Am I Still Ill?

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.