Am I Still Ill?

Day in the Life

Hi there.

Everything’s fine. Just fine…

OK, what’s a few imperfections between friends?

Isn’t it our very flaws that make us human and interesting? Mentally or otherwise?

I TOLD YOU!!!

And I ain’t tryin’ to make you wrong. Just insisting on my right to be right … at least occasionally.

The dynamic has shifted in our household. D and I are getting into some kind of heavy engagement/confrontation situation. Which is an absolute nightmare … for both of us.

L is the only one who remains relatively unscathed. She is like a cat. Self-sufficient. Concerned about very few things other than regular mealtimes and a little love.

It’s pretty much the ‘life flashing before my eyes’ scenario. I have always been the object of female jealousy and have had to defend myself against the She-Devil so many times that I have achieved mastery of this particular kind of psychic defence/martial art.

Why do Cameron and Clegg (or Cleggeron as my pal A prefers to call them) not appear to realise that the most important job any human being can be doing right now is taming the She-Devil?

Why is there no proper definition of a ‘She-Devil’ in the Oxford English?

Why do you hear so little about her in the popular press?

Would respectfully suggest, your Honour, that I suspect a cover-up.

She is a reality. My reality. I battle her daily. In the form of other women, sometimes ‘men’, but most significantly and scarily of all … in myself.

I can give you plenty information on the She-Devil as I have been studying her for years.

Listen to her sing. You’ll notice she can’t hold a tune and that her singing is in itself an offensive weapon. Know that she won’t decamp voluntarily. She will unfailingly outstay her welcome. She is insensitive to all needs but her own. She is bent on preserving self at the expense of you and me. She cannot be destroyed. Only tamed. Or defused.

Do NOT expect to be able to whip her ass in a fight. It won’t happen. Trust me cos I know of what I speak.

How to tame a She Devil (Advice for the Urban Shaman Part 42 1/2)?

You gotta give her a massive reassuring hug. She is full of fear so try every weapon in the book to win her over.  Begin with a flattery offensive. Tell her her hair looks great (it doesn’t). Continue with some slingshots of patently insincere appreciation of her special and unique gifts. Lie shamelessly and through your gritted teeth. Remember, it’s you or her. Her way or the highway.

The She Devil cannot detect these kind of self-defensive porky pies.  She doesn’t have an ironic bone in her body (and indeed, will often look as if she has no bones at all).

And how not to deal with a She Devil? Do not on any account attempt physical violence of any sort whatever. It will backfire on you very badly indeed. You have been warned!

Even worse than this? Laughing at her. Don’t even go there. Babs. XXX

Short-Circuiting Christmas

Hiya. It’s six am ish and I have already been up for two hours.

I really only need about three hours asleep. When I was ill and every day a grim struggle just for survival of course I had to take more.

My life has changed.

And ‘it’s all good’…Dizzee. It’s all good ‘cos it’s all God.

Listenin’ to Pulp. ‘We Love Life’. Waiting on an insomniac friend to get a cab here from Tottenham. I like to have company. My house guests are lazy mo’ fo’s. Yesterday they lay abed until midday. Then were hung over for most of what remained of the day.

Our Christmas was therefore as fucked up as most people’s. We stopped short of open rowing, tantrums or hysterics. We are all way too mature for that kind of carry-on. We feel the impulse to lash out at one another but don’t act on it.

For our dinner we had nut roast (traditional veggie fare), roast potatoes, gravy, Brussels sprouts ‘n’ peas. Followed by Xmas pud, which L pronounced ‘ the best hot cake she’d ever eaten’! Woah! Thank you Sainsbury’s. (Product placement…)

Further bulletins later as I have a guest. Love, XXX

Mysticism

The truth lies in the observation that: “with regard to the phenomena of mysticism in its proper sense, psychopathology has nothing to offer, and for the very good reason that infused contemplation is brought about by grace, which does not destroy, but perfects and elevates the natural capacities.”

Brian Wilson may be a tormented genius – like William Blake or Tchaikovsky – and Sally Clay may be something of a mystic – like Teresa of Avila or C S Lewis. However, both remind us that for each celebrity who steps ‘into the mystic’, (as Van Morrison said), there exist hundreds of similar, but unsung, spiritual travellers among the so-called ‘mentally ill’.  This is not to say that all madness has a spiritual basis; or that all people with ‘mental health problems’ want to explore their spirituality. However, we have met lots of people who had been pushed to the farthest reaches of their own human nature, and had slowly began to make sense of the experience. Like characters from mythology, they wrestled with their demons and became the heroes of their own stories.

Spirituality is often confused with religion. All faiths have spiritual origins but customs and rituals often dominate organised religion. By contrast, spiritual experiences are often highly personal – often lacking any sense of order. As such, they can be threatening – as Brian Wilson and Sally Clay showed. This suggests something of the power that lies beyond our everyday selves. This might signal God, the Absolute, or the Cosmos; or perhaps is just a sign of our own latent power, waiting to come to life. The epiphany – or realisation – associated with deep spiritual encounters, is a ‘wake up call’. Something significant has happened and nothing will ever be the same again.

People with experience of psychosis talked about the personal meanings of their ‘breakdowns’ in  ‘From the Ashes of Experience’[iv]. Many of them described their recovery as a spiritual journey. Their spiritual wake-up calls seemed to have been forced by the breakdown itself. The terror and confusion of madness seemed to be a necessary evil: something they had to go through to find meaning in life – or simply to find themselves.

We took this a stage further in ‘Spirituality and Mental Health: Breakthrough’ [v]and invited both people who had been ‘mentally ill’ and health and social care professionals, to share their understandings of spirituality. All the contributors to the book used a common ‘spiritual’ language, but the personal nature of their experiences stood out. They seemed to echo the Buddha’s invitation to follow their own path to spiritual understanding:

“Be ye lamps unto yourselves, be your own reliance. Hold on to the truth within yourselves, as to the only lamp”.[vi]

Health: A madman can look a lot like a messiah: There is no easy way for cult followers to tell if their leader is sane, says Raj Persaud

To My Son

Jasper, you are currently fifteen and lying upstairs trying to sleep away your latest growth spurt.

I am the privileged Mum who has watched you grow from a tiny babe in arms.

You were the best thing that ever happened to me. Nature’s greatest and most unexpected gift. Her affirmation of the worth and value of my life. Her way of ensuring I stuck around, and her way of motivating me to ‘not give up, and not be a quitter’ (Eminem).

You also gave me the strength and determination I needed to ‘reach for the stars’. Not to count the cost. What I could not do for myself, I could do for you. That primeval maternal instinct provided me with an imperative I could not dodge.

I had to ensure that you would never go through what I have been through darling Jasper.

If I had to die a thousand times over I simply had to make things OK for you. If that meant starving in order to feed you, that’s what I would do.

And the loss of you to foster care was undoubtedly one of the most heart-wrenching griefs of my entire life. I felt the pain a cow feels on having its male calf torn away from her and taken off for slaughter Jasper.

I understood the helpless suffering of a vivisected feeling living breathing mammal. There was no room in my head for any question but an eternal, resounding and endlessly echoing ‘why’.

‘Why are they doing this to me?’

‘Forgive them father, for they know not what they do’ didn’t seem an adequate response. For how could they not know that to cut into a sentient animal’s flesh would bring pain?

Maternal pride is a joyous thing Jasper. And I feel it every time I look at you. You are flesh of my flesh. Closer to me than any other living being. You were my partner in crime from the first moment I saw the miracle of your tiny fist waving at me over your transparent plastic cot in the Whittington maternity unit.

The happiness of those first two weeks totally anaesthetised any pain I felt following the emergency Caesarian by which you were born. You were light as my own heart as I carried you proudly up and down the ward.

And as for childbirth itself. Who are these women who fear and dread the pain of labour? What nonsense! There’s nothing to it! Breathe, woman, breathe! It is your fear alone that creates pain in your mind! You are surrounded by angels, and giving birth to another! How can that possibly hurt?

I can truthfully say I had not one moment of genuine psychic or physical pain throughout the whole process, and I was in labour for twenty-five hours.

A good friend came to be my birthing partner. She sat patiently for so many hours, keeping watch, on sentry duty. And though I don’t often see her now we will always be bonded by that shared experience.

And Jasper. So many of my friends and colleagues ask about you as soon as they see me. Even when they have never met you Jasper! You have the thoughts and good wishes of SO many people that you don’t and maybe never will know.

How could you fail, buoyed up on a magic carpet of love like that sweetheart? How could you fail to achieve greatness, since you were born a great soul?

And you are a master psychologist Jasper. The only person’s head you have trouble working out is your own! And that goes with the territory I’m afraid. The teens herald massive change. You cannot remain untroubled at times. But always know Jasper that ‘this too shall pass’.

Happy Christmas, most precious boy. XXX

Mad For It

As the Madchesterites used to say!

Feelin’ a little like a Cambridge graduate who finds herself teaching the remedial class.

That DOESN’T mean I think you’re stupid, gentle reader. It’s just a reflection of my half a degree of pissed-offness with my stats dive. Twelve readers today folks! And who is this elite band? You don’t like to reveal yourselves, do you?

Anyway, reminding myself that ‘I write because I write because I write’ I will continue to bore you with renditions of ‘another day in the life of’ a suburban housewife (crossed out), aspiring R and B singer (crossed out), all-round happy bunny (not crossed out but permitted to remain in all its glorious imperfection).

Today I made it as far as the end of my road. An improvement on the many days when, stricken with fatigue, I couldn’t even get that far.

Luckily, that was as far as I needed to go in order to enjoy a cup of coffee and slice of tiramisu with friends. Buy baccy and soya milk and cat food. And (piece de resistance) HAVE MY HAIR DONE!

Told you. I’ve got it made. I’m in clover. No one can touch me for sheer jamminess!

No one can touch me full stop. Without my permission!!!

Sometimes I voluntarily touch even people I don’t much like. But I reserve the right not to be touched by people who don’t like me. It’s called healthy boundaries folks. Read up on your codependency!

I am surrounded by kindred spirits whom I know absolutely I can trust. Or as near as dammit! Anyone well acquainted with descendants of the ape species knows that you trust them at your peril. But luckily some of us run with the wolves.

Dispatches from the Hair Front. It’s now vibrantly red with subtle blonde highlights. The ‘look’ I had in mind was ‘fire’. Failing that, a light-skinned Cheryl Cole!

‘The thinking man’s Cheryl Cole’ maybe! Hur hur.

Resolutely refuse to give in to the ‘dowdy’ urge. Sticking to the script. Glam’s the word.

At risk of just lookin’ plain ridiculous and ‘mutton dressed as lamb’. Can’t ever happen to me, cos vegans are forever young.

Thought of my wonderful and much-loved friend A again today. Wearing her friendship ring. And knowing that she is finding it in her heart to smile.

Forgiveness? Or just flexibility? Being willing to let go of stuff that no longer serves me?

Take care folks. Lots love your faithful favourite blogger.  XXX

I’m Tearin’ Down Your Balcony…

‘All those who looked down on me…’ Eminem.

Had a personal visit from a Jehovah guy I’ve become friendly with.  If I can’t get myself to Bible Class, the mountain will just have to move to Mohammed.

I was talking in the last post about Dizzee and bein’ on auto-pilot. And that’s how I feel today. I’m not gettin’ a buzz from writing this. It’s just what I do, and like all hobbies become work, there’s more than a thimbleful of drudgery in the task.

Yesterday was a steep learning curve for me and my housemates. I don’t want to compromise our privacy by going into any details. But remember what I was saying about my ancient drug habit? They had one too. And we all simultaneously got into a state of craving.

And sometimes the only thing to be done when in a state of craving is ‘to give in’.

And sometimes, when you are extremely lucky (and sensible) giving in is the best thing you can do. Cos by the act of submission you can remove that cancer (of addiction) from your system once and for all.

It was mad stressful. Lesser people than us would have been at each others’ throats by the end of it. The miracle is that we remained friends throughout.

I never want to do another drug. I don’t include caffeine and baccy. I’m talkin’ chemicals. The one remaining substance in my life now is seroquel (quetiapine) to help me get off to sleep at night. It’s an anti-psychotic. I won’t need that forever.

I’m alone in the house, L and D both off to their respective jobs. Snow still so thick on the ground that I’m tempted not to go out at all. May make it down to the local health food store. Get some soya yoghurt. Tho’ it hardly seems worth it just for that. Part of me wants to go back to bed and sleep the rest of the day away.

Love to all my Peeps. Z XXX

Like a Pig in S**t

Hiya.

Suck my m***** f***** dick.

‘Had enough of bein’ courteous and smiley, now I really gotta get grimy, blimey…’ Dizzee.

Hey Zoe, what’s with all the swearing, rude girl?

Been huggin’ my hip hop demons too close is all.

Can’t get to DRA today. The weather would turn the whole affair into some kind of Antarctic expedition.

My plans? Slide down to the corner shop. Get cash out of the ATM. Pay the extra £1.75 so’s I don’t have to go any further. Buy soya milk. More baccy. Consider my ancient drug habit and decide to manage without.

D has gone to work delivering sandwiches in Central London on a bike. Good luck!

L has been quietly writing her book in her room. I had a moderate girly lie-in myself.

Last night we took turns to choose music vids to watch on the lap top. I bored everyone choosing one Eminem track after another. His vids are quite simply,  superior to anything else I have ever seen.

They richly returned the compliment with Guns and Roses and Metallica. Forgive them. They know not what they do. (And they’re from Brasov).

I received my usual flurry of Christmas cards from relatives and a few friends. And sent precisely none. Haven’t been ‘doin” Christmas for many a long year. The excuse for a fabulous nosh-up is never unwelcome tho’.

Gospel of Matthew, Mark, Luke, John…and Dizzee. And the greatest of all these is…

Advice for the urban shaman part IV?

Develop more than a passing acquaintance with our home-grown London Grime talent. And Dizzee, who uniquely has succeeded in ‘crossing over’ into pretty much every other genre you can think of, so therefore can no longer be considered strictly ‘grime’.

All the while somehow pulling off the miraculous achievement of staying true to his roots and ‘keepin’ it ‘ well and truly ‘real’.

‘Bein’ a celebritee, don’t mean shit to mee’…

I love Dizzee so much I took the unprecedented step of going to a music festival to see him, Lovebox at Victoria Park in Hackney. He was the consummate professional. He jumped through all the ‘performer’ hoops to perfection. But I could see he was on auto-pilot. There was no passion in the performance. He got no ‘buzz’ from facing yet another audience.

And that’s the key to his greatness. He’s completely devoted to his art. Think Bobby Zimmerman. Fifty years younger and born in E3, London Town.

Here endeth the ‘Dizzee’ puff-piece. And urban shamen everywhere. Don’t commit the cardinal sin of underestimating rappers who find their way to Zoe’s (non-existent) Top Ten of All Time.

Take care folks. Lots love. X

Just Another Day in the Life of a Lunatic…

Lucky for you, world, this particular loon is currently the happy sort.

Can you imagine the sheer ‘jamminess’ of somehow wangling to have two highly accomplished psychologists live with me while our Haringey world struggles to deal with this unprecedentedly severe winter weather?

In case your image of a psychologist is that of some well-meaning but ill-informed professional tellin’ you that all you need to do to feel better is to go for a brisk run (yeah, in the snow right?):

Subtext. It’s your fault you lazy sat-on-your-arse mo’ fo’, YOUR FAULT you feel so shit! YOUR FAULT!

You take another look at their well-meaning, ill-informed face and decide that whatever works for them will never work for you, because even on your worst day you would have a job thinkin’ down to their level.

All psychologists are not this way, folks. Let’s not succumb to the ‘labelling’ game that has nearly killed us, and take people as we find them rather than according to their ‘job title’ or any other bloomin’ label.

My pair of house-trained psychologists are never patronising. Sometimes they piss me off just a little. But only when I feel like shit and notice that they don’t.

But at the end of the day, ask yourself this. Would you rather spend time with happy, positive people or have a perpetual pity-party with the competitive misery-gutses of this world, of whom, let’s face it, there is no shortage?

Um. I think you have your answer right there, folks, since today I am crediting you with sanity.

I love my house professionals. And they return the compliment. I am one of the luckiest manic-depressives in the world in the run-up to Christmas 2010. These are not just my ‘carers’. They are my friends. We have a larf. We break bread together. Smoke up our weed.

But the household would not be complete without our two members of the non-human species, Merlin and Amber. My cats. They, too, are a lot happier since my house guests moved in. They are both cat-lovers and delight in their antics every bit as much as I do. There are far fewer spats. Everyone’s happier.

And ‘am I still ill?’ For you to judge. For you to judge. Since it wasn’t me who judged myself ill in the first place, I can’t be the one to tell you this. My house professionals tell me I am not and never have been. They think we’re all ‘bipolar’. That people should not be labelled ‘lesser’ or ‘different’ according to the experiences they have had.

They are huge fans of Stanislav Grof. They had their own books by him written in Romanian. But they love my ones written in English even more.

Today it’s D’s turn to cook. He’s gonna make something called ‘mamaliga’. It’s a kind of East European polenta.

Last night we watched ‘The Snowman’ film (animated Raymond Briggs). Can you believe they had never seen it before? They loved it. As did I. I can be ‘attentionally challenged’ with long movies, spesh if they are just not my bag. My house profs get about 4 out of 5 choices right. Their only notable lapse of taste was the film ‘Inception’ with Leonardo di Caprio.

But their reason for this was sound. They are passionately interested in the idea that life itself is essentially a dream state. That we wake from sleep into yet another dream.

This Polar Bear is no longer endangered. She has her right habitat. No one is threatening her young. So she gets to be big, fluffy and ‘only a little scary’. Who folks, who in this world does not delight in a film of a Mammy Polar Bear frolicking with her young in the snow?

Resting my case (again). Heaps love and all that seasonal shit. Z XXX

Site Stats Contemplation

Some thoughts on my site stats.

I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t regularly check my site stats and if my face did not fall when they do.

My stats chart is like a dodgy heart monitor right now. Too many peaks and troughs for comfort.

Then again I have never prioritised ‘comfort’ in my life. And (advice for the urban shaman part III) I suggest that none of us ever should.

To recall the very human ‘drama’ so well documented in recent blog posts, I broke up with my ex when it became clear to me that ‘remaining comfortable’ was a priority for him.

I am deeply fortunate and happy that he and I still have a strong bond of friendship and that we remain extremely important to each other.

But our differences over the meaning and our personal definition of integrity was a sticking point we could never get over.

I write because I write because I write. Not because I want fame or fortune, or approbation from any living soul. Does a flower bloom with the hope of approval from any passing human? Or for the simple joy of being alive, and in homage to the God who made it?

Lots love X

No More Drama

Mary J Blige. One of the greatest female soul voices. And she reached this point about six or seven years ago I believe. And I was like, fuck it Mary, what’s your secret?

But now I know.

The secret is letting go of ‘problems’ and shit. Letting them sail out of the window like a hot air balloon. The helium that I was planning to kill myself with only a few months ago. Why not go out laughing and happy with a silly, squeaky voice what?

Easier said than done, folks, if you’re not yet in that space. And I daresay that a proportion of you feel irritated by my insouciance and new-found peace and contentment. This isn’t California Zoe! It’s Haringey!

And we currently have sub-zero temperatures and snow. My East European friends have brought the Romanian weather with them. Nature is putting her foot down. She’s pulling rank and putting us in our rightful place. Under her thumb.

The only decent thing to do is submit!

X

The Healing Begins

…cos urban shamans need healing too, right?

Develop some healthy naricissism folks. Yes, I did say healthy.

Ways you might start. When you know you’re getting hungry, ask yourself what your body is asking for. Allow your native intuition to guide you to the right choices…for you.

Which reminds me that there is a ‘bulimia nervosa’ forum also entitled Am I Still Ill? which did not exist before. This is all good, because it means that a few bulimia sufferers may find their way over to this blog by accident or happenstance. Welcome girls (you will mostly be girls and women, sadly). Make yourselves at home here as well. Pull up a comfy chair and join me for a ravishing meal (or a diet soda if you’re more that way inclined).

Cos my whole point is. You are engaged in throwing up your food FOR A REASON. The right time to quit ‘throwing up your food’ will be when YOU are ready. Not when someone else tells you.

Likewise, I am not the kinda vegan who evangelises her way of life or tries to ram it down anyone else’s throat. My preferred approach would be to inveigle you round to my house, sit you down for a chat with my housemates, and exert my very own form of gentle persuasion. Go to the kitchen and cook up a vegan storm in there, praying over the food I am preparing that it will meet some unstated, unspoken and maybe completely unknown-to-you need of yours.

Cos this is kinda what mummies do, ain’t it? It’s only natural they want to nurture their kids (or guests) with the very best that vegan hands can produce.

Which is probably why this particular ‘vegan’ is, at times, a bit of a fraud. I am a vegan, yes, but life is sometimes that little bit too harsh for those of us who choose to be as spiritually open as we possibly can by our food choices.

Which means that this particular vegan can frequently be found chowing down on a piece of cheese or, better still, a slice of tiramisu. I am also partial to croissants, warmed up with a little butter, with my coffee in the morning. So far, so inconsistent.

But that’s my whole point. Being fanatical about any diet or food plan is a violation of your own body.

And sadly, it is generally those with some kind of loathing of their bodies, who become obsessed with dieting or being a certain size. This is part of our society’s sickness. To be overly concerned with outward appearances, neglecting the inner light that alone, makes us truly beautiful. Angelina Jolie herself has her off-days folks! And if her inner light is not switched on, she can’t shine.

So, getting back to ‘healthy naricissism’ what can you do besides listening to what your body tells you it needs? Well, you know these wonderful things called mobile phones we all have these days? A lot of them have cameras on them, don’t they?

Point the viewfinder at yourself. Take little piccies of your face from every possible angle. Feel free to delete all the ones that don’t please you so much. And NOTICE how multifaceted you are! Like a diamond!

See how different you look in different lights, with make-up or without, relaxed, smiling, frowning, looking angry, sad or fearful.

All of this is human. And all of this is therefore wholly good. There is NOTHING inside of you that is so terrible and unknown to humankind that it can not be allowed to show itself.

In particular, focus on your eyes, for they truly are ‘the windows of the soul’. You can learn so much about yourself this way and most importantly of all, it’s fun! Play with your mobile phone. Experiment with making little videos of yourself in your environment. Make it effortless, as my yoga teacher used to tell us.

Giving yourself plenty of ‘me time’ will harm nobody else. This is NOT an ‘either or’. This is about YOUR HEALING. Your improving health and happiness will ultimately benefit everyone around you. So do this for them if you can’t see your way to doing it ‘purely’ for yourself right now.

In deference to anyone who is ‘attentionally challenged’ I will sign off here.

With all love. Zoe XXX

Nuns, Sluts, Knives…

A shocking, eye-catching title for a very tame piece of writing. What’s good enough for The Sun is good enough for me.

Gotta get my stats back up somehow, folks! All fourteen of you!

What put me in mind of nuns is a very special tea date I just had with a lady I shared a ward with earlier this year.

The ‘nun’ vibe coming off her was so powerful and mysterious.

True devotion to your God or Higher Power can get you into serious trouble with the Authoritarian Strong-Arm of the State.

Yeah in this ‘land of the free’ we laughingly call England…yeah I know honeys, that’s America, bear with me…we face incarceration simply for having experiences not commonly known or shared. More than that. We face invasion and intrusion into our very minds…the inner sanctum itself. They don’t stop at imprisoning our bodies. They want to lock our minds up too.

Once in a so-called ‘mental hospital’ environment in this country, you lose your civil rights. As there is little point you being there unless you ‘take’ the ‘medication’ (and as to be there is unbearable if you don’t), once there you no longer have the personal autonomy to decide what goes into your body and what doesn’t.

In the medication queue. You stand, swaying from foot to foot. Your knees feel like they will give way. You eventually reach the front of the queue. And then you take ‘Unholy Communion’ folks.

Pills in your hand. You take a good look. You try to divest these substances of whatever evil power they have over you. You pray over them.

You take the proffered plastic beaker of luke-warm, funny-tasting water. You place the pills on the back of your tongue. Down the hatch. This is the price we pay for daring to be different.

Advice for the Urban Polar Bear Shaman. Part II.

Advice for the Urban Shaman

Hiya folks.

Re my last post. I am one such untreated Polar Bear, at large and loose in an unsuspecting society! Please check the Polar Bear Community link on my blog roll.

When I go out I feel endangered. I use hip hop on my IPod to create an aura of inviolability around myself. This protects me from confrontational or even violent situations by building a shield of superior power around myself that other humans will not attempt to breach.

It also provides me with an outlet for my own rage and frustration at having to face what pretty much amounts to a psychic ‘war zone’, daily.

Sometimes my need for an outlet prompts me to rap quietly to myself along with my music, on the bus and in other public places. Teenage schoolchildren particularly enjoy (and understand!) this, and provided I am not too aggressive, other people do not feel threatened by this only mildly ‘crazy’ behaviour.

It is imperative not to scare other people. That will put ME in danger. You can usually get away with slightly unsettling them. It is GOOD for some people to feel unsettled, and part of my duty as an ‘urban shaman’.

Always consider your surroundings before speaking your truth. FEEL your way.  Intuitively understand what the people around you can cope with. Never overload them with what is beyond their capacity. Do not cast your pearls before swine as the Bible tells us.

Flow around others like water… as much as humanly possible.

Sometimes this will simply not be possible, as you will HAVE to confront violence of so many different types. We are not Gandhi! The Buddhist Way is not our way. As well as highly evolved beings we are also creatures locked into a struggle for our own survival. Remember the Polar Bear! Once you threaten her,  or her environment,  she has no option but to destroy you and will have no compunction or hesitation in doing just that.

‘You leave me no choice but to hurt your feelings, G’.

It’s a regrettable fact of life that ‘love peace and harmony’ is not for this world, but for the next. Let’s be realistic now!

‘Advice for the Urban Shaman’, part I.

Rarer than Corpses

Rarer than corpses in our society are the visible untreated mentally ill.

Domestic Bliss Part II

One of the great things about sharing a home is that you don’t continually have to drag yourself out into the world in order to enjoy a convivial atmosphere.

Like now, D and I are both ensconsed in the living room on our respective computers. We don’t need to talk. There is no tension to break. We are both absorbed in what we are doing, but at the same time, it is reassuring on a human level to have another person present. L has gone off to a job interview.

A and P will be arriving at eleven am for my Shadow Coaching session. This feels like the very best kind of ‘pampering’. Tho’ of course, they don’t touch me. P is a trained masseur but then again, so am I. The Coaching works on a more subtle level than that. It gives me permission to unfold my petals, like a rose.

Being able to share my music with my ‘captive audience’ is weirdly healing. Because music has always played a massive part in my ‘psychotic episodes’. But the trouble was, I was alone with it, and with the powerful messages I took from it. With A and P I can share those messages, and have them affirmed, accepted and understood.

What’s the ‘fine line’ between madness and spiritual emergence? Having company folks! Having company! But it has to be the right sort. Not just anyone will do.

Incidentally. My Care Coordinator told me he is having difficulty accessing my blog since I changed the ‘theme’. I honestly don’t know why this should be, but as I have also noticed a massive drop in the stats in the last week or so, I would ask any of you who are experiencing similar problems to get in touch, if you can. My email is zoe.vincent@virgin.net

Last night I cooked us a vegan lasagne and then we watched the Eminem movie, 8 Mile. This is one of my ‘top five movies of all time’. (To be honest, not being a ‘lister’, I don’t know what the other four are off hand!) Anyway, it was a pleasure and privilege to see it again. I always find new things in this movie. It is one of the least fake, most real and true to life, films that I have ever seen.

And of course folks, it has the advantages of showing the roots of hip hop … one of my greatest all-time passions.

And Christmas is about a week and a half away. Am I bovvered? Not really. I don’t really ‘do’ Christmas. But I’m loving this proper cold wintry weather.  Hope you are too folks.

Lots love, Zoe XXX

Bipolar Bears

Hi to my ‘nineteen’ readers! My stats have taken a massive dive, interestingly. OK, I was posting anything up to eight articles a day a few weeks ago. Now that my life has become so much more interesting, the blogging starts to take a back seat. There’s a faint possibility also that people were ‘gripped’ by the massive psychodrama of my bullying scenario. And that now that’s all over and ‘moved on from’ I’m no longer such an interesting read??

Well, I know how that sounds. A bit presumptuous to say the least! But it’s also a realistic reflection on’human nature’. I mean, the popular British TV soap ‘East Enders’ certainly doesn’t get its viewing figures by depicting harmonious family and community life, what!

I’m beginning to answer my own question folks. Am I Still Ill? Not so’s you’d notice. Like all good (and endangered) Polar Bears, I require my habitat not to be threatening and to meet my needs. And it is starting to do just that.

I had a need not to be isolated, cut off and lonely. And I’m not. I have a ‘household’ of kindred souls. My divine house guest L is in the kitchen as we speak creating a divine meal. I’m sipping at a glass of red Shiraz. D is playing his ambient music. The cats float in and out. I’m no longer alone.

And during the day I am increasingly busy and focused on my various community projects. Like all good (bi)polar bears, I am bent on total world domination…but in a good way. Cos this ain’t about me (Babs!) It’s about us…and the planet.

I’m sleeping the sleep of the just. Which so often, the just don’t sleep. In case you wonder what that consists of, it’s an almost dreamless chunk of undisturbed and uninterrupted oblivion, from which I awake deeply refreshed and firing on all cylinders.

And like all bears, I have both a fierce, and a cuddly side. Now that I don’t feel continually under threat, I am much easier for EVERYONE to live with.

And this is what I want for ALL my ‘deemed mentally ill’ brethren.

Are you reading this Government Departments for the Hounding of the Mentally Ill Scroungers Back to Work?

Think you can find a suitable niche for me? Think again. I would not last five minutes in the ‘normal’ working world. I was not designed that way. Work must fit the person, not the other way around. And rest assured, I earn my keep. But ‘I do it my way’.

Sorry darlings. But I don’t wanna be like you! Never have, don’t now and never will. I am far too ambitious.

I am a seer. I have seen. My ‘illness’ made me see. And now that I’ve seen, I know what needs to be done. Women are good at that. We are resourceful. Persistent. Determined. Loving. We do things quietly and efficiently, without making a big ‘performance’ out of it, the way men so often do.

Lots of love folks. All nineteen of you! Z XXX

Asylum Magazine Relaunched!

Have just taken out a subscription for 2011 to Asylum magazine, which was relaunched this year. Hooray!

‘An international magazine for democratic psychiatry, psychology and community development.

In the spring of 1986 Asylum, costing 50p but ‘Free to Inmates, was launched.

Domestic Bliss

My guests are stars. Yesterday they set to and ‘winter-cleaned’ my kitchen for about sx or eight hours on the trot. It doesn’t know itself. Never been so clean and shiny.

Just like all ‘mums’ I’m a bit of a worrier. I fuss over them just a little. Like, today, I have a feeling they’re worried about money and getting jobs. I know I would be. At the same time all three of us are ‘in flow’ most of the time. Which means that we have faith that ‘something will always turn up’. Provided we all just keep ‘doing the next right thing’.

Last night I cooked an impromptu veggie meal for all of us (linguine with a tomato and mushroom sauce and a few trimmings). And D commented that ‘you don’t really need meat if you know how to cook veggies’. He’s a fast learner! Bless.

I’ve also already started worrying about when they will have to move on. Cos right now, I honestly don’t know how I’d cope without them! And that’s just a few days in. People who get close to me often have a way of  ‘making themselves indispensable’. Richard did it for years. I have a certain amount of ‘learned helplessness’ in my make-up! Certain things I’m just no good at, and which the very thought of doing creates ongoing anxiety!

‘Doing the garden’ is one. ‘Fixing the computer’ another. All sorted for the time being!

They share their music with me and vice versa. And that’s great too. In fact, I want to run a ‘creative space’ workshop at Polar Bear on ‘The Music and the Message’. We all have certain tracks that mean a lot to us, and sharing them with others and talking about what they mean to us can be a great way of ‘expressing our lived experience’ in a really enjoyable way.

I do a lot of this with A and P, my ‘Shadow Coaches’ who I am currently seeing once a week. It’s an absolute delight to have a space to do whatever I want and have a captive audience who are skilled in attentive listening and awareness! If I’m playing a hip hop track and want to start rapping along with it, or getting up and dancing like a lunatic, they will not only encourage me, they will even get up and dance with me! It’s called ‘mirroring’.

So far this ‘programme’, plus having L and D living with me, has had a notably healing effect on my state of mind. To the degree that I have been able to manage on a fraction of the night medication I was taking, and look forward confidently to being able to manage with none at all.

It’s also interesting how many male-female couples I’m attracting into my life. Now that I myself am single! But these aren’t just any pairings. I’ve got at least three wonderful couples in my life that have massively impressed me with the quality of their relationship. It’s like God is putting a role model in front of me. Going, ‘Zoe, it’s time to up your game with the relationship thing. Here’s how it should be done!’

Listening to The Streets ‘A Grand Don’t Come For Free’. Hip hop with a massive difference. Self-deprecating instead of posturing. British to the core! It’s great when we Brits manage to take a concept and sort of subvert it…using humour and a tongue in cheek approach.

And reading Martin Buber ‘I and Thou’. He was the originator of the concept of ‘Living Dialogue’. It’s very dense. He doesn’t waste words. Not something you can skim read. Something to imbibe paragraph by paragraph, like medicine. It has the feel of divine revelation.

DRA later, and it’s a beautiful sunny day. Love you lots folks. Z XXX

Movin’ On Up

Yeah folks. For real.

And sharing my space with like-minded peeps is doing me no end of good.

L and D are a highly intelligent and educated married couple from Romania. They are staying with me, not renting. They have tons to offer me as well as vice versa. We share and swop skills rather than money.

As a for instance, L (the female part of the couple) is a fantastic cleaner. I mean, she actually enjoys cleaning! D has practical skills as well as being ‘supergeek’ and highly intellectual.

And we’re even studying together, with Stephen W, to be Connections Coaches! So there’s a ‘shared student household’ vibe goin’ on too.

Uh, you gotta say it, folks, this couple are the lodgers from heaven. Psychologists! Psychologists folks. Not just one, but TWO! Living with me in my house!

Can you think of anything better for my mental health than that?

And we have a plan. They have a plan and now so do we. I’m going with them and Stephen W to Romania in January/February. They will find us cheap digs. The idea is to start some kind of psychology project, pooling their and Stephen’s ideas and expertise (and their contacts there).

Um. Could I be forgiven for feeling just a little excited?

But it’s not a bipolar thing. I’m sleeping like a baby and so are they.

But we aren’t babies. We’re grown-ups. With dreams and plans and a whole lotta skills and ideas.

At risk of being monotonous folks. It’s happening. It’s happening.

And the Equals stuff? Pretty much forgotten. Moved on from. Closure finally achieved last week. Didn’t have to meet with them either. The Babs Poison Pen pretty much did the job for me. Thanks Babs!

Gavin Eastley, his line manager and my Care Coordinator are perusing documents. Equals’ response to my original grievance. Which, I gather, was an immaculately executed exercise in complete and total self-exoneration. Folks, I am such a hideously bad person, basically, that exclusion, vilification and bullying is really just too good for me.

Have never read this document. Don’t intend ever reading it.

And even better. Richard and I now on amicable terms again. He helped me yesterday to buy an IKEA mattress for my house guests. They had the best sleep on it last night that they’ve had in ages.

My boy J continues to give his foster family a hard time, periodically. The main issue is, obviously, his school refusal. Please, anyone with faith, pray for my boy. He’s fifteen and should be starting his GCSE work. No one can completely get to the bottom of why he won’t go. Including him.

Thank God he has just started three weeks holidays.

I would love to let Stephen W and my house guests loose on him. They are all experts in changing people’s minds. Or rather, helping them to change their own.

And they are certainly doing wonders for mine!

Celebrate and drink a glass of virtual bubbly with me folks! Here’s to the residents of Zoe Towers going very very far. I ain’t just talking about Romania.

Love you lots. X

How to Handle Bullies

A useful and wise piece of advice from the bullyonline forums.

‘J, you will sleep much better if you can get it in your head that: 1. It’s not you — it’s them. 2. You did nothing wrong — you’re simply competent and they are not (And I’m guessing you are very very good at what you do).

Yes, what happened is unfair. It sucks that there are people that ruin people’s lives for sport. It’s very hard to accept and even harder (or impossible) to change. I see you are going to stay with the toxic workplace — I did too — so get ready for more of the same because they will not stop. They are jealous of your talents and personality and just want you out to make themselves look better.

My advice is: first of all, keep doing a great job.  Document everything!  Document every wrong look, comment, email, communication, directives which aren’t right, anything and everything that you know is not right. Get ready to respond with the phrase “Your behavior is unacceptable and I will not tolerate it.” And then walk away.

It probably will get harder before it gets easier. Stand your ground. Don’t be concerned or even consider how the bullies feel; this is about your survival. The bullies back each other up which leaves you to stand alone and fight. You can do it, J. Like X says, “FIDO!” ‘

Quoted with thanks. X

A Collaboration of Geniuses

Yeah, bit like ‘a cesspit of estate agents’, ‘a septic tank of traffic wardens’…

Clever people gravitate to other clever people and pool their resources. Don’t back a loser. ‘Stick with the winners’ as they say in AA.

And it takes one to know one.

Excuse the surfeit of cliches, folks. But I am building up to a quite phenomenal piece of news.

Anyone remember the Afghan refugee and aspiring fashion designer who I came within a whisker of cohabiting with?

Well that came to nothing. But now I have something much better. A married couple in need of a place to stay. But a very special married couple who also happen to be friends, as well as part of my shiny-new-and-exciting social and creative life in the Polar Bear Community.

More than that I am not inclined to say just yet. Don’t want to compromise ANYONE’S privacy, including my own.

Suffice it to say, this couple have ‘kindred spirit’ written all over them. This thing was meant to be. Share my space with someone needy yeah, but also someone who can give me something back.

It’s all pretty exciting. But excitement is not a luxury I can allow myself. Objectively speaking, it’s exciting, as I know it’s the start of a beautiful relationship. But I’m not talking about three. I’m talking about an ever-expanding community of kindred souls, who can swop skills and services, as well as put their money where it matters if they are lucky enough to have some!

It’s happening, folks. It’s happening.

And I knew it beyond doubt for the first time on my boy’s birthday.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Happy Birthday Jasper

My precious boy is fifteen today!

Streamers and fairy lights…

Party poppers…

Please send him all your prayers and love folks. This boy is very special, and I’m not the only one who thinks so. Naturally I can hardly be objective!

Here’s to him wholeheartedly embracing a good education. Eh sweetheart!

‘Never did me any ‘arm…’

Also the anniversary of John Lennon’s death. We love you John. Rest in Peace.

I love you Jasper. X X X

Ethics Versus The Law

Hurrah for the Quakers, folks!

‘Laws and regulations don’t guarantee ethical behaviour.

We have laws, regulations and organisation policies, but they don’t guarantee ethical behaviour.

Ethics is personal and rarely simple; it’s about individuals finding, and refining, their sense of responsibility to others.

The public’s perception of what is ethical and responsible is constantly evolving, and not necessarily related to whether the current rules are followed, as many of our politicians discovered to their cost. That’s why Quakers and Business have launched a new development programme, which focuses on the unchanging fundamentals of ethics, not constantly changing rules and regulations.

A deeper consideration of ethical responsibilities helps in various ways;

•To clarify an organisation’s ethical responsibilities

•To establish what it means to lead and manage responsibly

•To embed a sense of ethical responsibility throughout an organisation

•To clarify your personal sense of ethics

The programme provides the tools to consider any aspect of ethics in your professional and personal lives. More information at http://www.qandb.org/ethicsprog.’

With thanks to the bullyonline forum.

Queen of my Domain!

Sorry to pester you again, folks, but wanted to let you know that, to go with the ‘shiny new look’ I also have a new ‘domain name’.

With sparkling and inspired creativity, I came up with (drumroll) amistillill.com!!!

Blimey. ‘Ope it works. It cost about 12 quid, and lasts for a year.

Now just have to get rid of that bloody green!

X

All Shiny and New

What does tha’ think of me shiny new blog design?

Hope y’all can find your way around it.

I felt it was ‘time for a change’.

In more ways than one, eh folks?

And I know a lot of you out there who have your reservations or concerns about the rather ‘negative’ subject matter that has tended to preoccupy me for the last many months may be relieved to see I am branching out.

My old blog was a bit of a ‘shrinking violet’. Very understated and eventually, a little drab. It was the ‘plain jane’ of Mental Health Blogs. It was socially a little awkward and ambivalent.

I’ve changed, folks. And my blog has had to change with me.

I hope the new decor reflects that. It’s so ridiculously easy to change blog ‘theme’. It seemed a shame not to, really.

And folks? I hope you like green!

Take care sweeties. X

Spirituality and Mental Health

In the Fellowships there are Twelve Steps.

The first one goes like this.

‘We admitted we were powerless over x [insert our mental illness here] and that our lives had become unmanageable.’

The second step continues:

‘Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity’.

The third step concludes:

‘Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood God.’

Let’s stick with those three foundation steps to begin with. The entire Twelve Steps are way too much for any individual approaching this cold to comprehend in one sitting.

Does this work for a ‘mental illness’ as well as it does for an addiction, folks?

My answer (and yeah, I can only speak for me) is yes and no. The ‘yes’ is a resounding  and emphatic one. Because those with a ‘mental illness’ IMHO are actually in direr need of both a ‘programme’ and the ‘fellowship’ with other fellow sufferers that are the twin concepts of all 12-Step Fellowships.

The ‘no’ is less essential and emphatic. It involves accepting the reality that ‘mental illness’ is in some ways a less transigeant and more complex condition than any substance, or other, addiction.

Mental illness is also way more deeply stigmatised in our society than any addiction. Addictions are actually almost ubiquitous, when you think about it. Do you honestly know many people who you can honestly say is not and never has been ‘an addict’ of any description?

While we ‘loons’ are still only ‘one in four’, folks!

But to continue expanding on my ‘no’, I have seen the reality of ‘trying to work your programme’ with a mental illness, whether you have an addiction or not.

Put simply, folks, it represents some sort of handicap … and I mean that in the ‘betting’, horseracing sense, and not the old-fashioned sense of ‘disability’.

To sum up, ‘Yeah, not arf do we need Fellowship!’ The support, understanding and empathy that can, realistically, only flow from those who face the same challenges.

And ‘no’, we are not here to be ‘glowing examples’ of the Miraculous Power of the Twelve Steps. Cos they are a wonderful thing. But not quite that wonderful.

No moral ‘programme’ has, on its own, the power to ‘cure’ a mental illness.

Cos ‘mental illness’ is not a moral issue. It sometimes comes perilously close to feeling like one. We are punished and penalised by society and sometimes even the very ‘services’ that are supposedly there to help us.

Anyone who’s ever been depressed will know the rancid loop of self-loathing and -punishing thoughts that ensues. We feel guilty and worthless, and that it is our fault we are depressed. This is all exacerbated by the way we are treated by society at large.

But y’know what? Mental illness may be our own personal ‘cross to bear’. It may be our ‘journey’. Our ‘curse’. Our ‘condition’.  But what it is NOT – is a punishment for some hideous moral flaw in ourselves.

Very far from it folks.

But the fact that we have a mental illness does not mean we are not moral beings. Does not exempt us from being ‘actors’ on the human stage. Of needing to be able to distinguish right from wrong.

So yeah, we DO need a moral programme. Just like everyone else does. And maybe even more. Why? Cos following a moral programme will enrich and deepen our humanity, maturity and spirituality. All qualities we were in dire danger of losing or being deprived of, as ‘helpless victims’ of the ‘illness’…the ultimate Power beyond our control!

See where I am going with this folks? No? Bear with me and stick with it, cos this is complex and thorny stuff, even for me. I will continue to explain  my personal vision for ‘Twelve Steps to Recovery’ from mental illness. And I believe, that in time, it will all come clear.

Heaps love. Z X

Human Rights and Free Speech

Posting here three links to ‘freedom of speech’ and ‘libel law’ websites, for the information of anyone interested.

In the meantime I continue to ‘go with my intuition’ rather than frighten myself silly about who might ‘come here and get me’ for writing stuff that I feel a very deep psychological need to ‘get off my chest’.

One thing I doubt you will have noticed up till now is Zoe ‘playing the mental health card’ to evade accountability.

Having a ‘mental illness’ has never struck me as excusing me from facing the consequences of my actions.

There is no moral content in ‘being ill’. Disregard of others’ feelings on the other hand is a basic offence against our own humanity.

And where you personally draw the line, dear reader, between justifiable ‘self-defence’ and ‘becoming an aggressor or an offender oneself’, is ultimately up to you…

I’m afraid that even here at Zoe Towers, the jury’s still out…

Lots love. X

http://www.website-law.co.uk/resources/website-libel.html
http://www.complicity.co.uk/blog/2010/11/mass-libel-reform-blog/

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/organgrinder/2010/sep/06/rupert-murdoch-libel

Are You Still Ill?

Probably not, on balance, a good putative title for the ‘interactive forum’. Might sound way too much like I am a Government spy or double agent looking to pick off my comrades on benefits and get them onto the Purgatory that is Jobseekers Allowance.

However, I pose the question to you, reader, cos I wanna hear your IDEAS!

Sweet La (Letters from Exile) who has been a loyal and long-term reader and fellow blogger, has confided in me that I make her more than nervous, and that she doesn’t feel comfortable voicing dissent.

I got to admit it. This saddened me. And it is ‘yet another’ price I’ve paid for going so public with my grievance against Equals, let’s face it.

But in time folks. You will see the ‘fluffy kitten’ side of Zoe instead of the ‘Rottweiler’, tearing people’s legs off in prose and then watching them writhe helplessly on the ground, drool still dropping from my slavering chops!

PLEASE have faith folks. PLEASE bear with me.

Many of my friends have simply never seen this ‘scary’ side of me. I’m basically an extremely gregarious recluse. A warm and empathic introvert. A kind and loving hermit crab.

Yeah I have a Shadow. COURSE I do. You’ve seen a lot of it here on this blog lately. My ‘rage against the machine’. My hot temper. Grim determination in a scrap, not to be the one left in bits on the floor at the end.

Please be fair La and everyone. Don’t have selective memories, and forget the ghastly summer I had to endure, my PTSD symptoms, total loss of appetite, and worst of all, the admission to hospital on a Section back in May.

More than anyone involved, I suspect, I actually deeply WANT to move on from this episode. You can see that I have already begun writing ‘glowing reviews’ of my ‘Shadow Coach’ (hey A, maybe you’ll help me tame my Shadow, eh!) and my beloved DRA meeting.

And believe it or not, it isn’t the first time I’ve written about my love for Ange, either. The blog throughout is interspersed with heartfelt admissions of the love for and bond with, her that I continue to feel. Same goes for my ex, Richard.

PLEASE don’t be selective folks, and only see my ‘wrath’. I’m a well-rounded human being. In actual fact that was one of the most hurtful things about the ‘Equals’ campaign against me. They seemed to cease seeing me as a human being at all. They dehumanised me. They were obsessed with the ‘Wrath of Zoe’. They couldn’t see at all the desperate distress and intense vulnerability that lay just beneath the surface.

And this is something I’ve learned about my fellow humans. What they have repressed within themselves, out of a conditioned belief that it is ‘unacceptable’ perhaps, they will tend to project onto some other unfortunate. This is how scapegoats are made. And how wars start…

Thus, in microcosm, in my own little human ‘loop’, I observed the seeds of the human ‘deathwish’. And the evil that may thrive when ‘good people do nothing’.

You need an aggressor, to have a war (and of course, I’m accused of being that aggressor, and believe it if you want to). But you also need ‘helpless’ bystanders who lack the moral strength, fibre, courage or insight, to step in on behalf of the weak and oppressed.

Perhaps any mathematicians out there might want to come up with an algebraical formula for war?

In the mould of xy+ yy X y/x = Z?

I never was much good at maths!

Heaps love from a deeply fluffy Zoe X

Why I Love My Twelve-Step Fellowship

And no, Ange, Adam. I’m NOT implying it belongs to me. It is not my possession.

To think like that about it would be to violate our own time-honoured traditions.

When I say ‘my’ about stuff it is usually an indication that it is something I love. I sometimes say it to or about my friends and other loved ones. ‘My Ange’. ‘My Kate’. ‘My Jasper’. It’s in that spirit that I talk about ‘my fellowship’. I know how easy it is to be misunderstood when using this medium of communication, so please bear with me, folks. I do my best to be clear.

And there is another issue which I have already discussed here and which is clearly on the thorny side. Confidentiality. There are rules, ‘traditions’ governing what we can and can’t say regarding a Fellowship which centres on anonymity.

Yeah. Arguably I have violated these by naming Ange and Adam. I had a lot of complex reasons for doing this, which, to be honest, are VERY well documented on this blog. I have and will continue to refrain from naming other folk. The confidentiality rule is (I’m guessing) primarily about safety. About creating a space where people may feel comfortable sharing honestly and openly.

As time moves on and healing occurs, I will probably go back and remove all mention of surnames. I do not feel ready to do this just yet.

But my aim in this post was to share with my readers who may know nothing about Twelve Step Fellowships what they are about, and more specifically, what DRA is.

The revolutionary thing about DRA, which stands for Dual Recovery Anonymous, is that it is open to all those who suffer with both an addiction (could be substances, alcohol, food/eating disorder, gambling…the possibilities are limitless!) AND a mental health problem.

Adam was the genius who recognised the need for this, as he attended another Fellowship and found that he didn’t feel altogether comfortable or understood sharing about ‘stuff’ above and beyond ‘normal’ addiction. He set up the first UK DRA meeting and faithfully joined forces with one or two other stalwarts and a pot plant while the Fellowship was at the embryo stage.

This is an experience almost all of us with mental health issues who came into one Fellowship or another, shared. The feeling of ‘homecoming’ and relief is so often palpable when such people ARE lucky enough to stumble on DRA.

It is the most honest Fellowship you could ever wish for. People who are often in such dire need of an outlet, to be heard and better still, understood, can share their darkest thoughts, their deepest despair, their dreams and visions, and their rage.

Often, said rage is directed at the very ‘services’ which are supposed to aid and support those of us with mental health problems. We all completely understand how badly these can let us down. This is not ‘thinking badly of professionals’. It is just an immensely frustrating reality that we have to deal with every day.

We can share this, and know that we are supported, not judged, for it. We are also saved from the stigmatisation we can experience in the straightforward ‘addiction’ Fellowships (AA, OA, NA and so on). There we may be the recipients of well-meaning but unhelpful advice. That, for instance, if we are depressed, we just need to keep ‘working our Steps’.

DRA is the final port of call for people who are doubly stigmatised by society. Many of us can ‘work our steps’ until we are blue in the face. It will not magically free us from our mental health condition!

The issue of prescription medication can also be problematic in the addiction Fellowships. Some misguided and slightly fanatical ‘twelve steppers’ may try to tell us that taking our meds is a form of ‘using’ or ‘abusing’ drugs! Clearly massively unhelpful.

OK. Here is where I part from ‘what we’ve done so far’ and go just one teensy step further. I believe that working a Twelve Step Programme along with other people similarly affected by what we sometimes call ‘no-fault’ illnesses, could benefit ANY mental health service user. Whether they are aware of having any addictions or not!

Why so, Zoe, why so? One reason, for me, is that we all of us benefit greatly from peer support. I have written and talked extensively elsewhere as well as here, about my belief that it is the support of others similarly affected that is most useful and most helpful, in the journey of recovery.

Many of us are quite simply alienated by the professionally-run ‘services’ that are available to us in what we laughingly call ‘the community’. We feel both patronised and disempowered. However well-meaning and even good-hearted many of these professionals are, at the end of the day, we are talking a ‘them and us’ scenario which tends to breed both frustration and dependency.

My ‘dream’. Are you ready for this guys? Some of you will know very well what’s coming, as you have got to know me a bit, and are probably covering your ears as we speak, and I start ‘banging my drum’ or ‘tooting my horn’.

Service users caring for other service users. People at different stages of recovery helping those who are currently in crisis or possibly just too debilitated to help themselves right now.

The spiritual input of a Fellowship like DRA. DRA groups in every neighbourhood, where currently you have moribund ‘day centres’ where people huddle for warmth and a little acceptance, but then become institutionalised and can’t move on, out or up.

Bottom line. I believe in service users. I know so many. I love and respect these people. I see their guts and gumption just to get up and face another day. I recognise their amazing talent and potential. I see an entirely new world of de-stigmatised ‘care’, ‘support’ and ‘community’ for what we currently term mental health service users.

Before any of you comment that you don’t identify with that label, or like it, I hear you. Many of us have expressed the wish for an alternative description. I use it simply for convenience, but trust completely that when we begin to evolve our own ‘help’ that consists of reaching out to those who share our difficulties – we will be able to pension the term ‘service user’ off for good. And good riddance, eh folks?

Will be writing more about my ‘vision’ very soon. And when I say ‘my’, folks…remember. I am not indicating ‘possession’…but love.

Hugs. Z X

Dust-Up At DRA

No, I ain’t gonna go there, Adam!

But I thought you were a teensy weensy bit of a star for even having the guts to show. Full marks for bottle and sheer brass neck!

See, I really do like people who are happy to put their money where their mouth is…

You and Ange make such great copy it would be verging on criminal NOT to write about you!

The original Power Couple! Would that I could be bothered to post your wedding pic here! Do you remember how I saw your potential when you first got together, sweets? Cos I do. I was a bit manic and I announced gaily ‘It’s the Ange and Adam show!’ You both looked a little nervous. It’s like we all KNEW…

If you want me to ‘stop’ as you continually protest you do, you should stop being so darned entertaining!

You were made for stage or screen (or failing that, Zoe’s blog’ll just have to come a poor second…)

Adam assures me ‘beyond all doubt’ folks, that Ange wants nothing more to do with me! But I know this lady! She’s hooked on her own drama. And I have to hand it to her, it’s pretty good. Kept me entertained for years.

She wants to star in something. As Equals starts to dribble conclusively down the pan, she’ll have to settle for a sizeable (if not starring) role in my blog.

What most of you guys won’t understand (even her own husband doesn’t, apparently) is that Ange and I have a very special bond that will NEVER be broken. Remember Kano’s line ‘There’s a thin line between love and hate?’

Whether we’re locked into The Mother of All Wars or peaceably supping coffee together, NOTHING (and certainly not a mere man, Adam) can tear us apart.

Like I tole you guys before. Karmic connection.

Ange is a feminist like me. Unlike me, she prefers women to men (not in that way, dunderheads). But one thing she does get right. Her Rosie the Riveter poster of a muscular wartime lady flexing her bicep, with the caption ‘We can do it!’

And I owe this lady so much. She has genuinely empowered and promoted me from the lowly status of ‘an Equals Underling’ (God help me) to Blogger and Whistleblower Extraordinaire, by one sharp and simple move. Bullying me within an inch of my life.

And looked at another way, you could see this as her getting mightily fed up with seeing me sat on my sad, service user arse as my potential gets peed down the pan.

This is a lady who saw me as ‘the most intelligent person she knew’, remember.

And I saw something beyond unusual in her, too. Her beauty, for starters (though she seems to try her best to hide it). Her amazing, persuasive eloquence for seconds. Her presentations were something else. You could tell most of the professionals in the audience didn’t really know what she was on about, but boy, did it sound good!

I wanted to make this stuff clear, not just cos she might read it. But mainly cos I don’t want any of you aresholes out there (forgive me gentle reader, but there are bound to be a sprinkling!) thinkin’ Ange and I are engaged in any kind of cat fight.

We are just not the ‘cat fight’ kind of gals. We love each other. And put each other first.

And for the slightly retarded (or chronically inattentive) I’ll repeat. I WOULD NEVER LOWER MYSELF TO SCRAP WITH ANOTHER WOMAN OVER A MERE MAN.

Girls and women everywhere, I think the men need to be told this now and again. It does them no good to keep massaging their egos for them. Better to stick a pin in it.

And I know I have many male fans out there too, and they are very probably the kind of men who don’t need to be told this in the first place. Right guys? That’s settled then.

Hey, that’s Zoe ‘acting the child’ and ‘putting words in your mouths’ (see the Babs Poison Pen).

Shall I explain her why I do this guys? Talk to myself here on this blog? Answer my own questions etc?

COS I’M LONELY.

That’s the sad truth.

Nuffin’ to do wiv cunning, Babs. That’s your department sweetie.

I live alone, my son is fostered, I don’t have a bloke or even ‘somefing for the weekend’.

Talking of my ex, his latest short ‘n’ sweet missive opines that what I’m doin’ here is ‘not creative but destructive’.

Don’t really see how he can tell, since he never reads the blasted thing.

Poor man has never been able to see my talent. Nor can he resonate with my vision. He has so little of his own.

Ange, on the other hand. She always ‘got’ me. She was grandiose too, and I liked that. She had big dreams. And I’ve said it before and will say it again. We were a Dream Team.

Please sweet readers. Give me feedback on my blog. Not so much the content. But do you find the format easy to read etc? Should I change the decor? Don’t be backward in comin’ forward, cos I’m really not a tecchie lady. I actually need a geeky sidekick. CV’s please to ‘Zoe’s House, Haringey, United Kingdom’.

We also want an interactive forum. Well me and Katy do and we’re the visionaries, so the rest of you just fall into line.

Babs’d have a field day with that one, Zoe!

Kisses.

Lies, Damn Lies and Site Statistics

Hi folks. Honesty is the best policy, you know it makes sense!

Way less exhausting than spending your entire life covering your tracks…

Simply had to brag that my site stats reached a new high yesterday. 535 hits. Huzzah! Fall out from the hate mail probably grabbed a few more people’s attention I’m guessing…

There is a serious matter I feel prompted to discuss, briefly. Katy sent me over to the Freedom of Speech website (see her comment on the last post).

I am aware that I have indeed sailed dangerously close to the line in terms of divulging confidences.

In particular I have discussed a confidential Fellowship, DRA.

Sometimes, I feel, one will find oneself ‘pushing the boundaries’ a little when one is fully engaged in fighting what one is convinced is a ‘just cause’.

As I have observed so many times, sadly, none of this would have been necessary if said parties could have come to the table in a discussion months and months ago.

One thing I can never be accused of, is not giving them fair warning.

When I am allowed my proper ‘right of reply’ and preferably ‘to know what I am accused of in the first place’, I will certainly consider deleting mention of first names and the ‘politics’ of my much loved and appreciated DRA meeting.

In the meantime, apologies to any I have offended. Z X

Lancing the Equals Boil

My hate mail actually felt like an (other) early Christmas present!

Spesh when my boy went for her jugular.

No, I don’t know it’s a woman. But the more I reflected the more convinced I was that the ‘hate mail’ flowed from the pen of none other than Babs Lisicki herself!

What do you think, Angela, Nora, Richard? Can you not see her personal and political ‘stamp’ or ‘signature’?

Y’know, I don’t know her as well as you do (supposedly). But I think she couldn’t have done a better job of exposing and revealing her true character if she had signed her name to every line!

Whether it’s her or not I will probably never be able to prove. But what I like and respect about Babs is there’s a certain honesty there. She don’t like me, and she’s prepared to come right out and say it! Unlike the rest of you who shield yourselves behind utterly phony ‘concern’ (Nora!) or multiple playings of the mental health card (that would be you, Angie Baby!).

So, honeys. This is your ‘star player’. This is your ‘role model’.

A sociopathic bully with strange, outdated views. Who thinks the normal rules don’t apply to her. I saw all this on the very first day of your ‘course’, Equals. And by God wasn’t I made to suffer for my presience and insight?

It’s called ‘shooting the messenger’ loves!

Resting my case…until the next time. X

Talked to Richard

I was a bit upset by that silly ‘Seesaw’ character (who turned out to be commenting using someone else’s email address without asking!)

So I did what any normal person would do. I picked up the phone and called my ex for a chat and some reassurance.

Thank Heaven. He assented this time. We had one of our fairly fruitless games of verbal ping-pong. But then the comments from my son J (fifteen on Wednesday!) came through and that was immensely comforting.

I’m sorry I wrote that Tricky Dicky stuff now Richard. You know I love you!

And I want to take this opportunity to say now that I prefer to ‘get along with folk’ than be always arguing, or bein’ forced to mercilessly bait them and take the piss.

OK. I hear what you’re saying. No one forced me. But please hear me when I say … I DO feel repressed, when the Law are invoked to stop me texting. And no, that ain’t calculated to make me go quietly away and have a lie down.

Sorry ‘n’ all that. X

Accused of Leading A United Mental Health Front!

Whew this is heady stuff!

Where, anywhere ever, Seesaw Thoughts have I indicated anything of the kind?

On the contrary. I have asked for debate. I have openly invited dissent.

Yours is not reasoned dissent, but a thinly veiled personal attack which ultimately, I must take as a compliment. Just as you say!

I notice that you want to talk about ‘we’. You are not content to put your own view. You somehow want to speak for others. A typical coward’s ploy.

Honeys, if I make you laugh … as far as I’m concerned, job done. Continue to be entertained and laugh at me instead of with me by all means.

Regret to inform that, judging from this ‘comment’, Seesaw, you are clearly educated and intelligent. But not a natural writer. Not an original. Not creative. And very probably jealous of the qualities you see in my writing.

Sorry if that comes across big-headed or self-obsessed. But it’s my genuinely felt observation, for what it’s worth.

Blessings. X

My First Real-Live Hate Mail Folks!

I’ve gotta be gettin’ something right. Look at this!

Author : see-saw thoughts
E-mail : megalomedium@googlemail.com
Whois  : http://whois.arin.net/rest/ip/94.10.217.72
Comment:
Hi Zoe, here’s a comment!

I’ve made it a long one too, in the hope of quenching your apparently unlimited thirst for self-indulgence, and desperation for attention 🙂

Zoe I have seen the way that you go about your so called ‘campaign’ as well as heard comments from other mental health ‘sufferers’ as you like to put it (so much for your stance on independence which I’ve had the displeasure of having to hear about far too much since you came out of sectioning) and we are
not impressed. What’s more disturbing (somehow you always manage to out do yourself!) is how you view your own disability as somehow being better than non mental health conditions. It’s safe to say Zoe, we don’t all share your elitist opinion, although it doesn’t go amiss amongst all the other discrepancies you seem to chunder along with.

I am afraid that regardless of your deluded , mis-placed confidence in leading a united MH front, the idea of you representing anyone, let alone us, or other potentially vulnerable members of an often stigmatised group of people, nothing short of terrifying.

You would be to disability empowerment what the Titanic was to luxury sea-travel.

Having said that, you will no doubt, in your self-involved mindset, (which I have seen evidenced time and again), you will totally ignore the reference to historical destruction and instead think I am referring to the multi-award winning movie as some kind of compliment, perhaps highlighing your self-promoted creative genius.

The fact of the matter is Zoe, that people hear what you have to say, see your blog etc: and realise that you are, quite frankly, all about you.

Anyone who openly denotes the overwelming personal importance of a less than ground-breaking blog over that of their child is a cause for concern. most of us don’t even know how to comment on your desperations for attention because your posts are paradoxically littered with contradictions, obsessions (both self and external), clearly edited perspectives, dangerous allegations and probable illegalities.

Not to mention your cunning ability to put words in other peoples mouths, you know, like how a child does.

And as for your obvious cries for popularity, we don’t all like you as much as you might think.

The reality is Zoe, you make me and many other people laugh, and I just fancied getting in on the joke because after this long, the guilt of laughing at you rather than with you is not too dissimilar to watching a chained bulldog chewing through its own leg.

You might also want to rethink the way you describe yourself when you lead this new Mental Health exodus you unwittingly gabber on about. I was thinking maybe something like, “I am a Mental Health service user, additionally I am bat-shit crazy”

Just a thought.

Quite a lot of thoughts, I would say Seesaw Thoughts. What I can’t help noticing is you are not quite brave enough to identify yourself before spewing very obviously personally motivated vitriol. You obviously know me. And obviously don’t like me.

Y’know what? I can’t say I really care…You are in the same mould of cowardly bullies as Equals and, who knows, are maybe a close friend of theirs.

I really don’t care about my popularity as much as you seem to think. It’s not what you’d call a preoccupation.

Hope you feel better now, though, now you’ve got that off your chest. Suggestion. If you have a beef with me come and say it to my face, OK? Your ‘comment’ is thinly veiled abuse. X

Tricky Dicky ain’t no Clever Trevor

My partner of eleven years would not appear to be over-endowed with either brains or common sense.

I just texted him. Yes, gentle reader, I committed a felony. Texting my ex-partner.

But what poor Tricky Dicky REALLY can’t handle is having to come to terms with his own choices, all down the line.

In his world, only other people make choices. And even then only if they are named Zoe, not if they rejoice in the moniker Nora, Barbara or Angela.

But then he tells my Mum on the phone today (she still permitted to speak to him without breaking the law) that he wants to remain neutral! Hah! A little late for that I think you’ll find.

So I am now officially (though unwillingly) free and single folks. Looking for someone with a little nouse this time around. A soupcon of moral courage would also come in handy. An interest in human psychology a definite advantage. Some street smarts and maybe even a liking for hip hop? Ah Zoe. Dream on.

All I do know is. When it becomes painful to think down to your ex-partner’s level, it’s time to move on.

Steamin’!

Ah, I hate Sundays, folks. Fine if you have a partner or family. A royal pain in the arse if you have neither job nor companion in life.

Surplus to requirements. The day of the week I would most happily send out to do the Walk of Shame. Boring. Depressing. And guaranteed the day when Other Humans will annoy you the most.

If I brave the Farmer’s Market I will be overwhelmed by The Massed Smugness that is the Urban Middle Classes at play.

If, as I am about to do, I have to go and buy coffee or cat food I will be equally offended by the Chavvy Hordes of Wood Green.

My snobbery works both ways, folks.

And I’m fed up cos I’ve not even had any comments here for two or three days. And my ex continues to ignore my charming and fluffy emails. I’m all pent up. And then they wonder (scratching their poor befuddled heads) why Zoe goes berserkus autisticus on her blog.

Of course that byword for humanitarianism Nora Kirkwood expresses the oh-so-compassionate concern that I am actually ‘harming myself’ in some unspecified way, by writing this.

Can I clear this one up for once and for all folks?

WORDS OF ONE SYLLABLE FOR THE INTELLECTUALLY AND CREATIVELY CHALLENGED.

This is what’s known as a creative outlet Nora. You’ll find that when close people refuse all communication, you need to reach out to the wider world. Which is why if you genuinely want my equals-baiting to stop, it’s somewhat self-defeating to invoke the Law to prevent me texting my ex-partner of eleven years.

I can’t help thinking you are drawn irresistibly to read my pearls. You want to squeeze me until the pips squeak, as horrified, petrified and hypnotised by turns, you peruse my prose like rabbits caught in the headlights.

No one forced you to expel me from your ranks and then make an enemy of me.

Ah well folks. Enough already. Comments please! First sign of madness is talking to yourself, and 161 views on my stats means someone somewhere is reading this. Then deciding they can’t be arsed to comment.

Where did I go wrong, gentle reader? Where?

Oh and if anyone out there knows a good (and cheap) web designer, let me know.

What I want is an interactive forum. I’m bored to the back teeth with talking to myself. X

Clashing Ideologies

But Angela Kinn (nee Salway), Nora Kirkwood, Barbara Lisicki and Richard Adam not big or clever enough to admit the possibility that anyone might disagree with their ‘ethos’…not the right term, in the circumstances folks.

One of my major strengths is ideas. And I can spot an ideology when one comes at me, shaking the big stick of repression, authoritarianism, closed-mindedness and ‘inability to listen to or learn from anyone else’!

The metal hand in the proverbial woollen glove, folks. In the case of this crew, probably a fluffy white mitten if I’m not mistaken. They would have you think they are selfless, saintly and generally gorgeous. Those are always the worst sort. So many naive types get taken in.

Let’s face it I was taken in myself for a while. It was no accident they kept me on the sidelines and didn’t admit me to their closed ‘loop’ when they were preparing their shoddy piece of work.

Was it thirty thousand pounds you stole from Haringey Council to pay yourselves for this bit of old rope, Equals?

Haringey? You were robbed. And Gavin Eastley was their aider and abettor. He gave them the go-ahead, the red light. Recognised the kindred spirits in these folk who harbour a deep belief that mental health problems actually genuinely render you sub-human in some way.

Look at Angela Kinn (nee Salway, never trust the type of person who changes their name when the going gets tough!) She has next to NO friends who are mental health service users. There were just three people she was going to maintain contact with when she moved from Haringey to Soho to be with her esteemed husband. Two of those were me and my close friend Jim. Dumped, I think it’s safe to say, huh Angela?

The other one didn’t even want to attend your wedding.

Instead of remembering her roots as a service user Angela has chosen to cleave to an unrecovered addict who by his own admission, has no mental health problems except what was triggered by the excessive use of narcotics. In her work her desire NOT to work alongside other mental health service users is abundantly clear. Happy to boss them about or patronise them, eh Ange? Not happy to listen to or learn from them.

Ange, what your best friend wouldn’t tell you, but will now? You are not popular with service users, love! They see you coming a mile off. You’ve succeeded in making many enemies in this borough but sadly, not many friends … despite your desperate penchant for people pleasing.

Sadly you cannot count on other people being as silly as you. You had ideas way above your station in life Angela. You were as grandiose as a beribboned parcel of peacocks. I heard you with my own shell-likes as you expanded on your grand plans for world domination…starting with Haringey.

I for one am glad you’ve left. Some people light up a room on leaving it and you are one of those Angela.

Equals? You ARE the weakest link, goodbye.

X

Not Disabled

Differently abled.

I told you, Equals. I told you. When on your course you asked everyone to go around saying a few words about themselves?

Remember what I said? It did not include ‘bipolar’. That is not an intrinsic part of my identity. Nor is being supposedly ‘disabled’ either in the eyes of society or in any other way.

As regretfully you have not shown a notable capacity for ‘listening’ and ‘learning’ from others, I will tell you what I said.

I am artistic. Quite academic. And I believe that being ‘at rock bottom’ in life can confer a certain strength.

Didn’t like the sound of that did you, truthfully, Angela, Nora, Barbara?

Didn’t it dovetail sufficiently with the ‘firm’ victim mentality? Did you feel a little threatened by someone who doesn’t choose to see herself as ‘less than’ or ‘a victim’ just by virtue of having a diagnosis?

For the millionth time Nora, I don’t want or need your or anyone else’s patronisation or pity!

Truth is, I found your course and the attitude and ideology displayed within it fundamentally offensive and insulting to people with mental health problems.

Not to mention getting thrown out, ostracised, demonised, ignored and turned on by my own partner and close friend! (Sorry folks. Stuck record time!)

You and Barbara, Nora, will probably never be free of your physical ‘disabilities’. My case is different. Making a full recovery remains a distinct possibility. Mental health is not a fixed quantity. I see it as a process, as a gift, a blessing as well as a curse, a journey.

I approach it creatively. Intelligently. I look at it from every possible angle. Learn from it and about it. It takes me on a journey into the Self.

Having a mental health condition is in some ways even a privilege. It has given me a freedom from the economic imperative to earn a living, and plenty of time to develop my own talents.

I will never be ‘conventional’. Never be ‘normal’. Never be ‘a conformist’. Nor do I want to be. (You don’t say, Zoe!)

Your course, Equals, was all about encouraging us to believe ourselves ‘equal’ to the conformists of this world.

Not an outcome I have ever sought or that I will be seeking any time soon.

I’m not ‘less than’ anyone, by having a mental health vulnerability. I don’t need people like you, Equals, to convince me of that.

Go away and convince yourselves first, before you try to shove and project your own pitifully low self-esteem onto me or any of my friends!

Yeah, you surely do have ‘a lotta nerve, to say you are my friends’, Equals!

And Gavin? Look to YOUR self and YOUR attitudes too. To be taken in by this ‘cowgirl’ ‘firm’ of inadequates posing as Champions of Social Inclusion Extraordinaire!

Their veneer of professionalism was paper-thin. But it ticked too many boxes for you to turn down, didn’t it Gavin?

Disgraceful.

And as for you, Richard…

One question. Would it kill you, or be deleterious to your mental health in some way, to email your ex-girlfriend of eleven years???

If so I would suggest you are in dire need of some honest self-reflection. Because your behaviour recently is odd by any standards, even your own.

You phone the police. Then are allegedly rather taken aback when they arrive on your doorstep wanting a statement. You are majorly put on the spot having to find something credible to say to them. You waste copious amounts of police time with what is essentially a paranoid delusion. That you or your family or your mental health are in some way endangered by my text!!! Then you tell Jim you are ‘worried’ about me. As well you might be, knowing as you do my well-founded fear of the police.

But can you put yourself in my shoes for one moment? Apparently not. You don’t SEE the vulnerability. The isolation. The trauma of being revisited by the police in my home, where, unlike you, I have NO SUPPORT WHATEVER.

Do you like what you see when you look in the mirror these days Richard?

My mother is pretty shocked by what you did. It certainly represents a new low. You will also have to account to J for it, if you haven’t already.

It seems that in your book, it is only I who have to account for my actions. You, Angela, Barbara, Nora…exempt from the Law of Karma or the need for any kind of accountability whatsoever.

How so, Richard, how so?

For shame. Z

Grrrrrrr!

I am Woman, hear me roar!

It’s been a creative coupla days. Soul Collage at Stephen W’s Creative Space yesterday. Absolutely loved that.

Razz Writing Workshop  today. That feels entirely safe, friendly and accepting.

See Equals? You actually are the ONLY ‘trainers’, facilitators, teachers or whatever EVER to feel the need to exclude Zoe!

Usually people are only too happy to hear my views, and my contributions are valued. Even at ‘your own’ DRA Adam, let’s face it, I am way more popular than you.

The mistake you make is thinking people are silly. You may be. But people with mental health issues are often highly intuitive and have a radar for sussing who is genuine and who isn’t.

Come to the meeting on Monday by all means Adam. But don’t come thinking you will once again get away with blue murder, the way you did in the summer when your wife co-opted and manipulated you into attacking me verbally in a WHOLLY inappropriate way.

The truth is Adam. Neither of you is a grown-up. Neither of you apparently capable of taking an honest and fearless inventory of yourselves. And by God, it shows.

I told you Adam. The party’s over. You don’t own DRA. You actually have less justification for being there than pretty much anyone else I can think of. You have not lived with a severe and enduring mental illness, at any stage. By your own admission Adam your ‘bipolar’ was entirely drug-induced.

Certain overblown egos are sorely in need of deflation Adam.

I’m sorry you are so fragile and have such low self-esteem that you feel the need to control and take glory that isn’t yours. But that ain’t my problem, Adam.

I know what you will say already. That I shouldn’t write about a confidential Fellowship on my blog. You’ll do your best to make some of the mud stick. Do your worst. This is my outlet. No one will take it from me. If you and Angela had behaved yourself as befits people supposedly ‘in recovery’ I would not have been forced to do this in the first place.

You have called me ‘self-righteous’. On your bike Adam. Your wife is a cowardly and manipulative liar who you have watched violate every known law of friendship regarding me. And you appear to have enabled and supported her to do it Adam.

You both badly need CoDA. I spotted it almost from Day One. A couple of dishonest control freaks with a morality bypass can cause way more havoc than just one!

Think on it Adam. How well do you know your wife? As well as I do? I think not. You are too enmeshed with each other, and can no longer see the wood for the trees.

Is this love? No. She has used you shamelessly. You are leading each other in ever decreasing circles, but your Nemesis has finally arrived.

Rising from the ashes of my shattered mental and physical health. Caused in part by you and your wife’s appalling behaviour Adam. An apology on the phone ain’t gonna cut it when it comes to the eighth step Adam. Making amends to those we had harmed.

So on Monday Adam. I suggest that rather than committing further offences against me which you’ll have to account for later, that you start the process of making those same amends. It will save time and energy. And that you encourage your wife to start taking her own inventory instead of viciously, jealously and venomously hitting out at someone she once purported to love.

You know it makes sense.

Z

Haters

…can make like bees with no stingers…(Eminem).

And it’s probably safe to say, folks, that if you find yourself the subject of a ‘hate campaign’, you’re actually getting something right.

‘Only the best are bullied’. (Tim Field).

‘I pray for patience but they make me want to melt their face away’. (Jay Zee).

Have a heart folks! I’m human!

‘Forgiveness is fine/forgiveness divine/revenge is more – human’. (James).

Let there be no further doubt. I have roundly trounced Equals at their own bullying game.

Though as I said before. I couldn’t have done it without you, gentle reader. Could not have done it without you, good people of Haringey. Without you Stephen. Without you, Higher Power.

And watch this space for the next thrilling account of Zoe’s face-off with The Forces of Evil. Dispatches from here on the front line. This will occur at the Group Conscience at Monday’s DRA meeting. Whether you choose to come or not Adam. Your and Angela’s Reign of Terror, Control and Patronisation is drawing to a close.

Lesson? Don’t take on Zoe in the Year of the Tiger. The tigress will scrap to the death for her cubs. The tiger is solitary, powerful and The Striped Protector. And you ain’t got a tiger in your tank.

Demonised? Moi?

Richard Adam, my ex. Cannot see anything remotely ‘demonising’ about making a complaint against me for harassment forbidding all text or phone contact.

Ahh bless!

Folks, I’ve not been demonised. Not once. It’s just that an organisation of four people find me too scary to meet, email or talk to.

They love me, folks. Not once have they badmouthed me behind my back or to my face! Not once have they spread scurrilous lies about me, not once. And not once have they been ‘afraid, very afraid’… of words on a screen.

The need to inhabit ‘La La Land’ is catching folks. If you are vulnerable and easily led, be careful who you work with. If you lack a critical faculty, but prefer to be led around by the nose, beware!

The daftest thing in all of this is that my two close associates Richard and Angela love me very much.  More than either will ever love Nora Kirkwood or Barbara Lisicki.

And it can only be a matter of time before our paths will cross again. In the meantime, like lovers of horror films, they choose to spook themselves.

I’m partial myself to a good supernatural thriller.

X

Love, Peace and Harmony…

…Maybe in the next world. (Morrissey)

And can it be any kind of surprise to anyone, dear reader, that The Pigs would close ranks with a bully against a vulnerable individual?

Uh uh.

Running to the cops is usually the recourse of the silly.

I have never yet invoked the help of the ‘strong arm of the authoritarian state’ against anyone. Let alone a vulnerable sufferer of mental health problems.

Surely nothing can illustrate better how deeply these champions of social inclusion extraordinaire, Equals Training, have lost the plot?

I love you Equals, I honestly do! You have become an integral part of my life. I live, breathe, eat, sleep and dream you every day of my sweet life.

You have taught me so much.

Empowered me so generously.

And today is the Day of the Big Thaw, following the Deep Freeze.

I’m skipping Codependents Anonymous, which I have to say would benefit Angela, Richard and co so much more than myself.

Later on I have Razz’ Writing Workshop in Swiss Cottage.

Sitting here draped none-too-sexily in a bath towel. Joined The Great Satan Facebook purely in order to pester my enemies to be my friends!

I hate Facebook. Loathe Twitter. The clue is in the names. Social Networking for the Deeply Mediocre.

Not you, Stephen Fry, not you.

Blessings. Z X

I Fought the Law and the Law Won

Thanks for your comments Katy. It’s just a terrible shame that Equals are seemingly bent on self-destruction, or failing that, prompting and goading Zoe into doing it for them!

I’ve given them so many chances! So many. I didn’t name them for ages and ages. Asked until I was braindead from repeating myself, for meeting and/or dialogue.

Same with Gavin Eastley.

Even if the cops come and confiscate my computer (as my Care Coordinator told me they threatened to do) it ain’t gonna stop me exercising my right to free speech. I will simply go to an internet caff or Gavin’s own Day Centre, and blog from there!

I honestly hate and despise The Pigs with a grim vengeance. Hard-wired into me I’m afraid, after being strong armed around by them so many times when I was ill. Have never broken the law either…except when I broke someone’s window while being inadequately ‘cared for’ by the Home Treatment Team.

So no, I certainly don’t want a repeat performance with them.

Just a frightful shame that so-called professionals can’t be accountable for their glaring errors, but prefer to frighten themselves delirious with thoughts of me…

Thanks for caring and thanks for worrying though. You are not the only friend who has expressed similar concerns, and they are valid.

Heaps love. Z X

Threatened With Arrest…

…that’s some blog Zoe!

My Care Coordinator was on the phone to me just now warning me to send no further email to Nora, Angela et al. There’s some entirely fictitious ‘order’ forbidding my salvos!

Please note Equals. I have received NO SUCH THREAT regarding email to you, or blogging. The policeman who tried to fuck up my day on Wednesday only mentioned Richard Adam.

For God’s sake Equals. Can’t you even get ‘state repression’ right?

My caring and fluffy suggestion to you would be that if you want demons, go and check your reflections in the mirror?

You’ll find none here. The exorcism was successful. I am now going from strength to strength, and enjoying every minute!

I have many many friends, Equals. I make more every day. Your pity for me, Nora, was misplaced. Pity yourself…someone who’s really deserving huh!

HUN love me. Stephen W and Polar Bear love me. I have a finger in Sustainable Haringey, a toe in the Fellowships and Razz’s Writing Workshop. I’ve not even got myself banned from the Clarendon and I have many friends there too. Do you honestly believe I need the likes of you?

But I guess that’s one reason why you chose to bully me in the first place. You were threatened…not just by my ideas, but by my popularity!

410 hits here yesterday Equals! Your public profile at an all-time high probably, but for all the wrong reasons.

Angela, I look forward to seeing you at our DRA Group Conscience on Monday. Like you would go within ten miles of it, hon! Adam’ll be there to take the flak for you, won’t he, eh?

Blind leading the blind. Morally bankrupt leading unrecovered addict.

I feel for you. I honestly do.

Blessings. Z X

Yeccchh!

That was horrible. But I wanted you guys to see it.

To update you. Re the ‘close friend’ and ‘erstwhile partner’. Both of them showing signs of being in an advanced state of paranoia regarding me.

The close friend concerned could not summon up the courage even to meet with a mutual friend of ours in Muswell Hill…in case they bumped into me!

The partner wasted considerable amounts of police time by making a complaint of harassment, and was then allegedly rather startled when they took it seriously and showed up on his doorstep wanting a statement!

I would love to have seen his face when he had to cobble together anything sensible in the way of allegations!

You gotta love these people, folks. You gotta!

Sorry for the two ‘Nora Poison Documents’. They make me feel unclean just reading them, but someone somewhere might find them instructive or amusing, who knows?

Lots love, blessings and preferably an exorcism!

Better Out Than In

Thank you for your candid email. The cruellest outcome of this affair was the loss of your close and loved friends. I am sorry that I can’t shed any light on why this had to happen as neither of them told me much about any of this. From my position, their external personal relationships weren’t any of my business nor any other team member’s business, and I expressed to both of them that their friendship with you should not impact on Equals nor vice versa. The antipathy you expressed to us and to others about the business is likely one cause but perhaps other factors were also at play.

Exhausting to even read this rubbish I think you’ll agree folks.

And what she really can’t get her poor befuddled head around is why ANYONE…even an organisation’s chosen scapegoat, demon and hate figure, should ever feel any antipathy to these delightful, fluffy little darlings Equals. This saviour of the meek and helpless. This doughty trio of crusaders for the Cause. This selfless, saintly band of feisty fighters in the Battle for Social Inclusion!

Pass the Sick Bag

Roasting Nora  on the spit of her own email! Is ‘satirising people’s bullshit’ a criminal offence yet? It can only be a matter of time…

Hello Zoe.

Firstly, I want to thank you for your email. It would not have been an easy one to write and I do admire your determination to draw a close to the issue that arose between us in February. So, well done.

The lady says ‘well done, Zoe, for bearing up under the weight of demonisation from me and my cohorts!’ Gosh, thanks Nora! She says she admires me. Wow!

I did not always approve of the methods that you chose to use in previous correspondence because I feared that they were hurting you more than they would ever hurt the Equals business.

Approve? When did I last seek YOUR approval Nora?

Methods. By that you mean ‘analysing and dissecting you in a superb prose style till you disappear’, I suppose? Methods, indeed.

Still cherish that fond belief (that I’m somehow harming myself) Nora? In Shakespeare’s time ‘fond’ also meant ‘mad, or feeble-minded’.

I am aware that your health has been badly affected by this year’s events and if I am responsible for any part of that then I am very sorry – I did nothing intentionally to hurt you, nor would I ever do so.

Through discussions with Wayne and the Clarenden management, I did discuss the possibility of meeting with you in mediation, but felt that little could be gained in doing so whilst you were still so very angry; my genuine feeling was that to meet with you would increase your distress. Likewise, to respond to any of your emails during that period would not have achieved anything positive, and could only have hurt you more.

Unbe friggin’ lievable.

I am pleased that you are working with Stephen Wish and the Polar Bear Community. Stephen is a remarkable man. I truly hope that your involvement on his course and working with the Polar Community helps your health stabilise, that you recapture your self esteem and begin to recognise again that your value as a person is high.  Your intelligence ought to be used for creativity rather than destruction.

Nora, you implied in your second para that there is absolutely nothing I can do to hurt the Equals business. (Delusions of invincibility, anyone?) So where has this paranoid ideation about ‘destruction’ suddenly come from, honey?

Re my worth as an individual and your hopes for my self-esteem. Patronisation alert code red!!!

As an individual I would be prepared to meet with you to help the next part of your recovery.

Big, brave and oh-so-generous, folks! Does she believe she has magic healing powers now?

Stephen is probably the best person to facilitate this if you do want to go ahead as he is a person we both trust. Please feel free to pass this email to Stephen if you wish to do so.

You have always had my best wishes and my prayers, Nora

What does your ‘God’ think of your behaviour to me for the last ten months Nora? Does He sanction it?

Nora Kirkwood
Equals Training CIC
Selby Centre Pavilion
Selby Road, N17 8JL
Tel: 020-8885-0990

Please see our website – www.equalstraining.com

The lady’s all heart, ain’t she folks?

Ooh dear. Careful Zoe. Sarcasm now a crime against the state remember.

Ahahahahahahahaha!

You gotta love this folks. Just googled Angela Salway’s name along with Haringey. What came up? The esteemed lady’s many Trojan efforts to save the poor, marginalised service user from him or herself along with her merry band of Equals?

Uh uh. I think you’ve guessed it. Ange’s most public profile now consists of her regular appearances on my blog!

OK guys. Admitttedly it would just be plain mean and vindictive of me to gloat on this occasion. If it hadn’t been for the little matter of the bullying, ostracisation, vilification, and so forth!

Y’know what? Real work doesn’t all consist of ‘havin’ a laugh’ as you tell us on your very own (lousy) website!

Real work is not ‘hangin’ out with your mates, brown nosing your way around the echelons of power and seeing how many naive and credulous commissioners and service providers you can convince of your amazin’ capabilities!’

Real work is not about people-pleasing till your eyes pop out, spewing vitriol on your best friend behind her back and generally spreading chaos and confusion wherever you go!

Real work is not all fun and games Nora and Angela!

And just a very special ‘dig’ for Nora Kirkwood. You’re damn right I don’t like you. We have nothing whatever in common … including mental health. I took a dislike to you almost on sight Nora. And had no reason later on to revise my impression.

I prefer Barbara to you, Nora! You committed the cardinal sin of managing to both bully AND patronise me. And out of those two, I prefer to be bullied!

But no doubt in the La La Land that you inhabit you still believe I am ‘damaging myself more than I could ever hurt the Equals Business’ by writing this, eh Nora?

Ah, what do you know. Nothing about creativity for starters. Nothing about mental health and how it affects people, for seconds.

And hobble on your stick as much as you like Nora, I STILL won’t feel sorry for you. You showed not one iota of compassion or human feeling for me when you first excluded then ignored your ex-line-managee who helped you, in good faith, to recruit for your Godawful course!

Read my lips Nora. I FEEL NOTHING. GO TO HELL IN A HANDCART.

Angela will always be dear to me. Barbara I have some peculiar respect for. But you Nora?

Nuff said.