Had a pretty awful time last week, so decided to get out for a bit over the weekend. Went to meet a good friend of mine, and it started ok, but then got that horrible disconnected feeling. Sitting in pub with my mate, and two other people I kind of knew, and just felt totally separate. Everyone stayed up until about 5am drinking and talking, by which time I was starting to feel really crappy. Slept for a few hours, and woke up feeling even more crappy.

Trying not to let the shit stuff control my life, but it’s definitely taken over at the moment. Really feels like I’m separate from everything else, and can’t get any enjoyment from anything. Starting to get a bit desperate because all the usual stuff that helps is making any difference now. Just totally flatlined.

Explaining etc.

First post on new blog. I tend to swear a lot. And rant a lot… sometimes. Sorry if this causes offense.

Been having a shit time of it recently. Especially since sunday. Very bad depression, and dissociative symptoms. Last night I blacked out badly, and my ex-wife tells me that I was just staring for about 20 minutes. Not good. And today I just feel totally empty. Been working since 9am, but don’t seem to have done anything (I work from home most days). Just totally disconnected from everything and everyone.

I just read a post on someone’s blog (here), about their mother not believing in mental illness. What fucks me up the most is those people that seem to have some kind of multi-tiered acceptance of mental illness. They kind of accept/understand it on an almost theoretical level, if you know what I mean. The kind of “I know you have BPD, but do you have to be so moody and erratic” comments, that instantly cause a dramatic loss of faith in everyone and everything. It’s so disheartening. My boss has asthma. The last time I had to go into hospital he asked me why I couldn’t just be stronger (sic) and get over it. I told him that such a comment was equivalent to someone telling him to ‘just breathe properly” when he had an asthma attack. He of course didn’t get the analogy. And dropped the beautiful line as to how asthma is a ‘real’ condition… i.e. not imagined…. just fucking sickening.

Everyone I’ve met who has some form of mental illness has to deal with this. As if it weren’t bad enough to have to cope with the effects of the condition, they are surrounded by people who, in the main, have an underpinning of doubt as to the legitimacy of the condition. There’s some (often) unspoken resentment than the person just can’t get ‘over it’. Just consider the impact of this on conditions where the issue of self-identity is incredibly fragile… by internalising these reactions, even if it’s on a subtle non-verbal level, they are left with a feeling of deficiency. That if they were a better person they wouldn’t inflict themselves on others..

As neuroscience begins identifying more and more quantifiable correlates with psychiatric diagnoses, you’d think there’d be a shift in this prevailing attitude, however minor. But it seems the belief that these things are ‘all in the mind’ is just too firmly entrenched in the populace.