I’ve just been through the spume of drivel right back to when it started on 31 January 2005 and tagged every post. The overall impression I get is that I am obsessed with wine, food, Butter the bear and gadgets. Perhaps more than this I appear to have been ill quite a lot. I am not sure I can shake the vomiting problem, but I think I can honestly tell my regular reader that I think the worst of my mental health problems are behind me; psychotherapy has been quite amazingly useful. I hope, dear reader, you’ll be pleased to read this. I should whine less, at least.

I've stopped spewing, wehay! I am also sleeping again, this is better than I can express. It is such a rare treat for me to be able to go to bed and get a proper, healthy night of sleep in.

Generally, I've been feeling less shitty about going to bed, even when I don't sleep. My CBT person suggested that when I go to bed I don't try to sleep and I have been trying to do this: I no longer go to bed to try and have some rest, I go for a nice lie down. Being less worried about whether I get some sleep is a pleasant change from my last ten years' misery in bed.

I'm such a defective person. Since Wednesday my cyclical vomiting syndrome has flared up and I've been vomiting 30+ times a day. Even re-hydration salts don't stay down. This has totally prevented me from sleeping, which I'm told makes me have big, dark rings around my eyes:

Not sleeping doesn't help with the lunacy, and I am seriously close to flipping and just start to bang my head against the wall whilst screaming. I should go to hospital, but Saturday night down the Woolwich hospital is really nasty. I need a drip and something that'll get me to sleep. I'm really ill, in both the physical and mental health senses.

Nothing good ever lasts. Last week I was sleeping normally, last night I hardly slept. It appears my patch of sleeping normally has only lasted a week, which is depressingly crap. Moreover, since Wednesday the cyclical vomiting syndrome that bothers me every few months has flared up. I feel amazingly sick all of the time and the only drink I dare sip at are re-hydration salts, everything else makes me instantly violently ill.

I'm sleeping again, it seems. Wehay! This is really great. Also for the past few days I have not been feeling so crushingly unhappy and have been a bit calmer. I think the new anti-depressant, Escitalopram, is working. Hoo-tmesis-ray.

A month ago I was also feeling shitty, so bad that I burned my arm quite a bit. I saw the GP two weeks ago who said, "You've got some skin loss there; it'll hurt for some time I'm afraid". And he was right, it does hurt. Even the pressure of a shirt sleeve will make it hurt even more, so I roll my sleeves up. This means if I answer the door without remembering to roll them down gets me some horrified looks. Doing this much damage to myself has really put me off doing it again. Which I suppose is good.

Many people assume that if you self-harm you must be an attention-seeking teenager. I'm not, I'm not an attention seeking superannuated toddler, either. Some of us have real problems with self-harm. It is not a nice thing to talk about. Sometimes it is all that stops me from immediately trying to commit suicide.

I had an echocardiogram last Friday and I have finally got the results from my psychiatrist. Apparently the Clozapine has been damaging my heart so I have to stop taking it immediately. What a pisser. This seriously pisses me off, it has been the only thing that has touched my psychotic symptoms. Tomorrow I go and see him and get a prescription for Quetiapine, which should help me sleep as well as (hopefully) making me less bonkers. I've been taping the dose of Clozapine off for the last couple of weeks and I really am finding it hard being under-medicated. Hopefully this situation will change soon.

I went for an ECG today and saw the doctor this afternoon. He tells me that my heart is being knackered by the Clozapine I am taking; I have to stop taking it. This is really, really bad. In the decade that I've had paranoid schizophrenia nothing has helped me as much as Clozapine has. I am deeply upset.

For the past few weeks I've been having stabbing pains in my chest and getting heart palpitations. Not terribly enjoyable, I have to say. A quick bit of research, namely reading the drug information leaflet that comes with the Clozapine, suggests that Clozapine can have many, some potentially lethal, side-effects that damage the heart and cause the symptoms I am experiencing. This is a total bugger, Clozapine is the only medication that has really helped with my psychotic symptoms and it has also stopped me from feeling incredibly suicidal. If it is what is causing my heart problems then I'd have to stop taking it (or else die when my heart flakes out) and I am really worried what would happen about my nasty psychotic symptoms.

I've now tried two drugs that supposedly help with hyper salivation (aka sompting): one did bugger all, the other did bugger all for the sompting, made me me feel violently ill after taking it and gave me the squirts.

I see the psychiatrist on Thursday, so will ask if there is anything else he can suggest. Until then, the towel I put on my pillow will get soaked in drool every night.

I've been purchased a t-shirt that celebrates the main side effect of Clozapine. I am told that being bought such a shirt is 'supportive'. Hmmmm... Anyway, this is it:

Apart from the drooling Clozapine is marvellous stuff. I admit I don't want to go out, but I am happy enough ticking along in my own little way at home.

I've just been prescribed an anti-sompting drug to take at night that moderates the jet of drool that fires from my mount, but during the day it is a case of slurping the drool back into my mouth when the volume leaking out gets too great.

The t-shirt comes from www.zazzle.com as have a few others that I'll try and post pictures of.

As I mentioned I have been worried about my blood pressure as my vision has been blurred at times. I went to the doctor this morning who took my BP and found it was fine. She suggested it was the anti-sompting drugs that might be causing it. This is good news as I am supposed to be taking something different for sompting (as soon as my psychiatrist gets his act together), so hopefully this side effect will pass.

Over the last couple of weeks I've found my vision going blurred for long periods several times a day. When I mentioned this to my Community Psychiatric Nurse he asked if I had had my blood pressure taken as blurred vision can be symptom of that. It is well reported that Clozapine can raise the blood pressure of those taking it; indeed when I was first taking it and having my blood pressure, pulse and temperature taken twice a day my blood pressure went up as the dose increased. The nurses doing those measurements didn't seem to be concerned; if my vision is going blurred because of high blood pressure perhaps they should have been.

My computer has been tits up for the past 4-5 days. There was much typing of arcane commands until I remembered I could just do a repair install of Vista. I did, and all is now well.

The only real bit of news that has occurred whilst I've been offline is the delivery of my HTC Touch Diamond smartphone. It is a really cool little device. The screen is ultra-sharp and because it runs Windows Mobile there is a multitude of software one can get for it. My favourite piece of software is an IM program called Palringo. It supports all of the IM protocols I use so I can forever be online, if I so choose. The entry I wrote yesterday from the phone was using a simple blogging client called Diarist. It is a simple program, but perfectly capable of making blog posts.

I am hoping that I will not have to be locked up in the bin at any stage, but having such connected devices as the Touch Diamond makes being incarcerated a lot more tolerable.

I've been on Clozapine for a couple of weeks now; in some respects it is working out a treat. I am on the lowest dose that is considered to be therapeutic and it is really knocking me out, I haven't slept this well since before I developed paranoid schizophrenia a decade ago. Moreover, my suicidal urges are a lot more manageable; it is just great not to be obsessed with the idea of killing myself constantly. OK, I am still harassed by hallucinations and paranoia, which makes going out very difficult, but there is plenty of room to increase my dosage of Clozapine. Maybe, just maybe, the hallucinations will get a bit less intense and I'll find it easier to cope with day-to-day experiences. I am still sompting like there is no tomorrow, and feeling very stupid, but these are prices I am willing to pay for find life just a bit more tolerable.

Yesterday I was finally given some medication to help with my Clozapine-induced hyper-salivation (aka sompting). It appears to have worked, my pillow wasn't soaked with drool this morning.

Clozapine is working out quite well. It is helping me sleep, which is just marvellous. I am also feeling less suicidal, which makes it easier to cope during the day. Apart from sompting the only side-effect that I've had is that my vision goes a bit blurred for a few hours after my morning dose. I should be able to take it all in the evening in a few days time, which should deal with that problem.

I mentioned in my last post that I am dribbling like there is no tomorrow thanks to taking Clozapine. My pillow is really soaked in the morning, even if I haven't slept that well. There is a word for involuntary drooling whilst asleep: sompting*. I am sompting big time. I am told there are drugs one can take to stem the flow of drool, but I'll have to wait until I see the psychiatrist next week in order to get something. Until then it'll be a wet pillow for me.

*OK, the medical profession might call it hyper-salivation, but sompting is a much more satisfying word.

I've been taking Clozapine for over a week now. It hasn't help me sleep or feel less suicidal, alas, but it has made me drool like a garden sprinkler. My pillow is absolutely soaked in the morning. I wonder how much I'll dribble when I am on a serious dose.

Only four days after I was first made an appointment to have it done. Well done, the NHS. I asked the person I saw in the bin when I would be starting on Clozapine and she said she had no idea. Ah well.

Well, I called the bin before heading off to check I could be seen today for my ECG and they said "No". What happens when someone comes in with a heart condition? "Oh we cannot do an ECG today, the person who does them is in a meeting. You'll have to come back tomorrow." Triple-A, chaps.

I am going to start Clozapine, the anti-psychotic I mentioned at the end of last month. So far it has been a rather slow process. Today will be the third day in a row I've been to the bin to get an ECG. I was impressed when they managed to get the blood test sorted out on the first visit, but they then go on to prove that they could not organise a piss-up in a brewery. Hopefully I'll get the ECG done today and I can start on Clozapine tomorrow. That'll mean sleep, hooray!

I cannot stand Gordon Brown, he is a control-freak loony. The tax system is now more complex than ever before thanks to his fart-arsing around. His latest scandalous action is to re-classify cannabis as a class-B drug. Now, since I have paranoid schizophrenia you might think I'd be in favour of this, as there is much shouted about the (to quote Gordon) 'lethal' new types of cannabis that can cause schizophrenia. However, I used to be a scientist, and a damned good one at that, and the evidence linking the two is mere correlation. There are stronger correlations between the onset of schizophrenia with drinking and smoking, and it is only nutters (in the worst sense) who wish these to be banned because of their effects on mental health. Gordon completely ignored the balanced and reasonable scientific advice that it should remain a class-C drug, because he cannot help but interfere with people's lives. Since three million people in the UK regularly smoke cannabis he is not going to help prison populations by giving these people a maximum of a five-year sentence just for possession.

If you want to read some more of the evidence that that bastard Gordon ignored there is an excellent article on The Register and even that member of the great and good scientific community Colin Blakemore has spoken out against his action in The Guardian.

I did not manage to get any sleep last night. This makes me feel really rotten. My hallucinations and paranoia are really disturbing. Yet, there might be a plan to deal with this.

When I last saw my psychiatrist he pushed the idea of me taking the 'last resort' anti-psychotic Clozapine. This anti-psychotic is only used in treatment resistant people where other anti-psychotics have not worked so well because it has potentially lethal side effects. It can totally screw up one's immune system so for the first six months of taking it one has to have weekly blood tests. This is a bit of a pain in the arse. However, Clozapine is the most effective anti-psychotic for reducing suicidal ideation, which would suit me just fine. It is also very effective at helping people sleep, which would suit me just fine++. Indeed, some people sleep so deeply on it that they wet themselves in their sleep. Strangely, I am already prepared for such an eventuality by having a large stash of nappies to hand.

It is really hard when one is constantly thinking about killing or harming one's self, as I am doing pretty much all of the time. It grinds you down until eventually you reach a state where doing something silly seems like a good option. I am feeling extremely fragile at the moment and something that helps me sleep regularly and removes some of the pressing urges to commit violence against myself would help a lot. I am worried about taking Clozapine, but it does seem like a sensible option at this stage.

Of course, nothing will happen until I see my psychiatrist, and at the moment the soonest date I can see him is the 12th May. I need to be strong until then.

My escape plans can be safely put on hold for at least a day as I slept last night. Sleep is so good. I feel a lot less desperate.

Last Thursday I saw my psychiatrist who prescribed me a week's worth of powerful tranquillisers with the promise that they would give me a week's worth of sleep and hopefully get me back in the sleeping habit again. For three nights all was well, I slept like the dead. Then, of course, it all blew up. The last two nights I have had no sleep at all and I feel just dreadful.

Is it too much to ask that I be able to sleep? Sleep is the only respite I get from my horrible, horrible hallucinations and paranoia. When I cannot sleep these prey on my mind and get worse, which in turn makes it less likely for me to sleep. If sleeping tablets are only going to last three days before they become useless I don't know what I am going to do. Feeling extremely tired with florid paranoid delusions makes me very suicidal and I don't know how long I can hold back those urges.

My GP was supposedly referring me for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for insomnia but even if she has actually got around to doing that yet these things can take months if not years. I am at the end of of the tether. It is time to make some escape plans.

Six and a half weeks this bout of insomnia has lasted; that is quite a long one by usual standards. Tonight I even took a sleeping tablet. Sure it has made me feel more relaxed, but nearly two hours later no signs of sleep. At least I seem to be getting more accustomed to the constant nausea. Food makes me sick, but most of the time I can tick along in my own little way without being too incapacitated by the over-whelming nausea. The chemotherapy-grade anti-emetic I was prescribed, Ondansteron, hasn't even scratched the surface. So I am getting pretty sick of this, it is deeply not fun. I'd really love a good night's sleep, I feel it would help a lot.

I'm still feeling violently ill, the ubermensch-strength anti-emetics have done bugger all. I find this more than a tad irksome, I don't mind telling you. The only thing that seems to reduce my nausea for a short period of time is to have a really hot bath. Quite how this works I don't know, but I am willing to do pretty much anything in order to feel less shitty. The heat seems to be the key in the hot bath anti-nausea trick, so I am wearing my fleecy Racer pyjamas as I mooch about the flat. They are terribly warm, and the nausea seems reduced. I wonder if I can keep up this level of heat (I'm sweating like a pig) for an extended period of time that may enable me to come out of the other side of this patch of sickness. At least I've lost a pile of weight.

I clearly have some kind of book fetish. I've been buying piles recently, I've been buying a lot of books as well. This is what arrived yesterday morning which I have only just had the chance to unpack.

As you can tell, biology and cooking seem to be the current themes of choice, nicely crossing over in the molecular gastronomy book.

Of course, I get a pile of new cookery books when I am violently ill. I went to the GP today and spent almost two hours sitting in the waiting room, with waves of unbearable nausea flowing over me and the beast getting ever closer to consuming me, before they could be bothered to tell me I could not be seen that day. Hopefully they will see me later this afternoon and I can get some powerful anti-emetic action sorted out.

Look at the time *sigh* nearly 0420...

My insomnia is persisting, this has been quite a bout. It hasn't helped that for the past two days I have been throwing up everything that I have eaten and most things I have drunk. I am hoping the cause of this is simply that I am not sleeping, and once I get back to being able to kip the nausea will go.

So how have I been filling the endless nights? It is hard doing much, as I am so tired my concentration span has gone out of the window. However, I have managed to do a bit of reading. I have taken a short break from my voracious consumption of philosophy books and have undertaken to refresh my knowledge from a decade ago; I am reading about computer modelling of biological systems.

This is a subject that I used to find utterly fascinating and I was, for a period of time, very good at it. Of course, the attrition of paranoid schizophrenia and generally being out of the biological modelling-loop means I probably will not get as much out of these books as once I might. I am sure, once I reach the heavy maths bits, I'll be floundering. This is not a bad thing, though, I like to be challenged by what I read. If I am learning something new, or even re-learning it a second time, then all is well.

It does vex me a tad that once upon a time I had a plan to write a definitive book on computer modelling of diseases, and now I am reading such books written by other people. I cannot begrudge them their success, especially if the books are good, but the reminder that my original career plans now lie in tatters with no hope of them being repaired does hurt more than a tad. It would have been a good career, I was good at being an academic.

After a few weeks of feeling really rotten I am  almost firing on all cylinders again. It feels so good not to be overwhelmed by nausea all of the time and be incredibly harassed by hallucinations. I hope this lasts over christmas as I have some lovely food and wine planned.

It is eleven days after I over-dosed, I am still not sleeping. Five days after I took the OD I saw one of the doctors at my local surgery. I think he is on day release from some home for unreliable doctors. That day he gave me a month's worth of highly toxic drugs to walk away with. Great.

I saw my psychiatrist today who agreed that I need medication to deal with my insomnia. We agreed fives doses each of Zopiclone and Lorazepam per month. After this goes via Dr Idiot Cretin GP to write the prescription I get ten and fourteen doses respectively. Obviously in some ways this is great, it'll deal with my insomnia for a few months. However, I am not to be trusted with drugs. If I sleep I won't try to kill myself, but if I don't...

For the first time in ages I got a decent night's sleep. Hooray! I feel a lot better and hopefully bed will now no-longer be a place of terror for me. This is all down to the powerful tranquilisers I got from the psychiatrist I saw yesterday. My anxiety about not sleeping just melted away and I dropped off a treat.

Last night I was all prepared to post a 'Goodbye, cruel world' entry before I took an overdose. However, I got carried away writing my suicide note and swallowing tablets, so didn't have time. As luck would have it I didn't die so such an entry was unnecessary.

I've had another night of no sleep, only this time in hospital. I am told I have to spend the night here to check I am alright before seeing a psychiatrist who will hopefully send me on my way armed with stuff to help me sleep. I suppose one good thing about me being foolish enough to try suicide is that my insomnia might be taken more seriously.

For the past month I've been increasing the dose of Risperidone I've been taking and it has been very successful. I am really a lot less bothered by hallucinations and I am a lot happier. The only problem with Risperidone is that it made me, for the past two weeks, incredibly sick. At one point I was throwing up 15-20 times a day; I couldn't even sip water. However, as I have been getting used to the drug my nausea has decreased a bit and I am spewing far less often. I am still feeling quite sick all of the time, which makes it hard to actually achieve anything, but even this has decreased over the past two days so I am hoping it will go soon. I am happier than I have been for months which is great and once the nausea goes I'll be able to start writing a bit more. Cheers, cheers for being happier.

I woke up a few times during the night, but I pretty much managed to sleep until half-seven. Hooray! This has really perked me up. Even my paranoia seems reduced. Here's to more sleep!

I was up at two, but pretended to be asleep for another hour. Three am seems somehow traditional. It'll be the standard kind of morning, fritter away a few hours online before going to back to bed at six, burn myself occasionally, go on IRC and piss everyone off with my whining, write a miserable blog entry...

Oddly, after three hours sleep I don't feel quite as bad as before I went to bed. I haven't been crying uncontrollably yet. Also, the cat isn't tearing around like a mad thing, which is helping me keep slightly calm. Ah well, time to heat up a screwdriver on the hob and hold it against my arm...

And all's not well
In my private circle of hell
I contemplate my navel hair
and slowly slide into despair.

There are times when you just have to give up trying to sleep. The cat is set for the night on my pillow, and for once is leaving plenty of space for my head, but I cannot keep him company. The feeling of being in bed in the dark with all of the rats running over me, the voice telling me I am bad and deserve to suffer and the people outside the flat shouting abuse at me is just too unbearable to be able to stay there.

My left arm is so covered in burns there is nowhere left to burn on it so much to my annoyance I've started burning my right arm. Only the pain and knowledge that I am doing that much damage to myself gives me a moment's clarity and respite from the hallucinations and paranoia. It is literally a moment's break, and the cost is quite high, but I'll pay it for those fleeting seconds of freedom from my insanity.

I'd much rather the drugs worked and kept me sane enough so I didn't have to do this. But at the moment I am still under the psychosis-increasing influence of Trimipramine and not benefiting from its sedative effects. The Trifluoperazine does not seem to be doing anything at the moment, but can take a few more weeks to kick in. So I am self-medicating with severe pain. What a miserable existence.

Ah it is nice to sleep in one's own bed. And sleep I did for almost eight hours. I am slightly disappointed the cat didn't come looking for attention in the middle of the night, but it was good to sleep.

Indeed, I may go and try and get a bit more sleep.

Regular reader (Mrs Trellis of North Wales) may recall at the start of April when I reported I was feeling quite sick. Occasionally I have thought I have been feeling slightly better, but it has always lingered on and not really improved. Since then my weight has gone down from 97kg to 83kg, pretty much 2kg per week. I've been prescribed endless anti-emetics, but none of them have really scratched the surface of my all-consuming nausea. This is bloody typical of the National Health Service, if they can give you some drugs that will mask the symptoms they'll be happy even if it means they are not actually finding out what is wrong. Yesterday I went to the doctor again and finally managed to get them to refer me to a gastroenterologist. It was surprisingly difficult to achieve, until they weighed me and saw how much weight I'd lost. Naturally, being the NHS I was told it would take 'weeks' to be seen. How thin can I get, I wonder?

Finally I am beginning to feel a bit less sick. I even managed to eat a very small amount of fried rice for lunch today without blowing bits. This is really good news. I feel a lot happier not to be trying to hold back waves of nausea all of the time.

It is over two weeks since I started feeling disgustingly ill all of the time and still it drags on. Seems a bit of a long time for food poisoning to have lasted, particularly as I haven't eaten anything in an age. I do worry that something has physically gone wrong with my stomach thanks to the various operations I've had on it.

Yesterday I was feeling so rotten from my supposed food-poisoning that I decided to go to the hospital to have it checked out. I was there all day, got variously poked, x-rayed and bled, all of which resulted in a slightly irksome conclusion. Good news, is that there is nothing physical wrong, and I don't appear to have food poisoning. The bad news is that they think it is the drug aripiprazole making me ill and I am to stop taking it immediately. This is bad because that was keeping me reasonably sane. I haven't taken this morning's dose and I already feel quite a lot less ill. I hope there are no serious side-effects to suddenly stopping taking it.

I ate something nasty last night and have developed food poisoning. It is not very nice. My body aches, I have a splitting headache and eating makes me blow bits instantly. I don't really welcome the weight-loss opportunity as I like eating.

At least it is a nice day here in London. The sun has been shining all day and it is really quite warm for the beginning of April. The cat has really loved being able to bask in the sun.

The uber-mensch sleeping medication I was prescribed on Monday is still working a treat. I love sleeping, it is so much more relaxing than spending all night awake on IRC (much as I appreciate speaking to my chums on my regular channel). I now sleep so deeply that it would be foolish not to wear a nappy... 

I slept! Hooray! It wasn't for terribly long and was a bit disturbed, but I slept! Well worth seeing the doctor yesterday to get some serious medication. Even after only one night's sleep I feel a lot happier and better equipped to deal with life in general.

When it is bed-time Kisu the normally goes wild and starts running around the flat hunting anything small enough for him to take on. However, after a while he gets bored of this and wants to come and sleep with me, and he wants to sleep on my pillow on Fluffy Bat. If I am in bed he edges as close to my head as he can, taking up even more room if I move away from him, so by the morning he has the entire pillow to himself:

As you can see, there is not much room there for my head. I have to say I am not really sure if Kisu's friendliness in bed would really keep me awake if I were not being kept awake by the medication I am taking, but it does feel a touch strange to be lying in bed only to get a sudden mouthful of cat.

Tomorrow I had an appointment with my doctor to talk about my appalling sleep problems that have been going on for over eight weeks now. I must admit to seriously looking forward to this appointment as I am feeling at the end of my tether. So, I am sure you can imagine my delight when I got a call this morning from the health centre saying the doctor would be away tomorrow and I cannot be seen until next Monday. Brilliant. I am really rather unhappy, I must say.

It is half one in the morning and I have given up trying to sleep. This has gone on for nearly eight weeks now and has resulted in me becoming as unhappy as a particularly depressed donkey that has just been appointed professor of misery at Oxford university. I can manage this fine during the day when it is light and I have things to do, but the endless dark nights... oh dear...

I've got a dentist's appointment later today. The terror! I hate going to the dentist, there is always pain. Even worse than that, dentists have the same view of teeth as most experts have on their favourite topic: they are very possessive. They seem to think that all teeth belong to them and that if you have not kept 'their' teeth in perfect condition you are worthy of only withering contempt. Since I have a hole in one of my teeth I thoroughly expect to have the dentist look down his nose at me.

I have to say I am not looking forward to going out for other reasons than simply fearing my appointment. I am feeling really quite fragile and hallucinating wildly. When I go out in this state I have large-scale paranoid delusions about the environment turning against and trying to hurt me. This is terrifying. Moreover, I have been so unhappy over the past few days that I've been hacking my arm up with a razor blade. My arm I can cover up with long sleeves, but I've also cut my hand and that is harder to hide. In my paranoid, unhappy state this makes me think people will notice me and wish me ill. I'm seeing a psychiatrist again on Thursday to hopefully discuss changing my medication. Given luck, this will make me feel a bit happier.

I am feeling a lot better today. This is great. I've eaten lunch and not felt too bad. This is great, it was really draining feeling sick all of the time.

I am still feeling violently ill all of the time. At least the anti-emetics have stopped me from retching all of the time. I am a bit worried because it is now exactly three weeks until I am due to roast a lovely goose for Christmas. If I still feel this ill then it will not be a very jolly Christmas meal.

Words cannot describe how incredibly nauseous I feel. The anti-emetics have largely stopped me from retching, but I still feel staggeringly ill. Something is clearly wrong. I see the GP on Friday and I hope there is something he can do. I just cannot stand feeling this sick.

Turns out I wasn't hung over after my birthday event; the same thing had happened as after my last stomach operation. For a few days I was feeling slightly queasy before feeling incredibly nauseous and retching very frequently. Because the stomach operation tightened the entrance to my stomach nothing comes back up and a few minutes later I retch again. After the last operation I did this so much that I burst the stomach wrap rendering the operation pointless.

I spent all of yesterday at the hospital where they prescribed some strong anti-emetics. These have made me feel a bit better, but not good enough to eat unfortunately. I have to go back there tomorrow to get some different anti-emetics which should help more. Unpleasant as all of this is, at least it is helping with my weight-loss program.

The results of the operation I had on Monday seem to be pretty good. I've had no acid reflux and haven't blown bits all week. I've largely been eating soup since then, but have found it easy to eat. This is a lot better than last time I had this operation done: I felt violently ill and was in incredible amounts of pain. Well done Mr Siddiqui for successfully fixing my stomach problems!

Whilst I was in hospital my order from diaperstation arrived. I got a couple of things, firstly a 'lap' style onesie with a rather nice teddy bear print on it:

This is the first lap-neck style onesie I have purchased, it does seem to be a rather large hole for one's head. Perhaps better for smaller toddlers rather than huge ones like me. The second thing I got was a nursery-printed t-shirt:

They may not be incredibly cheap, but the diaperstation nursery-print designs are good and the clothes are of a generally high standard.

If anyone is interested, this is the state on my chest after being operated on:

Let us hold hands and dance around the lilac toadstool of love!

I am out of hospital. The surgeon said he was pleased with the operation, so hopefully this means no more acid reflux or random vomiting for me.

I am not entirely free of pain, my stomach is quite tender, but at least I have some strong painkillers to take. It is good to be out of hospital sooner than expected.

I had to go into hospital today to be checked that I am fit and healthy for my operation on Monday. They said I'd be in for five to seven days, which is a bit of a bugger. I mentioned I am extremely nervous about the operation, as last time I had it done I was in incredible pain, so at least they know I am to be drugged to the eyeballs. Ooohh... I am nervous....

After only mere months of waiting I have a date for getting my hiatus hernia operated on: next Monday. I am more than a little apprehensive about this as last time I had this operation done I was in unspeakable pain for days and felt incredibly rotten for weeks afterwards. I'll still have the operation done, though, it'll be good not to have acid reflux all the time and it should stop me from spewing regularly. After the operation I'll have to be on a liquid diet for a month. G&T's, wine, Harvey wallbangers...

I had thought I was over my patch of insomnia, but here I am wide awake two hours after going to bed. The problem, I find, is switching off. I lie awake with a frenzy of confused thoughts battling across my consciousness; this does not promote sleeping. There are some relaxation exercises I attempt to undertake, but my mind is so confused I cannot perform them terribly well. It is difficult to know what do do in these situations beyond get out of bed and attempt to clear my mind.

One of the most common side-effects of taking anti-psychotics is that one gets very hungry. With the last lot I was taking I ended up weighing over 110kg, far too much. None of my spiffy suits fitted and many of my baby clothes got too tight.

Oddly, even though I am on a very high dose of the current stuff, I am hardly hungry at all. I don't have lunch, don't eat much for dinner. This has resulted in me losing enough weight to fit into my clothes again. I am very pleased that my Oshkosh shortalls are now wearable.

I'll have to try on my two Paul Smith suits and see if they fit. They are incredibly smart and well-designed; I look like a serious adult when I wear them. I know it is hard to imagine that I might occasionally be a serious adult, but sometimes one has to go to wine-tastings, you know?

The drugs I am taking have helped me sleep over the past couple of months; I had hoped insomnia was behind me. Much to my chagrin I didn't sleep last night and it looks like I will not tonight. All I can say is: Bums.

As I have said before, insomnia is no fun. Not only is it really boring to lie in bed for hours not sleeping, but also after a couple of nights without sleep your whole body aches and I normally get a pounding headache. Needless to say, not sleeping gets me down.

It is 2am, ten hours until the cricket starts. I will have to think of some entertainment.

I've been prescribed some antibiotic ear drops for my infected ear. I've just used them for the first time and the only effect is that I can now hear my ear throbbing. Ouch!

Apart from that it is a lovely day here in London. The temperature has dropped to a more comfortable level and there is cricket on the television. What more could an easily entertained toddler ask for?

My ear infection has re-surfaced. One side of my head is throbbing with pain. Sadly I cannot get an appointment for some anti-biotics until Friday. I suppose I'll just have to whine pitifully about the pain until then. Perhaps I'll even take some painkillers.

It is still pretty hot in London. it was 33C yesterday and it is forecast to be just as hot today. This makes nappies very warm and sweaty things to be wearing. Not that this stops me from wearing them, it just gives me a reason to pout and be petulant.

My ear infection has left me with an ear filled with dried-out wax; I cannot hear a thing through it. The way of dealing with this is to soften the wax with olive oil which allows it to drain out. Since I sleep on Fluffy Bat (my security bat, who is a real bat, not a Mothercare-brand cellular cotton cot blanket) it seems likely that the wax and oil mixture will drain out onto him. Poor Fluffy Bat, I don't want him to get oily and filthy. I hope Butter doesn't catch any of the filth.

I've got an ear infection. I've got no hearing in that ear and the side of my face aches. It is really quite painful. I saw a doctor on Saturday who prescribed some ear drops, so I hope it clears up soon.

Turning up to the gym is not as utterly exhausting as it was when I started. Sweat still drips off me as I row and go on the exercise bikes, but my recovery time seems a lot faster. Going down the stairs from the gym is less dangerous now my legs are quivering less. I wouldn't go as far as saying it is fun, but already I feel a tad healthier.

For a local council gym it is really quite well set up. They have five large-screen televisions along one wall and on all the exercise machines facing them they have a headphone socket with a little remote control so you can choose which screen to listen to whilst getting knackered. I think daytime television is too banal to watch, though, so I take my I-Pod along.

Unfortunately, the journey to and from the gym is still completely terrifying. I really don't like going out, my hallucinations are simply awful.

My partner has been working late all week and he generally leaves the flat at an hour I am not fit to converse with him. I miss him. The neighbours are both working at the moment so I cannot go around there for a bit of company. I'm really lonely.

The crap with the graphics cards really annoyed me and this has been followed by more chaos with the computer today; I have faulty memory that I must replace.

I'm also broke. Bank charges have wiped out my income for this week so it has been a spell of minimal expenditure on fun things (like dinner). This also makes it hard to buy stuff to get the computer back to a perfectly functioning state.

The voice I hear and the visual hallucinations are really bad. I can see quite a large crowd of people standing outside my flat screaming abuse at me. Of course, no one else can see them as they are not really there.

All of this has resulted in me feeling pretty crappy, and today and yesterday I harmed myself. Nothing serious but I haven't self-harmed in weeks so I also feel dreadful that I am doing it again.

My hope of salvation comes in the form of visiting the gym. I went there today and expended energy on an exercise bike and a rowing machine (at least I still fit into my Oxford college rowing kit). I felt most drained after doing this. The hope is getting a decent amount of exercise will make me feel generally happier. I find the walk to the gym to be terrifying, though, thanks to my hallucinations. We shall see how things progress, but I do find it a bit of a hard old job having schizophrenia.

The sun is shining, there is a gentle breeze and it is nice and warm. What more could a large toddler ask for? I suppose I could ask for a cricket match to watch, but the first test match of summer starts tomorrow so soon things will be just perfect.

The only problem is that I will miss the toss and the first half hour of the cricket as tomorrow I have to go for an induction session at the gym. This will be when I scare the person doing the induction as I rattle off my medical problems.

I saw my psychiatrist today and he was pleased I had joined the gym. He suggested that regular exercise might help me deal with the hallucinations. This seems to be expecting a bit much, but doing a bit more exercise cannot really hurt.

My psychotherapist was very keen for me to get some more exercise. In view of this, I have just joined the gym at my local leisure centre. This is all very well and good, twenty minutes a day on the rowing machine will do wonders for my health. The only problem is that exercise is incredibly boring. Can I really manage twenty minutes of mindless activity without getting bored or, worse than that, getting really harassed by hallucinations? Time will tell, I suppose.

The food poisoning that surfaced ten days ago is still hanging around. Whilst this has done wonders for my waistline, I really don't enjoy feeling this rotten. It is beginning to feedback into my more general mood and I am finding it a bit harder to cope. I've been prescribed some anti-emetics by the GP. Sadly these did not help me hold down the four fork-fulls of dinner I had last night.

I saw my psychotherapist for the first non-assessment appointment yesterday. It appears psychotherapy might be a bit difficult.

The first thing he asked me to do was a visualisation exercise that involved me shutting my eyes. I don't like shutting my eyes. I don't trust the environment unless I can see it; I want to see what is coming to get me. This as a start made me quite un-nerved and I really wanted to leave instantly. I soon stopped that exercise.

I hope I am a bit more functional when it comes to trying other stuff. It would be very useful if the psychotherapy helped.

I've still got food poisoning.

Since Sunday evening I've been suffering from really bad food poisoning. I shudder to think how often I have chucked up bile and stomach lining. Over the last couple of days I felt alright in the mornings, but as soon as I have anything other than water to drink, or have eaten anything, it is back to feeling rotten and so hide in bed in the dark.

As I mentioned a few days ago I feel I might have performance anxiety when it comes to eating. I'll be seeing my community psychiatric nurse and psychotherapist later today and raise this with them. As I am sure you can imagine, feeling nauseous all of the time does not help me feel happy about eating. It also does not help me going out. When I feel this sick I could vomit at any time and the anxiety about going out where I have nowhere to spew is very difficult to deal with. Hopefully in a few days I'll get over it.

Ignoring the current violent illness, the Olanzapine does seem to be helping a bit with the symptoms of my schizophrenia. I'm not happy about going out, and I think about killing myself all of the time, but the need to kill myself is less urgent than it was a few weeks ago. I am reasonably confident that I can look after myself at home with minimal self harm. If I can persist with feeling slightly better I should be able to avoid hospital for the foreseeable future.

I've mentioned before that I have a knackered stomach, this often results in me vomiting when I eat a meal. During my sojourn in Sweden it struck me that I am sick more often when there are people around or we go out somewhere to dine.

Could it be that I have performance anxiety when it comes to eating? Certainly if I get a twinge in my stomach whilst I am eating I instantly begin to worry that I am going to start squirting from one end or the other. Does this heightened state of anxiety result in me becoming ill? I really hope not.

As I have probably made clear on this blog, I really enjoy food. It would be terrible if my own anxieties resulted in me enjoying it less.

I get really bad insomnia, it is a real swine. Luckily, last night I managed almost a full night of sleep. This cheers me up no end.

This gives me a good excuse to re-use someone else's joke about insomnia. David Baddiel says that when he tells people he has insomnia they say, "Really? That is odd as I have no problems sleeping." He goes on to wonder if such people when encountering a blind person say, "You are blind? Really? That is odd as I have no problems seeing."

Insomnia is really difficult to deal with. When you are exhausted all of the time with an aching body and a splitting headache it is really hard to deal with all the other things I have to deal with. At least when I am awake in bed I have Butter to keep me soothed.

I know it has been alluded to here in the past but I have medical problems beyond a hiatus hernia and high blood pressure. I am also schizophrenic.

The first of my recent admissions to hospital was after I took a massive overdose with the aim of killing myself. The second was because I was so suicidal I couldn't be trusted out of hospital. I see things that are not there and hear voices. I am also quite paranoid. The reason my blog entries are so short is because I lack the concentration span to write anything longer.

I haven't mentioned this directly before because I don't think it helps other ABs to think we are all luridly insane. I would much rather ABs felt happy with themselves and realise they are doing nothing wrong. I think I am not a good example.

I feel pretty bad about 'coming out' like this. Things are really bad at the moment and I am finding it really hard to achieve anything.

Yesterday I went for a pizza, oh the pleasure that gave me. The new drugs with their anti-emetic effects have rendered me wheat-proof. The wheat allergy is null and void whilst I am taking this stuff. Unfortunately, my doctor does not like people taking it for a long period of time so this will just be a passing piece of marvellousness but I am enjoying it whilst I can.

I've been prescribed some new drugs. Well, not new, I've taken them before. They are an anti-emetic but also cause constipation as a side effect. So effective were they last time I was taking them I could eat bread without throwing up or getting diarrhoea. This is a real plus; I hate being allergic to wheat and love eating bread. I shall celebrate with a sandwich when I've been taking them for a few days. The only side effect that I don't like is they make one terribly photo-sensitive. Should there be a bright and sunny day in the middle of winter I'll have to cover up. Luckily, I've got a hat.

There has been a lack of food related entries this year due to the number of them at the end of last year. I am trying to lose some weight. It has reached the terrible state that all of my best and most baroque adult clothes don't fit me any more; I cannot get into my brown cord suit! Worse than that, my usual house attire of Oshkosh shortalls have become restrictively tight.

So, today for lunch I had half a packet of soft mint chews. I'll have the other half, and a vitamin pill, for dinner. I suppose it helps my dieting that my stomach is not really working at the moment. If I try to eat a meal I feel incredibly sick and often throw up. That didn't stop me from putting the weight on, I admit, but I am hoping it will help me lose it. It would be a shame if I had to forgo the Oshkosh shortalls now they don't make large toddler sizes anymore.

All over christmas I had a cold. This resulted in me being tired all of the time and getting lots of sleep. The cold finally cleared up yesterday and I felt fine. Naturally, I got no sleep at all last night. Bums. I really enjoy sleeping so it pains me to have insomnia so regularly. I did once try taking a herbal sleep-aid, based on Valerian. It didn't help me sleep but it did make me wildly depressed. Perhaps my bedtime bottle needs something stronger than warm milk in it.

My birthday treat of a trip to the gastroenterologist was a disaster. My appointment had been cancelled yesterday and no one thought it worth telling me until I had walked for forty-five minutes up to the hospital. Curse the National Health Service! Luckily another appointment has been made for two weeks' time so all will be well. Unless that is cancelled too, of course. I am sure the day will only improve as I get to neck fine vintage champagne tonight.

The approach of my birthday was celebrated last night with a rather nice meal. We also drank rather well as can be read here. This soothes my frayed nerves about becoming the grand old age of two (again). The actual event tomorrow will be celebrated by a visit to the gastroenterologist to find out if my stomach can be operated on (please say yes) and the consumption of a magnum of champagne with the children from next door. This will be a good thing, although I imagine the acidity in the fizz will really hurt. Drinking at the age of two, I will certainly grow up to be a balanced and reasonable person.

As I've mentioned, my birthday is coming up. The event will be celebrated a couple of days in advance by a meal, and on the day by a trip to the gastroenterologist. Sadly my birthday is not the only thing that is 'coming up'. The hiatus hernia I have has been causing problems recently. Not only do I feel sick a lot of the time when I eat, I also get gastric flavours bubbling up into my mouth most of the time. This is particularly nasty when I take one of my drugs that is extremely bitter. I am hoping the gastroenterologist will tell me he can operate on my stomach. I've had the operation before, but at the time I did not know I was allergic to wheat. My first meal after the operation was soup that was thickened with wheat flour, so it was a case of immediately staring to spew again. The violent churning of my stomach undid the work done in the operation, now I am waiting to see if it can be done again. This time I will not eat wheat afterwards.

The anxiety is now behind me and I've been catching up on my sleep debt. I was quite impressed to sleep for nearly seventeen hours on Saturday night. I am sure having a big dinner of roast beef helped me relax a bit as well. This still does not reach my sleep record, made one spring holiday whilst at university. Much sleeping and little else was done in that holiday resulting in one barely memorable twenty-four hour period in which I slept for a little over twenty-three and one half hours. I remember feeling very tired when I got out of bed for twenty minutes. The incredible sleep-fest I went on made it difficult to get back to working once term started.

I managed that most wonderful of things, an afternoon nap, today and picked up an affliction in the process. Fluffy Bat, the real bat certainly not a Mothercare-brand cellular cotton cot blanket, generally rests on my pillow under my head. He has a rather textured, almost cellular, structure and so after forty-five minutes of sleeping and not moving whilst resting upon him I was left with imprints on my face. This is called 'Fluffy Bat face'. I admit, it is hardly a serious affliction, but at least it is an anecdote. He is a real bat, just to confirm, not a blanket.

I've had no internet connection whilst moving, and have spent a period of time in hospital, but a next-door neighbour has lent me their internet connection until mine appears next week. Below you can see the view from my new balcony. Visible are Canary Wharf, the Millennium Dome and the Thames Flood Barrier.

It is nice to be back and good to be out of hospital.

Sorry entries are spasmodic at the moment; I am staggeringly ill.

I have yet another new toy, one of those new-fangled dual core Athlon 64 processors. The phrase, "In the name of arse and by all that it is evil that is fast" just about covers it. I an now play multiple copies of Teletubbies games at the same time without them slowing down. Hooray!

As I mentioned eleven days ago, I have a really rather sore throat. It had started about a week before that so has been hanging around for quite a while now. It seemed reasonable to disturb my GP and check that I did not have tonsillitis or anything that required treatment beyond swilling anti-septic fluids with reasonable frequency. I finally got to see him on Friday. Sadly, he is a bit scared of me; he knows I have a doctorate in epidemiology which, coupled with me being considerably taller than him, he views as cause to be terrified when I burst into his surgery.

I asked him about my throat, he peered down there and said what must be the most moronic statement from a member of the medical profession to someone with reasonable insight into the nature of diseases: "Well, it is probably just a cold. Colds last a lot longer these days because they have evolved to be better than they were a few years ago." Perhaps he was just so scared he said the first load of drivel that popped into his mind in order to get me out, but perhaps he thinks that within a year or two rhinovirus will have evolved even more and so will wiping out huge swathes of the world's population because our immune systems, despite fighting these viruses for a very long time, can no-longer hold them back. "That is a very interesting story", was about as polite as I could manage after I'd gasped with incredulity.

So, there is the throbbing throat and also a late night out drinking cocktails yesterday. This morning I wanted to take things a bit easy and just play around in a soft, low-intensity sort of way.

As has been commented before, food makes me sick. I have vaguely thought for a while that I often feel terribly sick when eating bread and had always assumed it was something to do with the bulk of bread playing havoc with my hiatus hernia, but it appears I may be wrong. I mentioned this 'bread theory' to a frequent dining companion and he said, "It is not just bread, pasta also makes you squirt both ends every time you eat it." My heart sank.

It would be a terrible thing if I did have some intolerance for wheat or gluten for a couple of reasons:

1. Bread can be really, really lovely, and I would hate to avoid it most of the time.
2. This is the really bad one. I would feel awful about being associated with the ~90% of people who claim to have some kind of food intolerance, but in fact only have a sanity intolerance.*

This would pain me very much. Whenever one meets someone who claims to have an intolerance to some form of food it is generally safe to assume they are talking a steaming pile of horseshit. As I mentioned above, out of all people who claim some form of food intolerance, less than 10% actually have any form of medically recognisable food intolerance that causes any real symptoms. For an amusing discussion of this kind of drivel that people are wont to spew, do check out Jeffrey Steingarten's two books (here and here).

This is much the same as people who go around claiming they have 'flu. Generally, they do not. A chum in the disease department who was researching the influenza virus was once so annoyed with everyone going around claiming they had 'flu that he advertised for people who thought they had 'flu to come and have a blood test (expenses paid). Naturally, out of the hundred or so samples he tested, no one had 'flu and less than 10% had ever encountered a 'flu virus in any significant way during their entire lives. I must admit, as an ex-disease-studying sort of chap, to sharing his irritation. Not only because of the cheapening of the image of the serious disease that is 'flu, but also with over-the-counter drug companies who seem all too happy to suggest that their blends of paracetamol and decongestant is going to make someone who is suffering from 'flu feel well enough to to do six impossible things before breakfast. If someone in your employ really does have 'flu they will not be coming into work and if you expect them to you deserve to catch it.

Meanwhile, back to the plot: The idea of largely giving up bread is woefully depressing, so the thing to do is an experiment. All this week I have eaten only food that contains no gluten or any form of wheat product. How many times have I felt violently nauseous, been sick or squirted at the other end? None. The evidence suggests avoiding bread and pasta could well be the way forward. Bugger.

Naturally, the experiment is not over yet. After a period of time, a week might do, if I am still not redecorating the bathroom several times a day I shall make myself a great big sandwich with my favourite bread and wait for the result. That will be another piece of evidence, but since it would not be a blind experiment (I'll know I am eating bread so that may influence the result) I shall suggest to someone cooking me food that at some point they slip wheat-flour into it without telling me. If I find myself feeling violently ill then I shall weep as only a toddler can weep when denied sweets. Or worms.

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*As an aside, I mentioned this to my dear mother the other day. Even though she is a deeply lovely old bint with a doctorate in almost-science she is convinced she has every disease on the planet, be they known to unknown to modern medicine. Consequently, her list of 'food intolerances' is longer than my arm, and as I am a very big toddler my arms are quite long. So, when relating this anecdote the conversation went much like this, "There are two reasons I would be peeved by holding back on my bread consumption. Firstly, bread can be so very good <etc>. Secondly, I would hate to... ah... So, how are you today?" Much as it is reasonable to be aware that some people, no matter how much you like them, are irrational, raddled old loons, pointing it out to them in no uncertain terms is perhaps a tad unnecessary.

I admit it, I am sick, diseased and generally ridden with corruption. To put it another way, I've got a bit of a cold. Strangely, I do not mind terribly much as diseases are uniquely fascinating.

I must admit some previous dealings with diseases for when I was an academic disease transmission dynamics were my field. Much fun I had mapping diseases in populations and watching them spread. In my enthusiasm I managed to catch one of the diseases I was studying and ended up spending a month in bed in screaming agony.

Epidemiology tickled my fancy because of my deep interest in evolution. It is a deeply simple yet powerful idea that explains the mechanism behind the wonderful diversity of life we see on on Earth. Parasites and disease causing agents have are powerful selective pressures; living things have to keep changing in order to keep up with the parasites that change at a very rapid rate. Since my irritation with theists has always been almost palpable, it struck me that being in a field where I would be at the cutting-edge of evolutionary biology would suit me very much. Furthermore, humanity's on-going (and incredibly successful) battle against the countless pathogens in this world has been a triumph of sensible thinking as opposed to ancient, out-moded world-views.

Now, I am sure there are people out there who are intellectually-stunted and downright rude enough to suggest that I am ill, or indeed that most people are ill some of the time and terribly large numbers of people have died from illness, because some small-minded chap in the clouds is punishing me/us for my/our badness. I cannot see what I've done, or indeed most other people have done, that would deserve such nastiness and anyone that suggests we have is probably not a terribly savoury person.

So, I shall cough, splutter and drip my way through these next few days, marvelling at how quickly this Rhinovirus has evolved to exploit my immune system (again) and as I feel better I shall marvel at how my jerry-built, lashed-together and highly effective immune system eats those virions for breakfast. Until next time.

Much to my chagrin, these days I have high blood pressure. I am obliged to go and have it measured every so often so that the doctor feels something is being done, even if it is only watching it get higher and higher. This morning I had an appointment. I had a few other appointments this morning, so I had to move with alacrity to make it to the surgery on time and just as I dashed in my name flashed up summoning me to the consultation room. Went in and as I was a touch flustered I asked the nurse if she could wait a couple of minutes before measuring the blood pressure as I'd been in a rush and I did not the reading to be too inaccurate. The nurse agreed this was a good idea. So, from my bag I whipped out Butter, sat him on my lap and took a deep, relaxing breath. "Bloody hell!", the nurse exclaimed, "What are you doing with that teddy bear? He is much nicer than mine." The thought drifted through my mind, "I will do well here." The blood pressure continues its upward climb, alas.