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.

If I may continue the positive feeling from last night’s post I really am feeling a lot better these days. It is not that I feel superior to other people, but I do feel proud with myself firstly that I have been very mentally strong for years and survived the horrors of paranoid schizophrenia; secondly, with help, I have worked out how to beat my symptoms, which are horribly lurid, and managed to turn my life around; finally I am very happy that I can be jolly and enjoy life without feeling hounded and harassed. These three facts make me feel I have done well. This is a wonderful state of mind to experience; I hope, dear reader, you can experience it too.

I am terribly pleased that things are still going well, and my attitude to the problems that remain is extremely reasonable.

Sleep isn’t always great, but with the aid of sleeping tablets I get enough sleep in the end. Moreover, I don’t see the nights when sleep is bad as being a sign of how utterly awful everything is. I accept that I won’t always sleep and it is good to have some time relaxing in bed even if I don’t drop off. This ‘not trying to sleep’-thing is a wonder.

My attitude is similarly improved with regard to the paranoid delusions. The voice is shouting at me as I write this, but I don’t have to buy into its dreadfulness about what a bad person I am. I’m not a bad person. When you are unhappy it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking everything is utterly terrible. Now I am happy I don’t feel like that; quite the reverse, in fact.

It is really good to be able to tick along at home and write a little bit. I may not be the most productive member of society, but I feel I do contribute.

Today I trekked across London for my last Cognitive Behavioural Therapy session. I suppose I could joke and say the thing I enjoyed most about those sessions was my half of cider and nachos with chilli at the boozer next door before I went in. In a way, that is true, I didn’t really ‘enjoy’ the CBT sessions, but crivens were they useful. Together with the other therapy sessions I had I worked out methods for dealing with the unpleasantness of paranoid schizophrenia and generally come to terms with my problems. Things are a lot better these days, and they’ll stay better. Good, eh?

Today is my last appointment with one of my psychotherapists. Psychotherapy has been quite amazingly useful; I have learnt techniques for dealing with all of the bad stuff and I am generally feeling much happier about life.

That being said, I am somewhat pleased the sessions are over. Not only is it good to be feeling in control enough to not need them any more, but also I cannot deny I found them slightly difficult. You may find this hard to believe, but I am a quiet chap really, so talking about myself was slightly uncomfortable. I like to think I engaged with the sessions well, but during them I felt hints of being slightly ill at ease.

I have a small gift for my psychotherapist, a book which is literature at its most literary. I have warned him in the past that you are not expected to totally understand literature, so he is prepared.

After a few nights of really rotten sleep I took a sleeping tablet last night. OK, I got a bit less than seven hours sleep, but this is a great improvement over recent days. Even though my new attitude to going to bed has stopped me catastrophising bad sleep it is still a bit of a drag that it is so often rubbish.

One of the nice things about taking sleeping tablets is that I find I rarely dream, or at least do not remember my dreams. My dreams are routinely horrible, especially so when the weather is hot and the bedroom has the heat characteristics of a pizza oven. When they wake me up at weird times of the night I have to go and get out of bed for half an hour to let the unpleasant feeling dissipate.

I’d be nice if my sleep was normal, but second best is that it doesn’t bother me so much when it is dreadful. I am very pleased with myself that I have been able to improve my attitude about bed. Things are so much better these days, you know?

When I was in bed earlier tonight I suddenly thought of something I wrote yesterday, and went on to think '”Oh, that was good.” I then felt happy. A couple of months ago if I thought something good about myself I would be charged with a crushing feeling that would be physically painful. This is how much things have improved, I am ‘allowed’ to think I am a good person.

The psychological techniques I have learned in psychotherapy are responsible for this change, and amazingly effective they have been. I admit, applying them requires a lot of energy and constant vigilance in controlling what I think about, but cripes it is good to feel happier.

Last summer I was also feeling happier because I was taking the super-last-resort anti-psychotic Clozapine. On that I used to walk around central London thinking I was a superior being. It has been pointed out that I was quite manic on it. The difference between then and now is my view of myself is a lot more realistic. I know I have some failings, and I know at even the stuff I am good at I am not the best person in the world; but I’m not the world’s worst person. Having a balanced view of my self seems much healthier than the Clozapine view.

Psychotherapy is not easy. For a few weeks I was too vastly unhappy to really engage with the process. Then I had a change of anti-depressant and I felt happier and calmer. For it to work you have to be receptive to ideas, and capable of applying the good ideas to your life. You cannot just sit back and expect them to ‘fix you’, it is up to you to engage with your therapist and work out what is going to help. As I have said, the suggestions might be hard work to start with, but if they work then clearly that is energy worth expending.

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 mentioned before that ‘not trying to sleep’ has caused me to have the best patch of quality sleep I’ve had in a decade. Another demonstration that you can change your life by changing your thinking is how I am now viewing the voice I hear. For years I’ve been losing at its game; I’ve been getting unhappy and distressed by how nasty it is. One of my psychotherapists suggested I try having an aloof attitude to it. This was really hard to start with, but is getting easier and is fabulously effective. When I write something like this, or a tasting note, the voice really goes for me, it says how much people will hate me when they read it and torrents of other abuse. I just think ‘No, no, no’ in an aloof, detached and slightly amused way. And it freaking works. I am not losing at its game any more, I am winning at my game. Brilliant.

I'm still sleeping. Even better, I am not awake for hours before I fall asleep. This is all thanks to my new attitude of 'not trying to sleep' and listening to a really boring album as I lie in bed. I haven't had a patch of good sleep that has lasted this long in years. It is brilliant!

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.

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'm in a patch of insomnia. The last time I got five hours sleep was 15 February. Ever since then, including the time in the bin, I've hardly slept at all. I just lay in bed for hours each night, watching the minutes slowly tick by on my clock. As the time ticks by I get more and more anxious that I am not going to sleep which, of course, doesn't help. Normally I try to get out of bed after an hour of no sleep, it is four in the morning and I have been out of bed twice tonight so far. I'll go to bed again later, sometimes I can sleep between eight and nine in the morning, but largely I don't know why I bother. It is all such a depressing drag.

One of the things the CBT woman asked when I said I wanted to address my sleeping issues was, "How much of a change to your sleep would you be satisfied with? Would you, say, be happy with sleeping half the time?" I said I wanted to sleep every night like a normal person. Is that really so much to ask? I'm shagged out and want to sleep. Please let me sleep!

One of the problems with being a nutter is is that no one takes you seriously. If you have a problem, something you need doing or a desire and you tell people about it they still do whatever the hell they like and don't listen to you, they just assume you are delusional. This has led to me having two unnecessary and painful operations on my stomach because doctor's just assumed they knew better than me. It is a real pisser.

I got an email from a friend earlier. He apologised for not being in contact for a while with the excuse that he felt scared about contacting me because he doesn't know how I would be feeling. I've heard this a few times. Perhaps it has never occurred to these people that I would appreciate hearing from them most would be when I am not feeling so good.

And I did it with style and class. For a few of minutes I was on form and I had a vague feeling of what the old me used to feel like; I had an easy charm, I was confident, I could talk my way into anything I wanted. I got my dose of Olanzapine put up to something more useful, as well. I'm not feeling so bad at the moment.

I told the psychiatrist, whom I know quite well, that I had ordered the book on psychodynamic therapy. He said, "Ah, now I suggest you don't read it until after you have finished the therapy. I say this because... How can I put this? You'll win. And unfortunately I mean that in a bad way." I'll ask the therapist what he thinks and if he says no I will wait. I am willing to take the advice of experts (in some fields) and I want the therapy to work. I shouldn't try to sabotage it.

So, I have lost and will never regain my career. I will never escape from the horribleness of psychosis, I'll just learn to deal with it. Can I really be arsed?

I was supposed to be going to psychodynamic therapy this evening but the therapist cried off ill. He doesn't know what ill is. I realised I didn't know so much about psychodynamic therapy so I read this website and ordered this book. I ordered the book because part of me wants to learn about a new topic, now I can read again, part of me thinks I'll get more out of it if I understand it, and what I recognise to be the paranoid side of me wants to know my enemy.

Well, for two days leave, at least. If all is well I'll report back to the bin on Wednesday morning and get discharged. I'm feeling pretty good. Over these past few days I have been able to read books, something I haven't been able to do since November, my mind has been in such a mess. It is really nice to be out and have access to things like showers which have more than two settings ('ice cold' and 'off' in the bin). I hope my good mood lasts.

I'm still in the bin, alas, but I shall try to bust out on Monday as I am feeling a lot better. You might be amused to learn I have nursery-printed pyjamas to wear at night and, bad old me, I've smuggled in a couple of nappies. I shall wear one tonight and I am sure it will help me sleep. I don't think taking 'bin baby play' pictures would be appropriate, so you'll just have to imagine me in my little room, catching some zeds with Butter whilst wearing a nappy and a sleeper. It is nice to feel better, but it makes it bloody hard to be locked up.

No more means no posts tonight. And none for a while, I'm afraid. Tomorrow I will see the doctor and ask to get locked up in the 'nicer' bin. Sadly, I am now feeling really suicidal and that means bin time. See you when I get out.

So I didn't go to CBT on Friday. I was just too scared about the journey. There is a possible solution for the future, though.

I'm feeling really shit, and the bad news is I've started feeling pretty suicidal. This invariably means bin time. I'll make an appointment to see the doc tomorrow and get referred to the 'nicer' bin. Unfortunately I don't know if I am allowed my laptop in the bin so who knows if more posts will follow soon. I will ask, though.

There is some good news. I applied to have psychodynamic therapy at The Metro Centre in Greenwich. I expected to wait a couple of months, but after mere weeks I have been assigned a therapist, which is excellent. What is a bit weird is that it'll be the same chap I saw when I was on Clozapine and thought I was brilliant and could deal with all my problems. I'll be a very different chap from last time I saw him.

Today I have cognitive behavioural therapy, my second session. I am tranquillised, but I am so unhappy about having to leave the flat I've cut one arm up and burned the other. And this is supposed to make me well?

I managed to talk my way out of a trip to the bin, which is good, and I have medication to cheer me up. And if it doesn't cheer me up? Well, then, I suppose, it'll be bin time. I suppose I should be thinking "Result!", but I am afraid I'm still quite unhappy.

I've been taking the higher dose of Risperidone for the best part of a week now. Sadly I am not finding things that much easier; it has not had the effect it has had in the past. This has manifested itself by me hurting myself last night when I couldn't sleep and hurting myself just now. It looks increasingly like it is time for a trip to the bin. Bugger. Going into the bin really makes me feel like a dreadful failure of a person. Even with a loving partner I cannot hold my life together enough to avoid getting locked up. I'm such a crap person.

As you can see, I am happier today. Firstly my Community Psychiatric Nurse dropped by with a prescription for 8mg/day of Risperidone. Hooray! Secondly, and most importantly, when things were really crap at lunch time the partner dropped everything at work and came home to look after me. This cheered me up no end. He'll be working from home for the rest of the week, which should give the drugs time to kick in. Finally, the internet supermarket gave away some free toy vans, which, as you can see in the picture below, Kisu the cat was also interested in.

I see the psychiatrist on Thursday, hooray! I can get my Risperidone dose put up to the magic 8mg/day. I have also found out today that my first appointment for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for psychosis will be on Friday. I'm less happy about this. For a start, I'll be incoherent with terror by the time I get there. Secondly, they'll expect me to talk about what is going on in my head. I cannot talk about that, people will think I am completely mad. Well, I suppose they know I am quite mad, but it will still be really difficult.

The voice, the people abusing me from outside my flat, and the thoughts of passers-by are all telling me to cut and burn my face. I find this incredibly difficult to deal with. It would have helped if my anti-psychotic dose had gone up today.

I'm currently on 6mg/day of the anti-psychotic Risperidone. I've going up to 8mg/day on Monday. 6mg/day isn't enough. Too, too much nasty stuff is happening. It is very difficult.

I'm sick of being ill, I hate it and it makes me feel like shit person. What have I done to deserve this? Well, I know what I've done but this punishment is surely cruel and unusual.

I'm out of the bin, wehay!

I've mentioned paranoia attacks before, common currency for you paranoid schizophrenic, but I had a complete psychotic breakdown yesterday morning and that was a tad un-nerving (we have understatement in England).

After days of no real sleep and no effective anti-psychotic medication I found things getting a bit weird. I don't remember much about it apart from screaming as I repeatedly banged my head against the wall. It seemed to take a very long time for a nurse to notice this was happening. I found my mind completely bleached of all that is me, which was quite scary. In its place, well, I have no frame of reference for explaining it was so utterly nasty, so let us say 'indescribable horribleness'.

I've got a sore head.

Hopefully be out of the bin by the end of the week. Hopefully.

I had my last dose of powerful tranquilisers last night. They didn't help me sleep but I didn't feel so bad about not sleeping. The question is, how will I manage without them? Sadly I have the feeling that a trip to the bin approaches. I hate the bin, but I cannot put the burden of keeping me alive on anyone else.

Yesterday I didn't sleep again, despite taking vast quantities of supposedly sedating medication. I am utterly shagged out. I am afraid to say it all got a bit to much for me and I ran a hot bath and tried to slash my wrists. 'Fortunately' since our knife-sharpener disappeared all of our knives are so blunt you could ride bare arse to London on them. So I was sawing and sawing away at any blood vessel  I could find but could never actually puncture anything.

So with this failure behind me, I am still feeling shit and desperately tired, what do I do? I heat up the head of a nail with a lighter and hold the nail head against my arm. And repeat 59 more times. My arm looks fucking horrible.

I was really, really hoping to sleep last night, I was so shagged out. I was told by my doctor that 50mg of the drug Quetiapine (aka Seroquel) would knock me out. At 11pm last night I took 450mg, 60mg of Mianserin (which is supposed to help me sleep) and 1mg of Clonazepam, a powerful tranquiliser. I didn't sleep. By 2am I was getting a bit pissed off with this, so I took one of my precious Zolpidem tablets; these supposedly put you to sleep with in 15-20 minutes. 2 hours later when I was still awake I gave up for the night. I am so exhausted.

I had the assessment for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for psychosis this afternoon, I've lost count of how many questionnaires of this type I've had to fill in since I went bonkers, but they always upset my equilibrium. I suppose this is not surprising, as they are trying to find out what is wrong with you, but it still upsets me.

Today I filled in a few of these things, trying to be as honest as possible in my answers. As I analysed the answers I gave I realised that I had generally given the 'complete nut-case' answer. I'll give you an example from the paranoid thinking questionnaire:

You notice a shadow move across the room, what do you think?
0: It must be something going past the window.
1: I must have imagined it.
2: Something must be in the room with me.
3: Something is coming to get me.

As you can probably guess, the numbers are increasing bonkers-person points: 0-1 points = reasonably sane; 3 points = totally hat-stand. Do you want to guess which I chose?

Needless to say, this has made me feel bloody terrible about myself. Which has resulted in the hallucinations going screaming-butt-hole-crazy. When I got home the voice I hear and the people I see and hear standing outside my flat were screaming at me to slash my wrists in the bath. I resisted this, and so they switched to saying I didn't deserve the escape of death, I am such a bad person I should suffer forever. That upset me a lot.

Christmas and New Year were quite tolerable with people being about. But now everyone is back at work and I am alone with my hallucinations and paranoia. The anti-psychotic I was prescribed at the beginning of December really doesn't do much; I'm feeling barking mad and extremely depressed.

However, I am taking steps to change this. I see the loony doctor on Monday and I will ask for the dose of the anti-psychotic to be put up. In ten minutes I am leaving the flat to have a third assessment for Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for psychosis. Last time I saw them I was taking wonderful, wonderful Clozapine, so I didn't feel I needed their service. They said they would keep me on the waiting list for six months to make sure nothing changed. It has, so I am seeing them again. I am also trying to arrange CBT for insomnia.

I'm really scared about leaving the flat.

Lawks, it has been a while since I posted here. What has been happening?

I've had a cold, I've had an attack of my cyclical vomiting syndrome (which was bloody awful) and I have changed medication. The new medication makes me feel a bit weird, and it is only reasonably effective at dealing with my psychotic symptoms.

I am having a fun christmas with the neighbours cooking roast goose. More news as it comes in.

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.

Seven months ago I had a preliminary assessment for CBT for psychosis. I was screamingly bonkers at that time. They called me back today because I am now top of the waiting list for this therapy. I had to tell them I don't need it. By way of demonstrating the difference between then and now my score on the depression questionnaire has gone down from 69 (one below the maximum score) to 3. I am a much happier bunny these days. The chap I saw suggested I turn up for a few sessions, but I really don't see the point. Things are OK, and that is just great.

*That is Cognitive Behavioural Therapy not Cock and Ball Torture.

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.

But they start one on a vanishingly small dose, 12.5mg/day to start with when a therapeutic dose is at least 300mg/day. This means it has not been helping me sleep. This in turn means I am still plagued by paranoid delusions and am really suicidal. For the first ten days of taking the Clozapine someone comes to my flat twice a day to take my temperature and blood-pressure; cramps my style a bit. It'll be 20 days before I get up to 300mg/day, and I may well need more than that. I wish it could be speeded up, I need some sleep.

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 sprung myself from the bin yesterday evening. It is really nice to be out again.

Day three in the bin and I finally get to see a doctor. What is more, he actually changed my drugs, hooray! Hopefully I will get a bit of sleep tonight and things will not be so bad tomorrow. Apart from the bin, of course, that will always be bad.

I'm in the loony bin. The lack of sleep had got to me over the past few weeks and I had become really suicidal. The partner persuaded me that I needed to be here and I suppose he is right. It is a bloody awful place, though. This will be my second night and they still have not done anything about my medication. The bastards!

Tonight marks the ninth anniversary of me trying to kill myself by cutting my wrists in the bath for the first time. Not a happy anniversary, you might think, but it is good that I have lasted nine years despite all of the problems I've faced.

Things have changed a lot. Nine years ago I was an academic at Oxford and single. The wrist-slashing attempt was because I could not deal with the onset on schizophrenia, I found the voices and visions to be utterly terrifying (I still do) and I was too depressed by them to think that I could manage to continue on. I crashed out of my dream academic career in grand style. The next eighteen months featured a total of six months locked up in the loony bin, usually with someone sitting in the corner of my room to make sure I didn't try to kill myself (which I frequently did if I wasn't watched). Fool that I was it took me a while to tell people that I was hallucinating because I was so scared I'd be locked up forever. During this period I had Electro-Convulsive Therapy which blew large holes in my memory. Most days I cut my arms and for a period I was burning them repeatedly every day. It was an awful time, I don't feel happy remembering it.

However, some good things happened. I moved to London, which is the second greatest city on Earth (after New York) and full of larks for one to get up to. I made very good friends with two people who are now the neighbours. Without their support and friendship I'd have been in deep trouble. Also, for a week in the midst of all of this another superannuated toddler visited me to dine at London's best eating establishments. We had a great time and so later that year he moved over to London from Sweden because he wanted a better paying job and he thought it would be fun to live near me (fun to live near me? Hell's bells, I was screamingly bonkers). He lived in the flat underneath me for nine months before we moved in together. He is quite one of the loveliest people one could hope to meet, and treats me far better than I deserve. Without his love and support I'd undoubtedly be dead by now.

I admit, I am still plagued by hallucinations and my opinion of myself is terribly low, but I am pleased I have managed to survive this long. Things have been a lot worse than they are now, and it looks like they won't deteriorate to that level again.

I met long-time reader Llamabait last night, what a lovely fellow he is. The neighbours also dropped around, so there was an embarrassment of social riches for me to enjoy. I had a great evening.

Needless to say, the next day I've rebounded big time. Today has been one of my usual days on no social contact; I am excessively lonely and miserable. I didn't sleep very well for the umpteenth night in a row and I am sure this is not helping my mood. I get a bit of social contact tomorrow in the form of my Community Psychiatric Nurse visiting, and, whilst that may not sound like much of a thrill, I am looking forward to his visit.

I am going out to lunch with a fan of one of my other websites tomorrow. He contacted me out of the blue, saying he liked what I write on my site and would like to go out to lunch with me. One might have thought this would be fun, but I somehow manage to see the dark side of things.

It was pointed out to me a few days ago that whenever I see one of my friends with a job (and all of the bastards (lovely bastards, naturally) are successful and incredibly well-paid) I get miserable for a few days before because I feel inadequate and have a low opinion of myself. Well, it has happened with me meeting this fellow. I am feeling incredibly rotten because this chap is a successful wine merchant who can afford things like lunch and I have to meet him and pretend not to be a defective person. Can I manage to be happy that people like what I write and want to meet me? Apparently not.

Naturally, having this character-trait pointed out to me has not made me feel any better about myself.

After months of being eminently tolerable and for no transparent reason, my hallucinations have been utterly terrible these past three days. I've been screaming at the voice I hear, which is not good. I have also developed a new delusion which I have never had before. When I go out I can read the minds of strangers around me. They are always thinking bad things about me, which is a bit hard to deal with. I've been relying on Lorazepam these past couple of nights to stop me screaming, crying and shouting about all the awfulness I experience.

As good fortune would have it, I have managed to get an emergency appointment with my psychiatrist on Monday. I just have to endure all of this horribleness for the time being.

Mental health services in my area are rubbish. It seems every six months I get assigned a new psychiatrist and new care co-ordinator. Last time this happened I was in the process of being completely barking mad and trying to kill myself every two weeks. As a result of this, my care co-ordinator was upgraded from being an occupational therapist who I had to travel to see to a community psychiatric  nurse who travels out to see me. This is great, I don't really like going out and him coming to see me solves that problem.

It gets better. I just saw him and expressed an interest in real ales and it turns out we share a favourite beer: Bishop's Finger. When it is on tap it is magic. I mentioned to him my local boozer usually has it along with a selection of other good real ales. As a consequence of this, my next meeting with my National Health Service assigned mental health care co-ordinator will be down my local pub. Brilliant!

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've been supervised at home for the past two days, so I have not cut myself or done anything else bad. This has resulted in me being sure that I am a good baby rather than a bad adult. This works for me. My dose of the anti-psychotic that has worked in the past (Risperidone) was also increased yesterday, I am half way to getting up to a therapeutic dose. This has also cheered me up a bit, even though the hallucinations are still pretty bad. Still, I am a good baby and that is a good thing.

My community psychiatric nurse (CPN) came around this morning; what a nice chap he is. Even more amazingly, he likes me! I've only met him about four times before and all of those have been in crisis appointments in which I have been deeply out of my mind. I think I am horrible when I am out of my mind, apparently I am quite charming. He likes me! Amazing!

The upshot of the meeting was that he thinks I need to stop trying to control my dark side, instead come to an accommodation with it. All very well and good in theory, but my dark side has access to tools that fizz and pop with terror all around my computer screen as I sit here typing this. Cripes, I even have difficulty accepting that these boilingly real 'hallucinations' come from a dark side that has anything to do with me. Faulty wiring or biochemical imbalance in my brain, but not from me, surely?

Hell's bells, my non-dark side (the bit that is actually me) hates itself (myself?) with such a burning passion that any self analysis means I would be dipping my toes in water too dirty for my tastes. So not only do I have to come to terms with my detestable self, but also my frankly mind-paralysingly petrifying dark side that I am not even sure has anything to do with me anyway. This poses some problems.

Even attempting to engage the hallucinations is a horrific task. If I start to think about the nasty, dirty, hairy rat-like thing that is sitting on my knee... it is heavy... I can feel it move... triggers me to burst out into tears and thrash around uncontrollably for a few seconds. Oh, the terror. No, really.

And I am supposed to come to an accommodation with this?

I'm not feeling terribly happy. I thought a chat might cheer me up. I just tried to ring seven friends. With a couple there was no answer, some were out of the office, one was off skiing, another doing the harvest and finally it was Mr Hardy's back stretching day.

I then tried IM'ing three friends on various messenger networks who were shown as active. No response.

Now I like to think I am only a moderately paranoid person but the fact that ten friends are all uncontactable makes me think they are avoiding me, and that makes me think all kinds of other nasty things. I'm really not very happy.

I spent the weekend in France with the neighbours. The point was to go and visit three very good restaurants. At the first I ate this sausage:

The owner of the restaurant made suggestive comments as I toyed with the enormous sausage.

Things are still not entirely brilliant as far as mental health goes, but they have been a lot worse. I am generally holding off from lacerating my arms and only randomly cry a few times a day. The hallucinations are still pretty bad, but I am finally having my anti-psychotic medication changed to something useful on Monday, so hopefully these will be less of a problem soon.

I am still feeling slightly better. I haven't completely escaped the hallucinations, and have had a new, disturbing one over the past couple of days, but I feel I can deal with being at home without doing myself too much damage. Being alone is still difficult, and I am actually pleased that the home treatment team are sending people to see me.

Well, who'd have thought it, but it seems I am feeling very slightly better. I didn't cut myself yesterday and haven't today, and the hallucinations just seem a tad less distressing. I hope this will continue.

I've just had someone from the home treatment team around, no they haven't succeeded in dumping me yet, and he has made me very unhappy.

The chap was obviously trying to be helpful and suggest things I could do to stop the hallucinations being such a problem. People often do this. What they don't take account of is the fact that I've been suffering from this condition since 1998 and I know by now that not much does deal with the hallucinations and all these ideas that people float to try and be helpful are largely pointless. I've tried them, I've tried them hoping that this new technique will finally get me some relief only for my hopes to be dashed repeatedly.

I say not much deals with the hallucinations, but I manage to hold off their worst excesses very well most of the time. And this is another thing that annoys me. Medical professionals always seem to act as if I make no effort to deal with them and I just passively accept them and what they say. This is far from the truth. I really fight to deal with the hallucinations. My most of my conscious mind demands me to get into the corner of the room and scream so horrible are the things I see and hear but what there is left of me can fight off that urge. I fight to retain control. When I am with people I strongly feel the urge to shout at them that I know what they are thinking (it is never anything good) and ask why they want me to suffer and die. I am on the edge of florid, incoherent insanity and yet I fight, very hard, to stay on the right side of that edge.

The Oxleas House Home Treatment Team are a bunch of heartless bastards. They are supposed to provide care to people in mental health crises to keep them out of hospital. They have a consultant psychiatrist one can see to discuss medication and nurses they send out once a day to make sure you haven't killed yourself and drop off drugs.

They are always forgetting to drop drugs off, or bringing the wrong doses, but two events in the past week have really upset me. Firstly, on Wednesday of last week I rang them to make an appointment to see their doctor, I needed my anti-psychotic medication dose increased. I was told that I would be seen quicker by my community psychiatrist as theirs had left and so it would be best if they discharged me. The bastards were trying to dump me. My Community Psychiatric Nurse (CPN) contacted me to say he was very worried and why had I discharged myself from the Home Treatment Team. I said I hadn't, they had discharged me. Many irate phone calls later I was back being seen by the Home Treatment Team and seeing their new doctor the following afternoon. I had managed to crawl my way back into their fold.

Today I ring up and ask to make an appointment to see the doctor. I am told I'll be rang back and when this happens I am told the doctor wants to know why I want to see him because if it is about changing medication I should be seeing my community psychiatrist for that. Not only will it take over a week to get an appointment with my community psychiatrist it seems pretty pointless being seen by the HTT if the doctors are not going to do anything to help. The bastards were trying to dump me again, less than a week after the first attempt.

I've got a call in to try and contact the doctor and tell him to be less of a bastard ask him why he won't change my medication and if not what is the point in being with the HTT. I suppose I had also better start the arcane process of getting to see my community psychiatrist.

The psychiatrist did put up both my dose of anti-psychotics and tranquilisers, but not by much. Hopefully the tranquilisers will tide me over until the anti-psychotics kick in. I hope they do kick in.

The Clonazepam tranquiliser is quite effective. When I got up this morning I instantly started cutting my arm as I was so distressed by the hallucinations. Twenty minutes after taking the Clonazepam, a lot of the urgency is taken out of the situation. My mood seems a lot flatter too, less extreme and agitated.

I see a psychiatrist at four this afternoon. I will be pushing for a significant rise in my dose of Trifluoperazine and, for a limited time, an increase in my dose of Clonazepam. I'd rather not rely on the tranquiliser but things are just so bad I need all the help I can get to stop me from crawling into a corner and screaming for the rest of my life.

Turns out my community psychiatric nurse (CPN) thinks I should be in hospital and is trying to persuade a nicer hospital to give me a bed. This is difficult. My arms have had fresh blood on them all day and it would put a stop to that. However, I'd miss Daniel, the neighbours, my cat, my computer, my bed, and so on. Moreover, even nicer hospitals are not that nice. But I am not well. I am less and less convinced that my hallucinations are only hallucinations, they seem pretty freaking real to me. I can see that people might not want to admit they can see them, for any number of reasons. But, I don't seem to be thinking so clearly of late. I don't know about hospital, I really don't.

I wonder what else my CPN has been discussing.

My hallucinations are terrible today. The people standing outside my flat are screaming for my blood. They want me dead and they want me dead as nastily as possible. The voice I hear also wants me dead, and the colourful abuse it is dishing out to me is so horrible it is really upsetting. The place is crawling with nasty rat-like things, they crawl over me and I can feel them. I am really agitated and unhappy. Worst of all I don't know what I can do about this situation; I don't think there is anything, I just have to sit it out until the drugs kick in. I hope they do soon as I cannot stand living like this, it is really pushing me too far. My arms are ribbons of cuts.

I saw a psychiatrist on Friday who increased my dose of anti-psychotic medication. Hooray. The only problem is this can take weeks to kick in if it is going to work at all. I am still suffering really badly from appalling hallucinations and I just want them to tone down a bit. This is the kind of thing that is going to push me over the edge and have me in the bin permanently.

Here is what I looked like after a week of being denied a razor:

Do I have mange or what?

Yesterday I busted my way out of the bin.

In the morning I asked if it was possible for someone else to turn up with me to my weekly appointment with the psychiatrist only to be breezily told that the weekly appointment had been canceled. It would be two weeks between my seeing the consultant psychiatrist and I was severely harassed by hallucinations. I asked to see another doctor and was told by him that he would see me 'much later', but he would not change the anti-psychotic medication anyway.

It occurred to me that I would be seen by a consultant psychiatrist much sooner than ten days time if I was seen by the loony support service 'in the community'; I resolved to break out of the bin. I needed the doctor to refer me to the home treatment team, so I must wait to see him. Six hours later I still had not been seen by the doctor, so I threatened to walk out of the place, pressing all of the emergency door opening buttons, unless I saw a doctor within ten minutes. Surprise, surprise, one turned up nine minutes later. He referred me to the loony support team and a mere several hours and many lies told to me later I was free.

My suicidal thoughts had been bleached from my mind by the utter horribleness of the loony bin, so I was safe and could convincingly talk my way out. I am still incredibly harassed by hallucinations. The people standing outside screaming abuse at me are a veritable crowd and they still want me dead, and so on. So I still need to see a doctor and get the medication changed.

I am really pleased to be out of the bin. When I came home I was greeted by Kisu the cat who wanted to be picked up and purred loudly. I was surprised by how much I had missed my little cat. I may still barking, but it is great to be out.

I've been in the bin since Wednesday and not much has changed. Despite the increased dose of anti-depressants I am still as miserable as sin. This is largely because I am so harassed by hallucinations: everywhere is crawling with nasty, hairy, dirty rat-like things and there is a group of people standing outside my room screaming abuse at me. They want me dead. The rats will get me in the end. When I lie in bed I feel them running about over me. I constantly hear a voice which says incredibly nasty things about me and tells me that other people are thinking horrible things about me. It is like a free horror film at which attendence is compulsory.

I hope that, on Thursday, my anti-psychotic medication is changed to something more useful. I really cannot deal with how things are at the moment, I am crying all of the time.

Last night I cried for a couple of hours solidly and after about ninety minutes a nurse came in and asked what was wrong. I replied, "I am sick of being ill and I want to die." He said, "Well, that is why you are in hospital, to make you back into the person you used to be." This made me cry even more furiously and I manged to reply, "The person I used to be died in 1998."

Getting better from schizophrenia isn't becoming your old self again, it is pulling together the shattered fragments of your personality as best you can. This would be a lot easier if the heartless bastards here would give me something to help deal with the frankly petrifying hallucinations I experience. I have to wait until next Thursday for movement on that front.

After last night in a temporary bed I got moved to a ward first thing this morning. I was pleased until I realised I was just being moved to the ward; they had no bed for me. I assumed it would be the usual Oxleas House system of waiting until ten at night before finally being given a room, but I was almost pleasantly surprised only to have to wait six hours before a room was found.

I also managed to see a consultant psychiatrist (good) who doubled my dose of anti-depressants (also good) but he refused to do anything about my anti-psychotic medication as he didn't want to fiddle with multiple medications at the same time (very bad). I really need the anti-psychotic medication to be changed as the current stuff is doing nothing and I am experiencing really bad hallucinations; it could well be the intensity of them that is making me depressed. I do not get to see him again for a week.

The bin is the usual horror story, filled with unhappy, confused people who feel the need to shout a lot. Only a few times today have people exploded and tired to leave forcably. None of them have been me. Now I have my room I just hide in here cuddling Butter the bear and occasionally going online. The bin is greatly improved by the presence of my N800 internet tablet.

Well, I got to the bin and waited around for the usual hour after hour, eight hours to be precise. I was then told there was no room for me on any of the wards so I would have to use an 'emergency' room. I was given no promise about when I would be allowed on a ward, and so be able to see a doctor and have my medication changed. Also, I am not allowed to turn the lights out in the emergency room (so can be watched more easily) so sleeping in the bright light is very difficult. I am fantastically unhappy.

I have come back from France early as I am so depressed I need to go to the loony bin immediately. Bugger.

I'll get home, charge my phone and internet tablet then head straight there. They are expecting me. I wonder how long I'll have to wait for a bed this time. At my local bin my minimum waiting time has been twelve hours.

It was not in the so distant past that I wanted to stay alive because I thought the medical profession were trying to kill me. Now I am so amazingly depressed all I can thing about is dieing. It fills and consumes my mind. I really want to kill myself as soon as I am free from any obligations.

I wish these anti-depressants would hurry up and kick in. I am feeling so depressed. I'm crying all of the time (including now) and all I can think about is that I must kill myself when I return from my holiday which starts at the end of the week. I am obsessed with the idea that  must die. This makes normal functioning very difficult.

Not me, but happier:

 

I am remarkably less paranoid, and really not being so bothered by the hallucinations, but really still terribly depressed. I have no interest in my hobbies, I cry all the time and I feel like I want to die. Soon. But I am still happier than I have been. Those arms are a real mess; I am disgusted with myself.

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...

Tanks to the power of lots of sedatives, I got a couple of hours more sleep last night. I feel less tired and I ache less, but I am still not very happy, alas. I've burned my arm a couple of times this morning (and that doesn't cheer me up). I'll have the nurses coming to check I am still alive any minute so I had better dash.

The 'nicer' bin was full. They offered me a bed 'wherever you fit', but I am buggered if I am going into a really horrible place like Oxleas House. I am going to have to deal with the hallucinations and paranoia myself. I will get the new anti-depressant this evening, which I hope helps rather than poisons me. I could really do with some sleep. Last night's experience of being awake most of the night crying because the hallucinations were so bad is not something I really want to repeat.

I have asked if there is still the possibility of going into the 'nicer' loony bin I was offered yesterday. I am waiting for a call to tell me if there is a space or not. If there is, my anxiety levels will leap as I step into the dragon's den, and hopefully I will get established on some medication and stop burning myself. If there is no space, I stay at home. Nothing would get me back into Oxleas House, it is one of the most horrible places I have been.

One slightly good piece of news is that I have been promised delivery of the anti-depressant I didn't get yesterday later on today (assuming I am still at liberty). Assuming it does not poison me, it might help me get a bit of sleep and cheer me up a bit.

No anti-depressant being delivered really upset me. That is why I went to see the doctors in the first place, to get the anti-depressant medication sorted out, and yet it doesn't happen. For two days at least.

So, with relatively little night-time sedation, I am up before three. I am really unhappy and when I look at my arm all I look for is free places that I can burn. This is really not very good. My hallucinations are terrifying, and I am still really paranoid about the medical profession. I don't really know what I can do to help myself. My thoughts are not clear on this. I know I am really unhappy and utterly disgusted by what I am doing to my arms.

When the doctors tried to put me in the bin earlier they said there was a nicer bin they could try and get me into. I feel this would be walking into the lion's den, but might it not be a safer environment? I don't know, I am confused. They might get my medication sorted out and I might stop burning myself, as well as them having me locked up where they want me so they can do me harm. I need to ask someone who is thinking clearly. I recognise I am paranoid at the moment, but it feels so real. I'm scared of the bin,though, but I am also currently really scared out at home.

Because I am English and therefore omniscient about bad things happening. If a train breaks down, rest assured it'd be the English person who says, "I could have told you so."

The new anti-depressant is Mianserin, and guess how much the loony support service has delivered for me tonight? That is right, none. And none for tomorrow either.

I saw two psychiatrists today, both of whom wanted to lock me up. I managed to talk my way out of it by agreeing to have psychiatric nurses visiting me at home every day and handing over the month's worth of drugs my GP prescribed.

I have also been prescribed a new anti-depressant (the name of which escapes me at the moment, the nurses will bring it later), which may increase my psychotic experiences (including paranoia) and may knacker my immune system. But it also may help me sleep and make me less depressed. I am still convinced the medical profession is trying to kill me, so I'm expecting the increased psychosis and dead white blood cells option. My dose of anti-psychotics has also been put up, which makes it more likely for me to get side-effects from them. I suppose that also may mean my experience of psychosis may reduce, but we shall see.

It was really hard to see the doctors, when I have such nasty thoughts about what they are trying to do to me, but I suppose I should be glad they didn't lock me up. Gladder, perhaps, I'm not very happy.

Thanks to my remaining, and extremely dwindling, stocks of clonazepam, I finally got back to bed and got a couple of hours more sleep. I cannot rely on this for much longer, though, even if I had more I don't want to get addicted.

I am going to have to make an appointment with a psychiatrist as rapidly as I can manage, difficult as this will be as I still think they are trying to kill me. I have the mobile number of my psychiatric nurse, which he has strongly indicated is for emergencies only. I'll ring him at a decent hour of today and ask as soon as he gets back to work from his week's holiday tomorrow if he can arrange for me to see my psychiatrist. Once again, this will be hard. I must try not to end every sentence with the words 'you bastard'.

The recent drugs I've been prescribed by the psychiatric services have made me so sick I've lost over 14kg, stopped me from sleeping, made me think doctors are trying to kill me, made my hallucinations frighteningly worse and made me burn my arm to buggery. I've also been given a month's worth of reasonably toxic drugs eleven days after I took a serious overdose. So I do have some slight evidence that they have not been treating me ideally. In my mind this becomes evidence they want me dead, but that is something I am just going to have to deal with.

Not only does the drug information leaflet say it may increase paranoia, but also this place says, "The drug may cause exacerbation of psychosis in schizophrenic patients." Is it any wonder I think the medical profession have it in for me?

Cheered as I was to have friends around last night, I am not happy about this wake-up at three am thing. It doesn't cheer me up terribly much.

It was incredibly difficult to take my medication yesterday, such is my paranoia about the medical profession trying to kill me. Required much re-assurance. The thought lingers and is hard to shake. I am not particularly looking forward to when I finally get to see my care co-ordinator next week. I've got to tell him this.

I've also got to show him my left arm that has more than seventy burns on it. He is not going to make me go back into the loony bin.

I got around to reading the patient information leaflet that comes in with my Trimipramine anti-depressant. A known side-effect is increased paranoia. Brilliant. Is this really what is happening or is it just that they (and the anti-psychotics) have not kicked in yet? I don't want to have to start something else instead. There is perilously little I haven't tried already.

See my solitude where once was truth now only doubt
Touch my tortured skin torn from within and from without
Kiss my blistered lips, my fingertips frostbitten and gray
Heal my wound within and watch the dead skin fall away.

Many thanks for Neil Hannon for this jolliness. Indeed, if you ever need a really unhappy song then I heartily recommend 'Through a long and sleepless night' by The Divine Comedy. I often listen to it at 3am or just before going to see my psychiatrist in order to feel appropriately miserable.

Last night I was building bloody Ikea furniture. I hate, hate, hate building flat-pack furniture so much. Not only did it get me distressed, really uptight and stinking, but it also resulted in me going to bed at 3am. It is now just past 5am. Fantastic. I'm going to be in a great mood today, I can tell. There is a bookshelf to build today, freaking great. At least being able to try out a new program has distracted me enough so I haven't burned myself this morning (yet).

I am using Microsoft Live Writer to make this post. It may only still be in Beta, but it connects to dasBlog blogs a treat and does things like check your spelling, has a proper WYSIWYG editor and uploads photos for you. The editor in dasBlog is not ideal; whereas this seems the best blogging tool I've used. Certainly better than Maemo Blog on my Nokia N800 which served me so well when blogging from the loony bin. That is very much a work in progress, though.

Oh, by the way, I hope you like the new layout of the blog. I thought it was time for a change. That tiny font of the old design was such a swine to read when crying.

I may have got an extra hour's sleep last night but I am still terribly unhappy. By way of demonstration of this, we had some Ikea furniture delivered today, and I normally don't like putting such things together as I am not very good at it. However, so depressed am I that I don't even want to look at them and even thinking about trying to build one of them makes me burst into tears. The only thing that is allowing me to get a bit of focus is hurting myself, which isn't terribly good news.

I want to speak to someone and explain how unhappy I am and have some comforting words said. However, I am so unhappy I cannot explain why and there are no real comforting words so I cannot impose myself on someone to ask for them. I suppose what I need is for the anti-depressants to have an effect, but this can take up to four weeks (I only started on a decent dose last night after a couple of weeks of faffing about with a dose of piss all). I am afraid, dear reader, that it is you that has to suffer my whining.

I picked up my month's worth of medication earlier, and the temptation to swallow the lot is very strong. However, I am going to see a good friend in Burgundy in mid-July and I don't want to mess that up for those I am travelling with. So I suppose I will have to continue crying every ten minutes and hurting myself until something, arse knows what, improves.

I went to bed an hour early and slept until half-three so things have improved a bit with the increased dose of anti-depressants (they are supposedly very sedating). Now all I need them to do is start cheering me up as I am still not terribly happy. I wonder how good the new anti-psychotics are, though, as I am still having unpleasant hallucinations and my paranoid delusions are really quite colourful.

As a side note to last night's Wifi fun with my Nokia N95 phone; it works a treat but leaving Wifi on all the time sucks the battery dry terribly quickly. Leaving Skype/Fring running over Wifi permanently just cannot be done. I even tried lowering the Wifi broadcast power to see if that would increase the battery life, but no dice. It will have to be a case of connecting when I want to make an international call. I will see how the battery lasts on my N800 when Skype comes out for that. I think both my N95 and N800 are great; obviously toys in some ways, but terribly useful. I would have been so utterly unhappy in the loony bin without the contact they allowed me to have.

I saw the most useless of the GPs at my surgery today, what an interesting job he did. He asked a couple of times how I was coping ("Very badly", I said each time) and established that I had no follow up care after having left hospital. He then did something good and increased the dose of anti-depressants I am on. He didn't seem bothered enough to ask about the string of burns on my arm, but I realised his plan for dealing with 'problem patients' when he sent me, who had taken a serious overdose eleven days ago, on my way with a prescription for a month's worth of drugs. The Trimipramine (anti-depressant) and Trifluoperazine (anti-psychotic) are pretty toxic things. Perhaps he just doesn't want to have to fill out another prescription ever again.

I am supposed to see my normal psychiatrist and care co-ordinator/psychiatric nurse within a week of getting out of the bin. Naturally, they are both on holiday this week. This means I have to rely on my total crap GP to assist with my current situation. What I need is the dose of anti-depressants putting up and the chances of the hopeless fart doing that are frankly negligible. Rather than make any decision himself he'll try and get me to go back to the bin and that simply isn't going to happen. I may be unhappy and at risk of self harm at home, but I'd be unhappier in the bin and not at liberty. And, of course, the bin is truly, truly horrible.

I tried going back to bed and couldn't sleep a wink. I did have some unusual hallucinations for me, though. I know the usual hallucinations I get are weird, but these were different. People I didn't recognise kept walking into my bedroom to heap abuse on me. They were very real. This has been happening for a few days. I worry.

Louis-Ferdinand Céline said: Never believe straight off in a man's unhappiness; Ask him if he can sleep. If the answer is 'yes' all is well. That is enough.

I suppose I can sleep a bit, so all should be well, but it sure as arse doesn't feel like that.

I am once again awake and it is not even three. Last night I managed to get to sleep again, but it was some hours later. So I have been getting some sleep, which is better than on the aripiprazole, but this waking up early thing really does bother me. I must talk to my care co-ordinator about it when I next see him, which should be this week. I am supposed to see him, my GP and my normal psychiatrist within a week of getting out of the bin; it'll be a busy old week of farting around promising not to kill myself all the time.

It will be a pain in the arse when I see my GP. I have to get my drugs from them and there is fat chance they'll write me up a reasonable amount. I'll have to trudge up there twice a week to get a prescription. They'll 'um' and 'ah' when I ask for enough drugs to take on holiday with me in a few weeks time. The thing is they probably will have good reason. This getting up early thing is just one of the signs I am not terribly happy. I am aware it could well be because of my reduced dose of clonazepam, but I am buggered if I am getting addicted to that; I am stopping taking it as soon as possible. I suppose I had better speak to a professional.

I was awake (with a little help from the cat, I admit) at four this morning. I had been sleeping a lot better. Waking up early and being unable to get to sleep again is a classic symptom of depression. I'll try to go to bed again soon, but I don't feel like I can sleep.

Of course, it could be because the dose of tranquilisers I was given in hospital has been radically cut on my return home. This is a good thing, those benzodiazepines are really addictive and I want to stop taking them. I was supposed to take a milligramme of clonazepam last night but I only did half that amount as I want to get off them. It is pretty good stuff for dealing with anxiety and calming one down, I have to say, but so addictive.

On a related note, a chum with bipolar disorder was recommended aripiprazole by his doctor. He knew I had been taking it and he knew it stopped me from sleeping. He has problems sleeping himself, so wisely (in my view) declined the offer. He also saved a pile of cash as he is an American chappie and they have to pay for their medication; aripiprazole (aka Abifily) is muy expensivo. I know it doesn't have that effect on everyone, and it really did help with my psychotic symptoms, but no sleep is just unbearable and I just had to stop taking it.

I just saw the boss psychiatrist and with my charm, guile and sanity talked my way out of the bin. Hooray!

I have to wait until they find me some drugs to take home, which knowing the freaking NHS will take an age, but I'll be out soon enough. I am terribly pleased.

Next post from the comforting environment of home, with the cat trying to join in with typing, no doubt.

The best part was that I slept seven hours. This is really pretty good.

However, the religious loony who has been bursting into my room and incoherently going on about flying devils came into my room at around eleven last night whilst I was asleep. She helped herself to my books. I didn't realise this until she returned at midnight to throw them at me screaminng that I was evil and the devil. I suppose she didn't approve of 'Against all gods' and 'The atheist manifesto' (excellent book, by the way, very funny).

After I complained about her yet again I was told that I was now allowed to lock my door. A solution, I suppose, but keeping the god-bothering headcase from stealing, harassing people and waking them up might have been a better solution. When she roams the ward at night shouting incoherent prayers one might have thought the staff would do something as we need our sleep. But no, they'd rather drink coffee and gossip in the nurses office.

I was really distressed to have my stuff taken and my personal space invaded, let alone being woken up when sleep has been such a challenge for me.

I see the senior psychiatrist today and I am going to try and bust out of the loony bin. I hope the next blog entry comes from home (at least then I can spell check it).

I was awake betweeen about four and five this morning, then thought I'd try getting nack to sleep. I managed it! I was knocked up at eight by the staff, but I managed a pretty much full-night's sleep. Hooray! This will be great ammo in my quest to escape tomorrow. A week in the bin is long enough.

Five hours sleep last night. The aripiprazole must be working its way out of my system. I feel reasonsably rested and I did not have an awful niight of tossing and turning. My anxiety levels are also right down.

I did get threatened by a nutter last night who took exception to the scars on my arms. Apparently these were enough to make him want to kill me. I said, "I came in here because I wanted to die. Do you reallly think you can threaten me with anything?"

"I'll trash your room, then", came his response. What a big man!

This morning I refused to take the drug (aripiprazole) that was stopping me from sleeping. Suddenly stopping these things is not advisable, but bollocks to that I need sleep. I was getting so little sleep that I was getting more and more depressed and I would have ended up suicidal again if I had waited for the dose to be tapered off over the next week.

So I am thoroughly expecting to get a reasonable degree of sleep tonight. Maybe not eight hours, but a few more would be nice.

If there is another blog entry in a few hours you'll know my plan has failed; or at least there is aripiprazole still remaining in my system.

Once again I find myself awake before three in the morning. I really need to get off the all-awakening aripiprazole as soon as possible. Yesterday my dose was reduced from 15mg to 10mg, but it soon needs to be zero. I don't give a tinker's cuss that it helps with the psychotic symptoms, I need sleep. It is being replaced by another anti-psychotic that is supposedlymore sedating.

I was so pleased to see my friends yesterday. I managed perkiness, smiles and jokes. However, due to the restrictive visiting hours they could only stay for less than an hour. I was so upset when they had to leave with me left stuck in the bin. I know it is not supposed to be nice here, otherwise everyone would want in, but I find it a really stressful and intimidating environment.

The tranquilisers I have been prescribed have taken the edge off my anxiety about being here, but done nothing for my intense unhappiness. I hope no one from the bin is reading this otherwise I'll never get out. I don't think I am quite so suicidal now so I'll see if II can be transferred to the Home Treatment Team by the end of the week,

Last night one of the other nutters burst into my room incoherently insisting that I get the flying devils out of her room. Apart from the weirdness I found the invasion of my personal space most distressing.

I must try to seem co-operative and not cry all of the time. I want out.

I saw the boss-lady psychiatrist yesterday. She agreed to take me off the drug that is keeping me awake. Sadly, the dose will have to be gradually lowered over several days, but hopefully this means sleep will come soon.

She has also prescribed me a short-term course of clonazepam, a tranquiliser, to help me deal with the incredible anxiety I feel being locked up. To be honest, it barely scratches the surface of the terror that is my life, but even a slight improvement is welcome.

Amazingly, the nurses also were bothered to go and get my anti-depressants yesterday, so maybe I will begin to feel less miserable.

Feeling miserable, and sadly suicidal, is still a problem, though. Today I want to negociate for the return of my belt, shoelaces and earphones, so I will have to be very careful what I say. I will have to stress how much getting my medication sorted out has perked me up. Oh, and avoid saying I am as miserable as sin and if I am left alone with a bottle of cyanide I'll swallow it instantly. I do not think there is terribly much cyanide on the ward, though.

I suppose I am happy that I have my Nokia N800 and N95 to keep in contact with the outside world, and having Butter to cuddle as I lie awake at night helps a lot as well.

Some friends are going to visit this evening and I cannot express how pleased I'll be to see them. I'll ask them to dress as washer women and smuggle me out in their basket of washing.

My insomnia is a towering fortress that cannot be scaled or penetrated. 5mg of nitrazepam, which is strong old stuff, allowed me to get three hours sleep last night. I am uttterly shattered and generally shagged out.

I see the boss psychiatrist today and I am going to ask to be taken off the anti-psychotic that is stopping me from sleeping. It may help with my psychotic symptoms, but not sleeping does not help with my psychotic symptoms. When I came into the bin they took my belt and shoelaces away. They also took my earphones. How I am supposssed to hang myself with earphones I do not know. I am going to ask if I can have the earphones back as listening to music through them really helps me deal with the auditory hallucinations I hear.

I am so unhappy. Sadly so unhappy it would be unwise for me to attempt to leave here. I am really lonely, too.

It is my second day in the loony bin. Yesterday they did not give me the anti-depressants I have been prescribed because they could not find them. This was after a sixteen hour wait for a room. So several times today I have asked the nurses if they have found my drugs and each time the answer has been `no´. The bin is right next door to a large hospital with a large, fully-stocked pharmacy so one might have though getting some drugs would not be too difficult. Apparently it is. This has made me exceedingly unhappy and if I had a way of hurting or killing myself I would.

I would not recommend the Oxleas House Mental Health Service to my worst enemy.

So the fifteen hours I was quoted to get a bed expired, and I exploded in a highly articulate outburst and attempted to leave the bin. Nearly managed it too until I got intercepted by a very friendly doctor who said he would get me a bed within five minutes if he had to carry one up himself. So that was the bed situation sorted out.

Soon afterwards it was half ten and time for medication. My drug chart had been written up at five in the morning so they had plenty of time to get my drugs in. Naturally, none of them were to be found. Cue explosion number two.

Luckily, I had scored the phone number of the friendly doctor and rang him up. He could not get my sedating anti-depressant, but he did give me 5mg of nitrazepam. I went out like a light and slept until six. Sleep! Real sleep! How I love it. I think it has made me feel a tiny bit happier.

I have to say it has been great having my N800 here for blogging, IRC and IM`ing people. The bin would be worse without it, even if it is hard typing on a bed.

On Friday I had another awful night`s sleep, I got out of bed at half one. I am afraid to report that this all got a bit too much for me and at two in the morning I swallowed a large overdose of sleeping tablets, anti-depresssants, anti-psychotics and tranquilisers. The next thing I remember is staggering to a taxi to go to hospital.

Of course, it being a Friday night by then accident and emergency was packed and it took hours to be seen. I was then referred to a psychiatrist which took another age. I agreed to be thrown in the loony bin on the condition that I could jump in a taxi and go home to get some clothes (escorted, of course).

I made it back to the hospital at six on Saturday morning, and have been waiting for a bed ever since. The most recent news is that I will get a bed around nine at night, if I am lucky. A fifteen hour wait does not sound lucky to me.

The bin is bloody awful, filled with unhappy people shouting at each other and watching television at ear-bleeding volume. I have managed to persuade them to let me hide in a little store room, but it is still miserable as sin and I am vastly unhappy.

It does not look like my medication will be reviewed until Monday, so I am sure you can imagine this makes me even happier.More news as it comes in.

PS. The Nokia N800 is great for blogging in the loony bin.

Two o'clock I woke up this morning. Two o'clock! How is a toddler supposed to function with less than two hours sleep in a night? Fat lot of good these new, supposedly sedating anti-depressants are doing; they neither sedate nor anti-depress.

I'll have no one watching me today apart from the ten minutes when the loony support team come around, I feel incredibly at risk.

During my various appointments with the psychiatrist recently I have been prescribed a new anti-depressant. It is supposedly quite sedating and should help me sleep. Should being the operative word. Anti-depressants also take a few weeks before they start to cheer one up; I want to whip the box of them and shout "Work faster!" so little effect have they had so far. The upshot of this is that I am still hardly sleeping and am miserable as sin. These need to change very soon or bad things will happen.

I still have the loony support service visiting me, but I am pleased to report they are taking my mental state seriously enough to have increased the dose of Valium I am on. 5mg twice a day rather than 2mg has calmed me down considerably. I cannot take it for terribly long as it is wildly addicitive, but the idea is that it is just a stop-gap until I am feeling more balanced.

Quite when I am going to feel more balanced I do not know. I got a bit more sleep last night, but when I got out of bed early in the morning I spent a long time crying. Cuddling Butter may soothe me somewhat, but I am really not happy. I am still feeling pretty suicidal. However, with the increased dose of Valium I do not think I am going to act on those urges.

In my last post I mentioned how I was violently ill. Turns out a couple of the drugs I was taking were really aggrevating my stomach and were not helping on the constantly spewing front at all. Sadly, these were the drugs that allowed me to get a few hours sleep a night. I stopped taking them about ten days ago and have not slept since.

Sleep is very important to me in maintaining my mood; after ten days without any my mood seriously crashed to the point that yesterday I was going to attempt suicide. Obviously, I was stopped (otherwise I wouldn`t be writing this). I saw a psychiatrist and now I have the local loony support team visiting me every day to check that I am not killing myself.

I was also prescribed some medication that was supposed to help me sleep last night: Valium. Fat lot of good it did; clearly medication for girls. By which I mean medication for people with less entrenched insomnia problems than me.

After another night of almost no sleep I am not any happier. I have to say I am also feeling pretty resentful that I was stopped from killing myself. I have a couple of doses of Valium for today which I may take during the day to see if they curb my urges to do hideous things to myself.

Tomorrow I get to see a senior psychiatrist who will do a full review of my medication. The problem to be solved is that the anti-psychotic I take which deals with my symptoms best is the thing which is stopping me from sleeping. Will I just be given more downers or have to try yet another anti-psychotic that probably will not be as effective? We shall see...

As I reported at the beginning of the month, the anti-psychotic I am currently taking stops me from sleeping very much. I go to bed at midnight and I usually give up trying to sleep at two in the morning. It is still going on and I feel unspeakably tired, but, thanks to the stimulating action of the drug, quite restless and charged with dark power. My morning dose has started to kick in and I feel I should be either laughing manically or crying uncontrollably. This probably sounds reasonably insane, but I am actually a lot less bonkers on this drug than I was before I started taking it. Just extremely tired.

The anti-psychotics I am taking are still stopping me from sleeping more than three hours a night, they are quite stimulating. Together the drugs and the lack of sleep have left me feeling quite jumpy and restless. They also make me feel on fire! I can feel the dark power coming from my fingertips. I suppose this sounds quite bonkers, but really I am feeling reasonably sane at the moment, just powered up. I wonder how getting little sleep will affect me in the long term... hmmm...

I don't like taking sleeping tablets very often, partly because I don't have that many of them, but mostly because they are hilariously addictive. On too many occasions I've been addicted to sleeping tablets when the doctor has prescribed them for me to take every night. When this happens the nasty thing is that at some point you've got to come off them and this is an utterly horrible experience. Even if you taper the dose over a period of time there will still be far too long when you just don't sleep and feel completely dreadful.

This is why I didn't take sleeping tablets tonight (even after last night's successful sleep experience). So, needless to say, I didn't sleep at all. I pissed the night away on IRC and looking at my picture of Kisu the cat. We pick him up tomorrow, which will be good. It'd be nice if he didn't feel the need to sleep all night and would be happy for some company

Yesterday I had a visit from the local loony support team; they were supposed to be dropping off some drugs. Sadly, I found them to be the biggest couple of moronic, rancid fools it has ever been my displeasure not to have avoided dealing with.

It started when I got a call on my mobile from them saying they were outside my building and didn't know how to get in. I said you just have to use the entry phone by the door and dial my flat number, one hundred, and I could let them in. The person on the phone then proceeded to type my flat number in on her mobile-phone rather than the entry phone. After doing this a couple of times whilst saying, "It's not working, it is not working", I managed to attract her attention back to me on the phone and told her that she had to call one hundred on the entry phone, not her mobile-phone. "Oh, the entry phone", she said with great surprise, followed by, "But there is no button for one hundred there, it only goes up to nine."

At this point I was rather exasperated and told them just to wait where they were and I would come and find them and let them in. I went outside my building and, needless to say, they were not there. I tried ringing their mobile-phone back to ask where they really were and it was engaged. I started walking around the general area whilst trying to get through to their mobile. Eventually I found them on a road well beyond mine looking at the entry phone on some gates with expressions of pure stupidity on their faces whilst they pressed random buttons. One of them was holding a mobile-phone which it turned out was currently leaving a long message on my answer-phone of them muttering inanities. I told them to only go as far as my building next time and not try to get into a completely random address as that wouldn't get the drugs to me. I didn't invite them into my flat as I thought the floor would probably confuse them, being deceptively flat as it is.

At least I got the drugs, but I wonder how less functional people deal with such inane fools when they need support. I was shocked (and highly annoyed) by their ineptitude.

Either my fears about taking aripiprazole were correct, or the fact that I have stopped taking the previous, more sedating anti-psychotic has had an effect. Insomnia is plaguing me again. I got out of bed last night at 2am after no sleep. I then came and farted around on the computer and looked at all my normal websites. Thirteen and a half hours later I've looked at far too many websites and feel I have nothing left to do. I've already chosen the wine I'll be buying next, so what else is there?

I am seeing the psychiatrist tomorrow and will, of course, tell her I am not sleeping. What she will suggest I don't know, as the medication does seem to have cheered me up. Perhaps it is just a case of getting used to the new stuff and the reduction in dose of the old stuff.

Yesterday I saw the psychiatrist again and have been prescribed a new anti-psychotic: aripiprazole. This can take a couple of weeks to kick in, but I hope it'll be sooner than that as I am still quite barking. Aripiprazole can have the side effect of making it difficult to sleep. I really hope this doesn't happen as I find it hard enough to sleep at the best of times.

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.

As I have mentioned in the past, I am schizophrenic. Until last July I saw a psychiatrist every couple of months and a community psychiatric nurse every two weeks in a health centre ten minutes walk away from my flat. For some unknown reason the mental health services in my area were re-organised in July.

The first thing about this I didn't like was that I'd have to take a train to get to the new health centre where I would seen a new psychiatrist and nurse when they were allocated to me. It was much easier to walk down the road to be seen.

The second irksome thing was that a new nurse was not allocated to me until November, four months after I had stopped being seen at the old place. The chap who was finally allocated to me is a nice enough fellow, but it would have been better if I'd have been assigned someone sooner.

The most worrying thing about the re-organisation was that I did not get an appointment to see my new psychiatrist until today, six months after I last saw the previous doctor. The person who arranged this appointment had allocated fifteen minutes for me to see him. This hardly seems long enough for a first meeting. The psychiatrist agreed and spent a lot of the fifteen minutes telling me I should complain to the health service managers about the slowness in getting an appointment and the insufficient length of it.

I really wanted to have a serious chat with him. Over the past few weeks my hallucinations have been a lot worse and the medication I am on doesn't seem to be helping. I coped over the Christmas break because my partner had time off work; the extra support was very useful. Now I am back to spending days alone in the flat I am feeling really quite agitated. Alas, there wasn't time for anything but the briefest of chats, and he had only just been given my medical notes so had not had time to read them. Bleeding marvellous.

It has now been left that he will try to find time for an hour-long appointment as soon as possible. I wish I knew when this will happen. The NHS is good because it is free, I don't have to pay for my drugs or appointments with people, but this means they are constantly strapped for cash and under-staffed. I really hope I can be seen soon as things are a bit fragile at casa Pinot.

Since I ran out of my short-term dose of tranquilisers I have been feeling a lot more able to deal with things than before I started taking them. To be honest, the hallucinations are really lurid and florid, but I am feeling together enough to deal with them. I am also sleeping quite well, which no doubt contributes to my feeling of control.

There was a very interesting television program on last night. It was the second part of Stephen Fry's series about manic-depression. It was good to hear people with experiences similar to mine talking.

Third time lucky at the new lunatic support service, I finally got to see a psychiatrist. I got prescribed a short-term dose of tranquilisers, and they have made me a lot less tense. I also got some new sleeping tablets, so hopefully I'll get a bit more sleep tonight.

This time I made it as far as the mental health centre only to be told on arrival that the psychiatrist I was supposed to be seeing had gone home. Another appointment up in smoke and I am feeling terrible. I hacked up my arms earlier so miserable am I feeling.

The replacement emergency appointment (replacement number two) is set for Friday. I wonder what hopeless excuse they'll give for not seeing me then.

As I was trekking to the station to grab a train for my psychiatrist's appointment I got a call from the mental health team. They had double booked my appointment so I could not be seen today. Brilliant. They made me another appointment for Wednesday, but as I am feeling rotten it did not cheer me up that I had today's appointment cancelled. I am feeling excessively miserable.

I have managed to get an emergency appointment with a psychiatrist tomorrow morning. All I have to do is lie awake all night for another night and it'll be time to see him/her. It is a bit of a pain in the arse to get to the new place where I'll be seen, but I'll certainly be there at the appointed hour in search of chemical relief.

Clearly the mental health team my care has been transferred to are somewhat run off their feet. I tried to telephone them today countless times to get an emergency appointment and every time I called they were engaged. I am not feeling great and this didn't really improve my mood.

I'm really not feeling too good. The hallucinations I see are getting really nasty and frightening. I have tried to de-sensitise myself to them, by staring at them or not avoiding places where they are worse, but all I feel is more scared and my thoughts get very confused. I really don't feel like leaving the flat and Butter the bear is being cuddled an awful lot.

If I am still feeling this mad tomorrow I'll see if I can get an emergency appointment with a random psychiatrist.

I've been feeling slightly fragile for the past few days. As has happened so often in the past, drugs have helped for a while and then I seem to get worse again. My schizophrenia seems to get worse all of the time. This is really difficult to deal with, and I often think that the only escape from a future in which I will be in the bin permanently would be to kill myself.

It doesn't help that I haven't seen a psychiatric nurse or psychiatrist for months. The mental health system in this part of London has been re-organised and I am yet to be assigned anyone at the new place. I ring every few days, but nothing has happened yet.

I'm really not feeling too good and I am not sure what I should do about it.

My psychotherapist suggested I read a book called Accepting Voices; I largely hated it.

The book is based around the idea that the orthodox psychiatric view of hearing voices does not help people deal with them; they say it inhibits rather than stimulates personal growth. This is all very well and good, but some of the ideas they wish to replace the standard view with are quite laughable.

The book is filled with personal accounts from people who hear voices. A large number of these people seem to think they have magic powers to read peoples minds, tell the future and other such drivel. The accounts are filled with mumbo jumbo-level explanations about the voices they hear, with people talking about how they have holes in their auras and how spirits follow them around. As a rationalist, this kind of crap really gets on my tits.

The accounts people give about their magic powers are all riddled with inconsistencies, one sentence says the voices always tell the truth (and tell the future to some people) yet a few sentences later they say the voices lie and try to mis-direct them. Of course, drivelly tales of magic powers are usually inconsistent, but this doesn't seem to have been pointed out to the people writing the personal accounts.

It may be that believing these bogus tales has helped some people deal with their voices, but should the psychotherapeutic community really be encouraging people to accept further delusions in the form of obviously false stories as to why they hear voices? Of course not. Thinking that one has magic powers is hardly likely to help on integrate with or be taken seriously by society. These people already have delusions in the form of voices, loading themselves up with further delusions about the cause of the voices is not going to make them seem any saner.

Some may argue that these horse shit stories about their voices are what they believe, so that makes it alright. Clearly this is rubbish; unfettered belief is not a valid model for explaining things. If I believe that all Scottish people are only one metre tall (I don't, by the way) this has no bearing on how tall Scottish people really are and I should be corrected. Personal growth is not about thinking you are right no matter what bogus things you think. If you want to believe things that are at odds with how modern society works you are more likely to be side-lined and not taken seriously.

The book has some more classical explanations for voices, and suggests non-laughable ways of coming to terms with them, but I feel its uncritical view of less realistic explanations really damages the book.

Today I am being interviewed for a psychiatric journal. I will be explaining what it is like to live with schizophrenia. 'Very difficult' just about sums that up. At least this gives me an excuse to travel into central London and do a bit of shopping; there are a few things I need to get for my trip to France. Since I'll be visiting a lot of winemakers I should really get a notepad so I can write everything up. Given a bit of application I should be able to write an article or two about my trip.

The increase in drugs I'm taking seems to have worked quite well. I am feeling a lot less uptight during the day, and even managed an afternoon kip earlier.

I'm having a lot of fun playing LocoRoco. It is very cute with incredibly catchy music. This resulted in me dreaming about playing the game last night. Ah well.

I've been attempting to organise which winemakers I'll see when I go to Burgundy. Two of my favourite replied today to say I can visit. Hooray! I love wine and visiting such great people will really slap a smile across my face. Visiting them means I'll have to wear something smarter than my nursery-printed overalls, but I don't mind if it means I'll get to freeload fine wine. I say freeload, but I buy wine from all of them so it all balances out.

I saw the doctor today and my dose of anti-psychotics has been increased. This should perk me up enough to be on form when I visit people.

My short-term dose of tranquilisers runs out today. I am sitting around relaxing with Butter wearing baby clothes. People are often surprised when I say I go out in baby clothes but I have just been shopping in nursery-printed overalls and a nursery-printed t-shirt. Nothing bad happened, and I live in quite a scary part of London.

I should be able to relax a bit more over the weekend as the partner will not be at work. On Monday I see the doctor so I might be able to score some more tranquilisers if things have deteriorated again.

The tranquilisers I was prescribed yesterday really seem to have hit the spot. All the urgency has drained out of my urges to do nasty things to myself and the hallucinations seem less bothersome. This makes it easy to sit down with Butter and relax during the day.

The really hot weather seems to have left London for the time being. It is still quite bright and sunny but there is a strong wind taking the edge off the temperature. This is a lot more pleasant in the flat, which is so warm we have the windows open even in winter.

I saw my nurse earlier and it was very successful. Not only was she quite supportive, she had also scored me some tranquilisers from my psychiatrist. These have taken all of the urgency from my need to self-harm or commit suicide so I am feeling a lot happier. Putting on a nappy has also lifted my spirits. It is just a shame the cricket is going so badly. At least I get to cuddle Butter whilst watching it.

The partner is back at work and I am feeling rotten. It is really hard to deal with the hallucinations and voices I hear when I am all alone. I feel excessively suicidal and utterly miserable. When you can see and hear people telling you that you should commit suicide now it is difficult to stay bright and jolly.

I have a community psychiatric nurse who I see every two weeks. I have managed to get an extra appointment to see her tomorrow so hopefully that bit of support will jolly me along somewhat.

Mental health services are all changing in my area at the moment so I will not be seeing her or my psychiatrist much longer, I'll be allocated new people. This doesn't really help; it is good to see the same people and develop a working relationship. When one sees new people it all has to start again.

Schizophrenia is really difficult to live with.

Firstly, after a few overcast and rainy days it is now sunny and warm again. This is good news. Secondly, my partner is working from home today, so I am feeling a lot less lonely and generally happier. We may pop around and say hello to the neighbours later. It is good to have friends.

I've made a few trips out during the hot weather over the past week; these haven't left me very happy. I find it really difficult to be out and around people I don't know, my hallucinations get very bad when I do this. Sadly this has resulted in me hurting myself quite a lot over the past week. I am hoping the partner will be able to get home earlier now his rush at work is over, this should cheer me up a bit.

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.

I find I feel safer when I am with people I know, but really unstable when I am around people I don't know. Much as the flat provides a familiar environment, I feel less safe when my partner is not here as I feel really lonely.

That is one of the advantages of work, you get to speak to people during the day. Being stuck at home alone gets a bit difficult after a while.

The suicidal and self-harm urges are quite difficult to deal with today. I can put them off but I think of them so often it has certainly become wearing. I don't know what to do when I feel bad like this. I cannot really ring people as they are at work. I find it difficult to ring strangers on more anonymous help-lines. I feel so defective and bad.

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.

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 saw my psychiatrist today. Such has been the effect of my stop-gap medication that the injections have been put on hold for a few weeks and I have been prescribed more of it. The medication is called Olanzapine. If I can continue with this slightly improved degree of functionality I'll be a lot happier.

My stop-gap medication seems to have been a success. I am still hearing voices, seeing things and feeling paranoid, but the intensity seems lower and I am less disabled by urgent thoughts of self-harm or suicide. I am by no means in perfect health; I still don't like leaving the flat and my concentration span is non-existent. However, I am a tiny bit more functional and that pleases me.

I'll stop taking these drugs on Wednesday (when I next see my psychiatrist), so I hope last week's injection has kicked in by then.

Today I had the first real dose of the anti-psychotics that I will probably be on for quite a while. It was an injection in my arse. Hopefully this will cheer me up some more and I might be a bit more functional in a week or so.

I doubt I am ever going to be as functional as once I was, and I think a nine-to-five job will always be beyond me, but as long as I can manage to do a bit more than keep myself out of hospital I'll be pleased. I don't have high expectations about what I am going to do with my future, I simply want to survive and not be terrified constantly.

There was a knock at the door this morning whilst I was still in bed. I opened the door in my nursery-printed sleeper to find a delivery man there. He had two cases of nappies all for me. This is handy because tomorrow I am having my first real injection of the anti-psychotic that can cause incontinence. Be prepared!

I'm still feeling alright. Not completely functional, alas, but I am finding it much easier to deal with being alone. I haven't cut myself in days.

The hallucinations are still there, but the tranquilisers I've been prescribed make them less bothersome; I don't have to instantly hurt or attempt to kill myself as I did but a short while ago. The paranoia is also less irksome.

One of the good things about feeling a bit better is that I am more in the mood to do baby stuff. I must buy some more nappies tomorrow...

I had another reasonable night's sleep last night, and my vague feeling of improvement continues.

I didn't cut myself yesterday, and I haven't so far today. It is really hard to manage this, the voices are still there and very insistent. I am pretty strong about dealing with a lot of the worst symptoms of schizophrenia, it has just been that things have been more than I am able to cope with recently. If I can continue to feel a tiny amount less bad I'll be able to survive a bit better at home by myself.

My partner has had to go to work today. I might go around the neighbours shortly which will help avoid cutting.

I slept for the best part of eleven hours last night. This makes a change. I think the stop-gap tranquilisers my psychiatrist prescribed are finally having a slight effect. I haven't cut myself today (yet) and the hallucinations are less bothersome. I hope I continue to feel like this.

I am having two friends over for dinner tonight. I'm feeling a tad nervous about this, I am still pretty fragile. I saw my nurse earlier and she really wanted to lock me in the bin.

I have cooked in advance so all I'll have to cook is rice. I hope it goes smoothly and no one gets whammed and argumentative.

I am sure Butter will be whipped out not too late into the evening.

The dose of anti-psychotic I was injected with last week was a sub-therapeutic dose to check that I was not allergic to it. My first real dose is in a week's time and it takes about a week to kick in after that. Until that time I have to hang on with nothing to buffer the hallucinations. They are very real and very frightening at the moment.

I see my community nurse later, and I know my psychiatrist is working in the same building today. I might see if I can suggest to move the injection forward by a week. I am finding it very difficult to cope with lurid hallucinations and severe paranoia at the moment. I'm scared.

I have been feeling incredibly suicidal and compelled to self-harm by the hallucinations I hear. When I am alone I cut myself and find it really hard not to make an attempt on my own life.

I have been extremely fortunate in that I have had some help dealing with this. I've known our neighbours for years, they are very good friends. Both of them have variously had a few weeks off work recently and they have been very kind in letting me sit with them, doing my own thing and being safe. If I am with someone I know the paranoia is not too bad and I feel that the suicidal urges seem less urgent; I don't have to kill myself instantly. I really appreciate their efforts. I worry what will happen when they are both working again.

The local mental health service is pretty good in this regard. They know that seeing people can save lives so they have a Home Treatment Team who can visit people at home, dish out drugs and lend a supportive ear. This has kept me out of the hospital for a few weeks recently, but sadly they normally send different people each day who ask the same questions all the time so it is not ideal. I must have really scared them. I'd invariably be wearing a nursery-printed t-shirt that displayed my lacerated arms whilst cuddling Butter. 

I am one level down from this in the scheme of care-plans. I see a Community Psychiatric Nurse (CPN) once a week (when I have to promise her I'll go into hospital before I try to kill myself).

The best support I've had, of course, comes from my partner. He has missed a lot of days at work to keep an eye on me and even when he does go to work he comes home very early.

I do appreciate those who have gone out of their way to lend an ear; it really confuses my paranoid thoughts so I can tell the paranoia to shove it.

One of the things I find hardest to deal with because of my schizophrenia is the extremely intense thoughts of suicide. I am currently sitting with the next door neighbour during the days to keep me safe. I am incredibly obsessed with thoughts of suicide to the extent that it is really difficult to think of anything else. I know that if I am alone for too long I will do something. I have a plan.

I'll stay with the neighbour, though, until my partner gets home. I am not to be trusted looking after myself.

There haven't been many pictures of me doing baby stuff recently. This is because I am feeling incredibly rotten. When feeling this bad I find it really hard to ignore the voices I hear, which often instruct me to hurt myself. The result of this my arms are covered in cuts; these look most unsavoury. Being quite lacerated is not terribly childish and I don't want to inflict nasty images like that on my readers.

One of the symptoms of schizophrenia that I have is paranoia. This is a really difficult thing to deal with. Even when I am speaking to old friends my knackered brain makes me think they are continually coming out with snide digs at me.

Last night I went to a cocktail party. I provided three litres of Bloody Mary and mixed margaritas and Harvey Wallbangers. Every one who had one of my cocktails said how much they enjoyed it. My twisted thoughts interpreted all of these as nasty, patronising attacks on me and my ability to mix cocktails. This is not really how you what to think at a party so I left early. I was cuddling Butter in full view of the party-goers from about half-way into the time I spent there.

I saw the psychiatrist today and I have been switched from the anti-psychotics that are not working to something that hopefully will work. Because I cannot be trusted to look after my own medication I have been prescribed bi-weekly injections of Depixol. I hope it works.

Oddly, a side effect that can occur with Depixol injections is incontinence. Good job I have a lot of nappies.

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.

I was in hospital again for a few days at the end of this week. It is really not a very nice place. Even though I had a room to myself I was still disturbed by unhappy people screaming at night. It is very nice to be out and feeling a bit better.

The cricket seems to be going well. If I cannot sleep early in the morning at least I can now go and watch it.

The rugby was bloody awful.

Since leaving hospital I've had members of the health profession visiting me at home every day. I've been feeling fairly rotten over the past few days so when they came to visit tonight quite naturally I was cuddling Butter. Just as they were getting ready to leave after our chat one of them asked, "Teddy for comfort?".
"Yes", I replied.
"He looks after you?" was the follow up question.
"Yes", seemed a reasonable response.
"Good", she said.

No entries for a few days as I have been in hospital; it was touch and go for a while. I've been busted out on the promise of being good and having people come to visit me at home every day. Since this is the NHS I'll be dealing with I expect people to turn up a minimum of four hours late for any appointment they make with me, and simply not bother turning up to the medication review on Thursday. Ah the National Health Service just about works, but it is a creaking monstrosity of inefficiency and drivelly management.

I like to think I am quite a well adjusted toddler; I manage to fit baby stuff in with my life quite easily with no unhelpful interference or negative thoughts. Like all things, being an adult baby can lead to being less well adjusted. This person reported in the American Journal of Psychiatry seems less well adjusted. It is a shame when people allow things to control their lives in a manner that prevents them from functioning normally. Being an adult baby is undoubtedly not a mental illness, but it is a very compelling lifestyle that can dominate if one fails to have control in one's life. We all need control, be it to control the amount of money one spends or the amount one drinks; unfettered personality traits lead one into problems.

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.

As I've mentioned, I've been feeling incredibly anxious of late. Well, the pleasing news is that this is hopefully behind me. I've seen a doctor and the evil anxiety-producing drugs have been stopped and I've been put onto something else. I throughly except within days to stop leaping about like a gazelle on speed and get back to my normal relaxed loafing, back-sliding and farting-around. I might even visit the children next-door tonight to see if I can steal something to drink to celebrate. It is pretty bad, I have a hundred-odd bottles of wine in the flat but they are all too young to drink. I'll be taking them to one of my long-term storage cellars within weeks and liberating stuff to drink. Hooray! Some '97 Northern Rhône wines should make great drinking this winter.

I have an appointment to sort out my medication-related anxiety; sadly with this being the wonderful NHS it is not for eight days. The NHS is generally pretty good, things get done (given time) so I cannot complain too much. Just in case, dear reader, you are worried that I am turning into even more of a booze-hound after my last comment about medicating the anxiety with alcohol allow me to say that you should not knock yeast as it is the only culture I know.

I've been a bit slack on keeping the spume of drivel up-to-date in recent months. Obviously this is largely down to sheer idleness, but I do have a vague excuse. A while ago I was prescribed a new drug to assist with my various ailments and it has not worked out to well. Firstly it just didn't work as the dose was too low; I felt rotten all of the time. More recently, the dose has been increased. Turns out this drugs is quite stimulating in reasonable doses. Very stimulating I find it. Stimulating to such an extent that I am hardly sleeping and I have constant anxiety levels akin to those following the consumption of vastly too many espressos. I sit here jumping and twitching like a flea on a plate too warm for a flea's comfort. It is very difficult to sit down and compose rants and other drivelly prose when sitting down for more than a few minutes is beyond the realms of my tension-handling ability. Sadly the anxiety is not terribly assuaged even by cuddling lovely Butter.

I am perfectly willing to admit that I may seem like a comedy bunch of ailments, but at least high-anxiety levels can be very, very slightly medicated with the odd glass of wine now and again. And again.