My writer chum tells me what I have written so far captures the terror of paranoid schizophrenia, but seems a bit hollow without more background information. I’m going to have to think about this as a lot of the memories are difficult, and a lot have been blasted out of my mind by electro-shock therapy. Ouch! Over the next few days I’ll try re-writing the first chapter and see what I think of it.

6000-odd words in and I have suffered a crisis of stylistic confidence in my book. My aim was to write short chapters which concentrated on one aspect of being insane. The chapters themselves would be composed of short paragraphs in order to capture the intense, frightening feeling of paranoid schizophrenia.

However, my life before I went mad was quite interesting, indeed my life when I was mad had many fascinating events in it. I wonder if I should have more back-story.

I have asked a friend who is a writer to have a look at it and see what he thinks. He is coming around for drinkies on Friday so we can discuss it then.

Last night I stayed up until 5am. This is because I decided start trying to write a book. I’ve decided to call it “Everyone wants me dead” and it details my experiences with paranoid schizophrenia. I wrote 1500 words last night and so far I am pleased how it is going. Despite the difficulty I feel remembering and exploring all the experiences of being very ill, writing it down is quite cathartic. I hope my text captures the terror and intensity of paranoid schizophrenia.