Am I Still Ill?

Neighbour Related Guilt

Oh blimey.

For the second time my lovely Italian architect next door neighbour Paolo asked me, very kindly and amicably, to keep my music  and other noise down at night, cos he has a young child and an epileptic wife. I feel awful folks! I really do!

I also feel slightly resentful. Not of my lovely neighbours. But of my situation. I live in a tiny terraced council house, and the walls, it seems, are thinner than I imagined…

And I just don’t have the right kind of lifestyle for this kind of cheek-by-jowl living.

When I am here, with M, we wake up at odd hours and we want and need music. We also have quite noisy sex and laugh a lot. Oh dear. There we go. Well, why beat about the bush (oh, please!)

What can we do, folks, what can we do? I’m a naturally very considerate person, I have a rock and roll lifestyle, and I just don’t know how long I can continue to sustain this suburban existence, or reconcile these blatant contradictions…

Paolo says ‘it’s a worry’. Well, their worry has now become mine…

Thank God anyway, they are lovely people and have never given me any real grief. But aww, the guilt, the guilt folks!

Also, I guess I’ve been at Richard’s most nights in any case.

I live for my music. I need it like the air I breathe. Suggestions on a postcard please…

Outward expansion is pretty much an inevitability…realistically. I used to think I would never move out of this place. That could change. But not while I continue to have to subsist on State Benefits.

Wtf can I do?

Kisses. Z X

God in Da House

Hiya. I’m at peace. Peace on the bus. Peace at my ex Richard’s place. Peace on the streets. Peace in the caff. Peace in my own pad (tho’ it can still get a little scary at times…)

Wiley (Grime MC from Bow E3) was stabbed 21 times. I have never been so much as properly mugged here on the London streets, despite my so-called ‘mental illness’ and ‘vulnerability’.

I’ve been lucky. I don’t attract violence. I am not nearly as vulnerable as I look. When manic and walking the streets I exuded fearlessness and I imagine that would have repelled would-be attackers.

I’m still virtually fearless. It probably helps that, like Biggie Smalls (rapper from Brooklyn), I’m ‘ready to die’ at any given time. I burn with passion and determination.

Doesn’t mean I don’t know what fear is, or doubt. They like to pay multiple return visits to my mind on a fairly regular basis, even on my best days. I acknowledge the unhelpful thought, recognise it for the ghost it is and let go of it.

Listening to Radiohead ‘Rainbows’. Had breakfast at home. House trying to warm up on this very cold day. M on his way round.

I have the best of all possible worlds.

Lots love, Zoe X

Happy

Hi from Cloud Ten. No more Ground Control (God, that was a drag…)

Yeah gentle reader. I’m back in my own personal comfort zone. Living (at least partly) in my own house. My friend M and I spending lots of quality time and he’s great fun to be with, we make each other laugh. We have loads in common, in fact sometimes it’s like looking into a mirror, albeit a slightly dim, misty one…

I slept round my ex’s house last night because he is the best natural sedative I know of. My nightly ritual over there is to hit the couch at about nine pm, and have him put the quilt over me. It’s just like magic. I enter unconsciousness. A deep sleep with not a dream in sight. The sleep (dare I say it reader?) of the just. Bless him and bless his family. M and I more likely to go to sleep at odd hours and wake up at two in the morning.

R (my ex) regularly nags me to get back to a more ‘normal’ way of living. All very well except I am not altogether sure what ‘normal’ is for me…

So I awake very refreshed. This morning I made it up to Muswell Hill to get some more money out at Santander (my card got swallowed by a machine and is being replaced). Then I got some cat and human supplies at M and S. Bought a new cafetiere to replace the fucked up one (so far so middle class huh?) Some soya yoghurt, soya milk and soya cream. Natural oestrogens, don’tcha know!

Good old middle class Muswell Hill. People are so polite up there. It must be the mountain air.

Then heavy laden with bags I stopped off at a coffee shop in Priory Road. Phoned up M, and he met me there so I didn’t have to struggle home alone with the bags.

I went to DRA yesterday. When I shared I pointed out that I no longer require any kind of psychiatric medication. Hold the front page! The ‘complete and total recovery from a so-called severe and enduring mental illness’ which I predicted not so long ago on this very blog, is now, for me, a reality.

I do however have to notice that not everyone is similarly fortunate and many others continue to suffer the effects of depression, anxiety, psychosis, so-called personality disorder and many other conditions.

I try not to piss them off too much by banging on about how happy and free I now feel, but rather, just try and transmit the hope that they too can recover.

My ‘haters’ don’t bother me so much any more. I simply take the Wiley (Grime MC) approach. ‘To all those who don’t like me, goodbye’, or words to that effect. I have learned a clear sense of boundaries and refuse any contact with those who have some kind of beef. I don’t need that, or them. I’m not out to be everyone’s friend, and I long ago gave up people pleasing as a bad job.

There is no question whatsoever in my mind that I have divine intervention to thank for this outcome. My intense suffering also played a role.

Nice for me to see my stats rise again, however mysteriously. It makes me feel it’s worthwhile to go on rattling out my mundane accounts of Life in the Zo Lane.

Lots love Peeps. Z XXX

The Site Stats Mystery

‘Tis strange, ’tis passing strange, that suddenly my stats recovered to the tune of 90 and then 209 hits in a day when I hadn’t even been posting much…

Who’s reading? Whoever you are, you’re of few words.

I’m at my cold, unloved house waiting for the bath water to heat up and for a friend to come around to amuse me for a few hours until the evening approaches again with the promise of some really good quality sleep over at Richard’s place…

And financially life’s a bit of a struggle. I’m on a strict budget…just food and fags really, and still not in a fit state to shop or cook…

It mildly annoys me that I have no means of making any bloody money but instead have to depend on the State Handout.

Listening to Public Enemy. Not the ideal choice for a chilled Sunday morning feel I hear you say?

But as Dizzee says ‘a heavy bass line is my kind of silence’…

At the very least I can get myself clean, wash some clothes, freshen up and look vaguely decent. Grunge isn’t really my look…

Yesterday I managed to get up to Swiss Cottage to my friend Razz’s Poetry Writing Workshop. We did an exercise where we had to look at books of art (I chose Edvard Munch) and write in some kind of peculiar form based on a pattern of two syllables, four syllables, six, eight and then two.

I like this kind of strict discipline and minimalist approach. I’ve always been naturally concise. I enjoyed looking at Munch’s reenactment of the Garden of Eden and Jealousy.

Afterwards we went for coffee and the others had a meal. It was good to see them, especially Razz who has lost a shedload of weight as a result of bad teeth! Every cloud … He looks ten years younger.

Hope today won’t be the usual dead Sunday loss.

Love Z X

Update

Hi Peeps. Since my Romanian house guests left (all three of us having gone stark raving mad simultaneously) I haven’t wanted to live in my house any more. It’s full of ghosts and unwelcome memories.

I have to go there at least every other day to have a bath and feed the cats. Even this is a struggle.

Thank God for Richard, my much-maligned ex. He’s been an absolute rock. Keep tight with your exes folks! You never know when they’ll come in handy…

I stay round his house at night with his long-suffering family (ex-wife and fifteen year old boy).

What did brighten up my world since we last spoke was my Romanians coming back and us mutually declaring that there were no hard feelings, that we were all of us out of order and that things that were said should not be taken to heart or dwelt upon.

They are living in a hostel now, and having (ironically) much better sleep as a result. We are all well rested. We are all still intact. L in particular is looking great and she smiled at me in a way I hadn’t seen since we first became friends.

This was an enormous relief since there was some doubt in my mind as to whether their long-term plans were even to stay in London.

They are shaping up to be (almost) as weird as I am, and this does present challenges for our three-way relationship. At the moment we can’t even meet without someone else present as some sort of ‘mediator’. Which is OK with me, tho’ a little limiting.

I don’t do well in twos. I do better in threes but not in this particular case it seems. More I am not permitted to say.

I love both of these individuals dearly. They mean more to me than I can ever say.

I just hope both of them are fully cognizant of this and won’t use it to take advantage.

In the meantime while they go about their hugely important ‘business’ I have very little to do and a lot of time on my hands which can weigh heavily.

Since our experiences together I haven’t felt the same person that I was before. Can’t live in my own house. Can’t cook or shop for food. Can’t get very interested in any kind of voluintary work. Don’t actually see the (many) friends I know intellectually that I have.

Fortunately Richard and another guy I have known for fifteen years stepped into the breach. M does the ‘day shift’ babysitting Zoe, and R puts up with me at night.

I’m very lucky to have these two amazing guys in my life, even though one of them does represent a financial drain which the other considers wholly unacceptable.

The trouble with me is … I am basically a monogamous, one-man woman who nevertheless is too heavy a burden for one man to carry!

So I have to try and spread the load so to speak.

These men who think they are enough to satisfy two or more women make me laugh.

I’m not unhappy or happy. I’m sleeping really well, I laugh a lot when I’m with my people, and go silent and sulky when I’m on my own.

I hope you’re all well folks and enjoying restful sleep when you can. It is truly the most healing thing of all…

Home Treatment Team seem to have given up on me as I am never at my house when they come. No one could say I’m sectionable. I’m sleeping all the hours God sends without medication. I hardly even rap or sing on the bus any more. I am the very model of a modern Major General…

Heaps love. X

Ground Control to Major Tom…

Aaaargh. Blecchh. Etc etc. I have little more to add. I feel all used up and emptied out. Where my body finds the strength to keep breathing, sleeping, eating and defecating I honestly don’t know. But I guess it has little alternative.

People I can now count on now number two. One of them requires constant payment, and not in kind. A third possible one is actually a dog.

I am suffering massive alienation from the human race. Even the sight of them all makes me feel physically sick. I cannot chat. Cannot laugh smile or joke. I am at the end of my rope.

Home Treatment Team came this morning, like a pair of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Unwanted and unannounced. Nothing anybody can do, except make my situation worse by continually giving unwanted unsought and unhelpful advice.

My beloved house guests are gone. They left a fortnight ago and will respond to no text, email or phone call from me.

Anyone detect a pattern here? Remember the bullying by my close friend and partner of last year, and how they, likewise, would respond to no email, text or call? The relatively recent period when I was actually under threat of arrest by the Old Bill if I dared to send my ex a text?

Well OK. I now not only text my ex and call him but also stay round his house at night because I can’t bear to be on my own any more in my own house…

But people are unanimous about one thing. This is all about me. Me and my expectations. Me and my behaviour (which alienates people). Me and my inability to communicate effectively and in a way that removes barriers. Me me me me me me me me me me me me me me me…

Can everyone be wrong? And if so do I have your permission to check out of an existence I clearly have no aptitude for? And while we’re at it, can my son check out too cause he’s having no more luck with y’all than I am?

X

Hurting

Hurting because my son is having yet another bad time through no fault of his own. A scenario I know only too well. And become less, not more tolerant of as time goes on.

His foster parents are ganging up against him. Accusing him of manipulation and playing mind games. Not understanding what HE is going through. Trying to make out that he has a better life than they do. Not true.

Have done pretty much all I can for today. Contacted all interested parties. Spoken to my Mum and the foster mum and the supervising social worker.

Jasper gives the placement about a month. I want him home. Further foster placements are not the answer. Frying pans and fires come to mind. These are good people. Non-conformists, with creativity and a sense of humour. But sometimes even those of goodwill can fail us when push comes to shove.

I know this scenario inside out and back to front. I have been falsely accused of so many things it’s made me dizzy and nauseous. People have some kind of demon inside themselves which they have to inflict on those who are strong enough to take it. I am innocent as charged, and so is my son.

Was also rudely interrupted while washing my hair this morning by a contingent of six mental health professionals and police. They ‘negotiated’ (read ‘coerced’) an agreement with me that I would ‘work with’ the Home Treatment Team. Something I was not in a position to freely choose, as the threat of hospital was openly held over my head.

‘Work with’? For whose benefit? Certainly not mine. Will they ‘make me better’? No. Will I teach them how to look after mentally ill people more effectively? Probably. But that’s not my beef. My beef is me myself and I. Looking after me and mine. Not showing the professionals how they should be doing their job.

In order not to be dragged off by the strong arm of the authoritarian state to the hell hole that is Downhills Ward, St Ann’s Hospital, for another bout of serious bullying, I had to agree to be patronised and intruded on in my own home and fed medication that my body will probably reject in no uncertain terms.

If you think that is all fine and dandy? You’re way madder than I’ll ever be.

I want my son home. He can protect me and I, him. We understand each other. My son has not had a happy day for two years and nor have I. I wouldn’t know a ‘happy day’ if it jumped up and slapped me in the face, which, knowing my luck, it probably will.