I'm sure those principled, compassionate journalists at The Mail On Sunday will be pleased to learn that I am saving up for a one way trip to Dignitas. Perhaps they'd like to accompany me there to see a job well done. Thanks for reminding me that I'm not wanted. The Nazis had a policy called Aktion T4. Perhaps that should be the next step. We must deal with these people. (Myself included, of course). Grab your torches and sharpen your pitchforks, people, we're going on a witch hunt. What fun!

DLA was originally introduced by the Tories with the intention of saving money. It was also a key feature of their care in the community policy. ** It was intended to keep people out of long term psychiatric facilities. If the Mail on Sunday have their way and this benefit is withdrawn then its recipients will probably face a life in institutions which, incidentally, will cost far more than the taxpayer is currently paying.

Of course, there is another alternative: government sponsored work placement schemes but these will never be implemented because they too cost far more than DLA.

Meanwhile I cling to this:

The woods are lovely, dark and deep

But I have promises to keep

And miles to go before I sleep

And miles to go before I sleep

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening, Robert Frost

*It really helps if, on a whim, the hospital in which you are incarcerated (AKA Section Three) decide to perform an EEG on you which detects 'abnormalities'.  Most people aren't so lucky.

**And, my God, they've got a nerve.

Hospital Memories I

He had bloodshot eyes, moss-covered teeth and malodorous breath. We were in the corridor. He reached out and tried to pull me towards him.  I hit out at him and backed away.  There was a nurse sitting nearby.  He did not intervene.  He just looked away.

Somebody Save Me...

I'm drowning.

Then learn to swim.

I can't.  I can't.

You can. You can.

Suffering in Silence

I can only begin to imagine the kind of pain the family of Mark Saunders must be feeling right now. Losing a loved one to suicide (and that's exactly what it was) is one of the worst things that can happen to you.

Because of my situation (I have a mental illness and have spent rather a lot of time in hospital) I've lost several close friends to suicide. The repercussions of their actions cannot be underestimated. Journalists have repeatedly emphasised the fact that Mr Saunders was a barrister, destined for great things, as if that somehow should have rendered him immune to mental illness. I would imagine, if anything, that his situation exacerbated his condition. He was intelligent and resourceful, a 'high flyer'; he was not expected to ask for help and so he didn't.

Last year an ex boyfriend, A made his fourth suicide attempt. Like Mr Saunders, A was also a high-achiever. He worked in the City and it was amidst the intensity of that world that he had a nervous breakdown. He goes further: he calls it a meltdown. His name for it is his 'Chernobyl'. After his first suicide attempt he requested help. He didn't receive any. All the health services in his area had to offer was a cocktail of medication. People have asked why Mr Saunders did not ask for help. I'm speculating wildly here but maybe he did and was turned away like one in three people suffering from mental health problems who appeal to the NHS for help.

The authorities will conduct their inquiry. We'll shake our heads and ask ourselves why it had to happen and why it should never happen again. But nothing will change and it will happen again. Over and over again.

High on Coke

Freddi (Nobby's dog) is ill.  Her breathing is shallow and she is subdued.  She will be taking a trip to the dog doctor tomorrow.  I managed to sooth her by stroking her gently as she lay at my feet.  I have come to love her almost as though she is my own.  Listening to Nelly Fertado's Why do All Good Things Come to an End? : flames to dust/Lovers to Friends/Why do all good things come to an end?  I ask why things come to an end, maybe it would be more productive to ask when and why things begin.

Diet coke really isn't a good substitute for food, but then I expect most sensible people knew that already.

If You Want to Avoid...

...exposing yourself as a refugee from the eighties, then for the love of cake, don't use the word 'ace'. Please.

And take a look at this - the only hospital in the country that attempts to help those afflicted with personality disorders is being closed down. The lunatics really have taken over the asylum.

(Nothing wrong with that - it's just that these are the wrong lunatics.)

Its patients are mostly young women who, after traumatic childhoods often involving horrific sexual abuse, have become bent on self-destruction through prolonged bouts of self-harming, cutting and burning themselves.

The wrong demographic and the wrong kind of mental illness?

Apparently I have Nothing Better to Do Than...

hang out at this blog.

punter (qual res) | 12.03.07 - 9:00 am | #

Louise, (for it is you), I have avoided addressing you directly before. Not out of fear but because mental illness is your thing and I tend to avoid accusing FJL directly of mental illness. I know too little about it and it does no good because she simply denies it and throws it back.

My thing? No, I never take credit when it isn't due. Let these people take the credit for that:
http://www.ministryoftruth.me.uk...lower-a-flower/

Hmm, all those people lining up to kiss one guy's ass. An epidemic of backache must have ensued.



But Jailhouse lawyer is not me. He, as far as I know, does not post here and has no need to, because he has his own blog, and he has no record of commenting anonymously. He may well have an ego of his own. He certainly isn't afraid.

Message to Felicity: The next time you commit a crime, make it less serious. Don't target the online world's answer to the people's princess, bash a little old lady over the head with an axe instead. (And remember to use the blunt end because that somehow diminishes culpability.)
It's an excellent career move.



So - quoting what someone else wrote on JHL's blog is a bit of an obscure thing to be doing here.

And I note that you commented 3 times last night and then immediately responded to the first comment here. Are you, as some have suggested, hovering over these pages?

Who has suggested this then? One of your alter-egos? I'm just waiting to see what you'll accuse Ms. Lowde of next. Every misfortune this species has encountered since the fall? Or was she responsible for that too? That serpent was framed. On these pages it has been intimated that she is a prostitute, a holocaust denier and now this. Seriously, mate, are you trying to get her off? You know, if I were FJL I'd have started this blog myself, enticed my accusers (Victims, call them what you will) to comment on it and then induced the defence of provocation.



Please, comment under your own name and don't assume (à la fjl) that this blog or its comments are written by JHL. I dare say he would take credit for his own work. He has done so far.

And your given name is 'Punter'. And Shurly Some Mistake's name is 'Shurly Some Mistake'? Whatever.

I'm afraid you're the one making erroneous assumptions. You may not wish to take credit for other people's work but someone else certainly does. One of your...um...masterpieces was plagiarised on the comments section of my blog. The person responsible had Mr. Hirst's portal on his blogroll.

If Ms. Lowde is an attention junkie, then you are her dealers.

Random

I know more about abuse than you could ever dream of. My mother says she only wants me to be happy. Is this an entirely realistic expectation? It grabs hold of my mind and it won't let go. Surely contentment is the best we can hope for. Happiness is supposed to be a fleeting emotion. That's why we relish it. Been doing something dumb - eating alka selzers like sweets. They expand in my stomach and the relentless hunger dissipates.

The Abuse of the Word 'Abuse'

I was sorting through old usenet posts and I came across some very wise words from an old friend:

And I will say, about this monotonous repetition of the word ABUSE where it doesn't really apply:

-- If I feel I have been abused, it *may* indicate the other party acted abusively; or, it *may* be that I am so identified with my victimhood that I re-cast all problems I have in the present as reenactments of the abuse Iexperienced in the past.

-- Such wolf-crying of abuse is an insult to one's own experiences of abuse earlier in life, and to others' experiences of true abuse as well. It cheapens the truth and allows one to avoid the opportunity to grow out of victimhood here and now.

-- If I subjectively experienced a situation as abusive (eg, ase-d), and I voluntarily came back to it, who is the abuser now? And what evidence does this give of my miraculous recovery? The recovering people I know act very differently.

Oh, and I think I offended someone's patron saint. Oops.

A Conversation

Some prose for those of you who think my poetry sucks like a Dyson:


Aurora was what was known among the nursing staff and patients alike as a revolving door patient. She spent her life going in and out of hospital. ‘I’m treatment resistant,’ she boasted. Each admission was a badge of honour. ‘I black out,’ she told Gemma. ‘Especially after sex. It was with my downstairs neighbour this time. We spent the day drinking. Before he … you know, did what he did he told me he loved me and then afterwards he just abandoned me. Another neighbour – this elderly guy – found me standing in the middle of the road. He put me in a taxi and sent me here. Not all men are total gits.’

Why are you telling me this? Asked the voice inside Gemma’s head. Do you expect me to be impressed?

‘I was really high that night,’ Aurora went on. ‘Higher than I’ve ever been. I thought someone or something was spying on me. You know, like MI5 or something. I wouldn’t settle down. I walked through the ward, searching for bugs or secret cameras. Then the doctor came and gave me enough meds to fell an elephant…although I suppose to someone like you I am an elephant.’

Well, you said it, thought Gemma.

‘They call us failed anorectics,’ Aurora said.

‘Who? ‘ Gemma asked. ‘Who do they call ‘failed’ anorectics? And who’s ‘they’.’

‘Bulimics. That’s what people call bulimics. And ‘they’ are the medical profession.’

‘I’ve been bulimic too, you know,’ said Gemma defensively.

‘Oh, that wasn’t an attack on you. After all it’s not your fault that the medical profession chooses to play favourites.’

Gemma knew that was exactly what it was.

Radio Rental?

http://tinyurl.com/29bhse

A Response to Anon@5.34

(See Dancing on Someone's Grave is One Thing..)
(See Comments section)
To Anonymous at 5:34:
(Because the first was rather curt)

FWIW I have a lot of respect for some of JHL's views. I wholeheartedly agree with him when he asserts that 'We (ex-prisoners) are as human as our victims.' I just find it odd that he extends the right to be viewed as 'human' to every single prisoner and ex-prisoner except Felicity Jane Lowde and (maybe in time) The McCanns.

You ask why I am on this woman's 'side'. I don't regard this as a matter of sides. It's not a game. It's not a George Bush post 9.11 'With us or Against us' kind of situation. Felicity Jane Lowde certainly wouldn't think I'm on her side. I believe she has a serious mental illness and needs urgent help. I've been in and out of hospital a fair bit and I've seen this kind of situation. I even remember someone with very similar delusions to Felicity Jane Lowde - secret services, connections to government figures - all delusions of grandeur. IIRC one of the newer neuroleptics took the edge off her fear. But I could still see the anguish on her face. Her terror terrorised me. I firmly believe that this woman was genuinely afraid - that her inner world had turned into an inner hell. And it's kind of hard to escape from yourself. But that doesn't mean I can't feel sympathy for the victims. After all, it didn't matter to Rochester whether The First Mrs Rochester was mad or bad. The consequences for Jane Eyre and Rochester were still the same. Mad or bad, she was still dangerous.

I've more to write but this is kind of draining.)>

Burying Someone is One Thing...

Dancing on their grave is quite another: http://streamsofutternonsense.blogspot.com/

And, yes, I'm posting on this issue again. So, sue me. (Oops maybe I shouldn't have said that. They probably will.)

In response to this, from Wombat Blogger:

'Although few have any sympathy with a seriously ill person at the centre of events, the fact is that the pattern of harassment and abuse that is much more serious than some realise, is likely to continue until proper medical help is offered and accepted.'

So, you acknowledge that she is ill? How very charitable of you. Please tell me how all this is supposed to help. I know of no doctor who would reccommend this course of action.

Just one more thing. This little nugget of wisdom was left on Ms. Lowde's blog by an individual known as 'Jailhouse Lawyer'. (respected and admired by some of you - I'm told I shouldn't judge you collectively but I can do little else as I don't know who you are.):

''Glad to hear that you are homeless. I am sure that men will give you a bed for the night in return for your sexual favours.'

'So, not only have you lost your head you have lost your house. LOL.'

Do you condemn it?

A 'yes' or 'no' will suffice.

____________

The middle class liberal elite, just as vicious and merciless in their way as their working class counterparts who persecute paediatricians because their favourite newspaper tells them to hunt down paedophiles, only worse, much worse because they think they are superior.

This Jeremy Kyle Chap

I've been hearing rather a lot about him recently. Apparently, he hosts a daytime TV show for people that is like a new human form of bear baiting. Well, being partial to a little of that myself, I casually tuned in (as you do) and very nearly tuned right back out again. However my butler passed me the smelling salts, I steeled myself and carried right on watching. I rang the Queen and asked her if she would be prepared to give me the George Cross for this outstanding act of bravery. She thought about it for a while and then told me to bog off.

To begin with our 'Jezza' presided over the jobless, the feckless, the reckless, the talentless, the tedious, feeding off their inadequacy - smug, supercilious and sneering at the centre of the stage. People have compared him to an American talk show host called Jerry Springer. There is, however, one crucial difference: unlike Kyle, Springer does not pretend to be some well-intentioned social worker out to save the world. Springer knows what he is providing: entertainment and nothing more and he is quite prepared to admit it.

Halfway through Kyle's minions led a mother and her bulimic daughter onto the stage. The solution they offered to this girl's mountain of 'issues' was to parade a group of real anorectics before her. Then Graham, the show's psychologist (and now, apparently, ED Specialist) told her that in order to 'shock her into recovery' the 'team' would take her to a clinic where she could see end-stage anorectics 'in the flesh.' The girl on the stage switched off at this point. There was a 'the lights are on but there's no one home' look on her face. What Kyle and his sidekick Graham didn't seem to realize was that the message they were sending out was not the message that was being received. In her own mind she wasn't as thin as the other young women being paraded before her were because she was weak. She was just a 'wannabe' and I bet she left that show determined that she wouldn't be one of those for much longer. Such is the twisted thought process of the anorectic. What part of the phrase 'distorted perception' doesn't he understand? Why does Graham, the psychologist seem unfamiliar with the concept of 'triggering'? The anorectic's denial of nourishment is born out of a need for control, about the need for self sufficiency. 'The fashion industry; and 'the desire to be glamorous' do play a role in this but those issues are not at the core of the illness.

As I'm a dedicated follower of fashion I'll say what many others have elsewhere: that guy should not be allowed within a million miles of anyone remotely vulnerable. Halfway though the show he threw up his hands and said 'I just don't get it.'

Well, he got that bit right. Dead right.

Oh, and leave it to a judge to state the freaking obvious.

It's not the band we hate...

It's their fans.

In response to this:

Don't get too complacent. I've seen exactly the same behaviour by your compatriots on Usenet. But yes - these people are slightly deranged. Some of them actually believe that denigrating someone over the internet is more reprehensible than battering an old lady to death with an axe. Strange days indeed.

I recall one particular case in which the 'culprit' was a guy from Madison County, Wisconsin. However, I do not remember anyone criticising his physical appearance or suggesting that part of his rehabilitation should consist of performing sexual favours for the opposite sex.

I can't imagine why that could be.

Can you?

Why?

We know how he died but we don't know why. A few nights ago a neighbour killed himself by jumping from the balcony of his sixth floor flat. He died, they said, of 'horrific' internal injuries. We don't know how long his broken body lay on the grass before he was discovered. His closest neighbours cannot even remember his name. They only remember that he was 'very mentally ill'. He was deemed worthy of a couple of columns in the local paper.

We know how he died but we don't know why.
Perhaps we never will.

In Case..

you didn't know.

Into my thirties I go. My cat is growing old. She is dying. My father is growing old. He is dying. I am growing old. I am not dying. But the future is this great, terrifying, black abyss and I have no desire to step into it.

A nameless fear, a menacing fear. Its cause cannot be identified. I guess that's why they call it free-floating anxiety.

My Friend Lisa

Let me tell you a few things about my friend Lisa. She suffers from a mental illness known as bipolar affective disorder. She has spent about a year of her life in hospital. She does not complain, she does not make a fuss and, as far as I am aware, she poses no danger to anyone except herself. And she tries. God damn it - she tries. She has a part time job (she teaches at a local FE college), she has a certificate of higher education. She has a social life and a multitude of friends: a testament to her generosity of spirit but she often wakes up in the morning disappointed that she is still here.

It would be so easy for Lisa to 'play dead', to curl up into a ball, to cut off all connection to the world. But she doesn't do this. She throws herself headlong into living. She has all the qualities that should be nurtured in a human being. One would imagine that she would be rewarded for her efforts. One would imagine that she would be rewarded for such behaviour. However, far from being rewarded, she is penalised. She has discovered that the single source of help she receives from the state has been withdrawn. She has been told that from now on she is not entitled to the assistance of a psychiatric nurse because she appears to be 'doing so well'. She replied to this news with the words: 'Has it ever occurred to you that one of the reasons I am doing so well is regular contact with the CPN?' She pleaded with the team that manages her care to reinstate her CPN but to no avail. She asked if the action taken by her psychiatric team was a result of the drastic cuts to the health budget in this area. They admitted that this was part of the reason behind their decision. Whenever there are cuts it always seems to be the people who make the effort who are affected the most.

Rightly or wrongly, I cannot help contrasting Lisa's case with Andy's. He is abusive, regularly indulges in criminal activity yet he has a string of helpers traipsing in and out of his flat: social workers, CPNs, occupational therapists, you name it, he has it. Message received and understood: those who shout the loudest receive the most whereas those who make any kind of effort to engage with the world beyond the mental illness ghetto are penalised. Those who harm others are valued more than those who pose a threat only to themselves. Conclusion: the only way to receive help is to give up, curl into a ball and play dead. Fine in the short term but has anybody stopped to consider the long term consequences of this policy? Somehow I doubt it.