Sleep

Thanks to fluoxetine, sleeping comes pretty easily. Waking, however, doesn't. Nowadays, I'm not fully energised until I have at least twelve hours of sleep. Living with ongoing depression, of course, doesn't do you any favours. I've been having recurring themes in my dreams that have gone on for over a year now. I wake up screaming or thrashing. Lately, most of these dreams have been gratuitously violent. There was one dream I had last year when I was watching infants being put in a vat of boiling water and watching them burn, struggle, and drown, their precious skins bubbling. Another involved me having to kill a crazy old woman who was chasing me with a blunt axe. Eventually, I smashed her head against the pavement outside my house and carried her brain matter indoors.

My grandmother is the true inspiration for my liking for dream interpretations. She's not too big on the fortune-telling side of dreams (I'm not either) but she tends to focus on a recurring theme and how the dreamer was feeling at the time of this dream.

RECURRING THEME#1: Shark attacks. I've had this dream for a couple of years now. Probably since I watched Jaws? I don't know. I've had it for at least two years and I dream about it every so often. It's not awfully terrifying, but there's a lot of panic, scrambling, struggling and frenzy and it usually happens in a swimming pool. I never get a good look at the shark - I'm usually just told by someone at the side of the pool that it's in the water and I need to get out as quickly as possible. I personally have never found sharks that enchanting. I hate the look of their rows of teeth and big, cavernous mouths and the way their eyes do this leisurely roll when they bite their victim.

I saw on a David Attenborough programme a great white shark leaping full out of the water, jaws agape, to grab an unsuspecting seal. It was massive, huge. It spun in mid-flight and with perfect precision, caught its prey before becoming engulfed once again in the monstrous deep of the North Atlantic. In a way, it reminded me of how much I fear the sea. Paddling in the shallows at the beach is fine. I just don't allow myself to try and comprehend the gigantic ancient tempest that stretches out before me in a million azure wrinkles. How can children play so freely in the shallows of the very thing that has swallowed ships and even countries? Hello? Indonesia? Japan, anyone? To me, it's like playing at the feet of a titan. The sea is so big and so furious and people overlook its hidden dangers based on its grandness and its regal size. Why wouldn't I be afraid of it? What could be more terrifying than being completely isolated in a world of complete silence, no breath, no warmth and absolutely nothing in sight but giant green-blue emptiness?

But, hey, about 70% of the planet is covered in the bloody stuff, so I might as well get used to it.

Back to the recurring theme of my dreams. Shark attacks. Last night, I dreamed I was in a swimming pool (where the attacks usually occur) and suddenly, I was made aware that a dangerous shark had been released into the pool. As I was the only one in the pool, I was told to get out as quickly as possible. Panic filled me as I could sense the beast getting closer and more frenzied by my frantic movements and an overwhelming feeling of dread propelled me to the nearest exit. Like in all my other shark attack dreams, I only get out of the pool at the last second. In this particular dream, the shark managed to leap out of the water and onto the pool floor. I decided in the nick of time that the only way to escape was to jump onto the shark's head and to leap elsewhere. After accomplishing this, the shark somehow ended up back in the water. I was with a group of unidentified people who were talking among themselves in panicked voices "It's a great white! It's very dangerous!" But after closer inspection, I realised it wasn't a great white shark at all. It was a baby whale shark - the biggest fish in the world, and very harmless. So I said to them "No it isn't, it's a whale shark. It's not even white - it's blue! Look at the shape of its mouth and its length - it's not a great white. It's a baby whale shark." I was saying all this to very unbelieving faces.

I don't tend to go by dream interpretation websites (someone's interpretation of something may differ from someone else's) but the websites I did visit offered some interesting insights. While one website described shark attacks as the subconscious's way of signifying a fear of an upcoming event, another interpreted it as a personal fear of being hostile, aggressive and fierce - which leads generously on to my next recurring theme...

RECURRING THEME#2: Screaming at people. I've been having this dream for a shorter period of time than the others (about the last few months) but they're very regular and very emotive. In the dream, I come across a certain person who has offended or hurt me in a certain way and decide there and then that enough is enough - I'm going to give them a piece of my mind. And they just stand there and take it in their stride, almost mocking me and I'm left feeling empty, drained and humiliated. In these dreams, I feel overwhelming hostility, uncontrollable rage (not unalike to my previous childish fits of pure fury) and an overpowering desire to hurt the opposing person. It fills me up like a balloon about to burst. I scream, rant, shout, roar, even jump up and down in anger, flail my fists, completely let loose on this person or group of people who, in this moment, I hate, despise and loathe with all my life. Often I've woken up during these dreams because I'm thrashing about in bed too much.

My immediate response is to relate this to my daily disgust at certain people in my life - people who have force-fed me their shit and cover each others' arses. People I un-Christianly detest and spurn as I would spurn a rabid dog.

People these dreams have included:

Those bitches from the musical theatre company I used to associate myself with. In girl world, there are some who start out nice, and then stab you in the back. These were those girls. Nothing could stop the rage from the very core of my soul tearing through my lungs and lashing out at these skanks through truckloads of profanity and foaming-at-the-mouth-and-so-blinded-by-fury babble.

The random, makeup-clad hos from school who made fun of me. An obvious choice.

My youth leader. An absolute wanker. I know full well that I am not the easiest person to deal with, but if he's going to call himself a Christian youth leader, I think he should know full well more than anyone that people in the church with mental health issues are meant to be helped, not shunned. I told this man once again through floods of tears that my terrible, terrible fear of certain things on television has driven me to the brink of insanity. This is the same problem I have been dealing with for my whole life. I was helpless, angry with God and completely sick of "setting myself up for shit". He, having had me in this state a couple of times before (maybe not as intense, though), must've had some idea by now what I needed to hear. His response? A blank stare coupled with (and I quote exactly) "Simple. Just don't watch TV."

I must have looked like I had just been slapped. What the fucking hell was he trying to do?! "Pat, it's really not that simple," I said. Response? "Abi, it really is." I don't know to this day why I didn't smash his fucking face in. Probably because the fucking "house of God" forbids it. Instead, I took a deep, ragged breath and told him that this is exactly the reason why if I even get so much as a glimpse of something that triggers every alarm bell in my system, I'm in the middle of the street in the dead of night, bellowing, howling and trying to split my arm wide open with a sharp pebble while crying up to heaven, demanding some sort of Godly homicide upon myself. That shut him up for a few moments before he began rambling on pointlessly about how "God challenges us" and "God wants to heal me, but only if I let him."

A week later, this fucking prick makes us all watch a movie in a youth session for the billionth time in an attempt to help us all "learn".

I grip my seat in revolt. This is not the first time this has happened. As a matter of fact, this has happened repeatedly for the past year or so. Cinema seems to be Pat's favourite way of shutting us up and preaching, regardless of the risk of setting one person into a violent psychotic episode. Privately, as soon as I begin to feel to threatened to keep still, I slip out of the door and wait out my crippling anxiety in the building's kitchen, singing to myself to distract me from intrusive thoughts and vulgar sounds that just might echo from the hallway. I'm in there for a long, long time. Nobody even checks up on me to see if I'm okay. Perhaps they haven't even noticed I'm gone. But when I finally pluck up enough courage to step back into the room once I'm sure the film is over, the group have all moved on to several more activities, having invited me into none of them and then I'm told off for "not joining in with the group".

WHAT THE FUCKING FUCKED-UP FUCK DOES THIS MOTHERFUCKER WANT FROM ME???!!!

*And breathe*

I returned once after that, and then never again. The one time I decide to return to the youth group for one last shot of getting along with their fucking cinema-preaching policies, I'm pulled aside by the youth leader and lectured once again for not being part of the group. I sit there with a plastic grin taped rigidly on my face while screaming inside "FUCKING HELL! You would have thought the way he keeps bollocking on about it I was sitting in a corner holding conversation with my GENITALS and refusing to talk to anyone else!!"

Maybe I take myself too seriously at times, but I won't lie, I'm actually not a bad youth group member. I always have something to say, I'm not presumptuous, I value other peoples' opinions, I always join in the stupid "team-building games" even if they're as fun as getting fucked in the ass by a train, I share personal stories that I feel are relevant to the subject matter and I contribute pretty well through offering prayer, reflection and insight. Furthermore, I'm one of the minor few who would rather talk about Jesus and Peter and John and how the Holy Spirit works than about fucking Justin Bieber's new single.

But no. I'm criticised for wearing black "the wrong way", wearing alleged "satanic jewelry" and though it is never declared, it is always implied that "we're not socialising with you because your suicide attempts and dyed hair means you've clearly been touched by the devil and we don't want to be contaminated."

And people wonder why I'm so cynical about the church.

Just WRITING this has gotten me absolutely FUMING. So it's no wonder why I dream about shrieking my guts out to these motherfucking posers. Just unprofessional shits of teachers, a ton of other bullies, ex-best friends, stalkers and perverts to go. Whoop-de-fucking-doo!

*...And breathe*

RECURRING THEME#3: Being forced to watch TV - or other stimuli that triggers a psychotic episode. I don't like having psychotic episodes. They're horrible, horrible, horrible and I have no control over my actions. My entire mind goes into a frenzy and before I even know it, I'm trying to throw myself into oncoming traffic or slicing my arm open with a razor (cue pink ribbon scars that never forget...((cue Smashing Pumpkins reference))). My biggest fear is having a psychotic episode. The aftermath fills me with a toxic hate for life and overwhelming shame of the horrendous things that I become in my dissociative, diabolical alter-ego. These usually end with me waking myself up (and sometimes other people in the house) by screaming. I believe today, I woke up at noon while crying out the word "Please".

MINOR THEME#1: An ultimate classic - a naked dream. Sometimes it humiliates me, other times, I'm walking down the street, proud of my nakedness, grinning at the shocked faces that go by. More often, however, is being naked and feeling vulnerable. I bear my nakedness with shame, knowing I can't do anything about it, being martyred by repulsive comments, mocking laughter and sometimes unwanted sexual advances. I hate those ones the most.

MINOR THEME#2: Out-of-body experiences. These only happen when I'm sleeping in the dream. My boyfriend thinks this is quite peculiar as he's never heard of anyone else whose dreams involve sleeping. Moreover, he's never had an out-of-body experiences in his own dreams, so he thought this was interesting.

All of these theme, save the last one, involve a high level of anxiety or fear. Now, because my moods have decided to be pretty cruel to me today, I have to get out of here before someone says "Hey, look, a gothy emo girl crying. How original."

The Bipolar Diaries

Feel honoured. I'm letting you into my weird little head in order to help you identify with those who are...a little more than messed around in the head, shall we say? Currently, I'm not bipolar. I have received no official diagnosis. I'm just showing a lot of symptoms. Diagnoses that I've received in the past are depression, anxiety, extreme phobias and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Anyone is susceptible to a bipolar illness, but mostly those that are in genetic disposition (i.e. it runs in the family) or those who have been exposed to trauma.

Those who are bipolar (and I've known a few) are probably the most intelligent, creative and strong-willed people I know. Stronger and smarter than me, I think. About half of these beautiful people with a bipolar illness may end up killing themselves. Nonetheless, this illness is nothing to be afraid or ashamed of. People with bipolar disorder can appear to be very "normal" indeed. Maybe more creative than the average person and maybe more sensitive, but only a tiny minority are "dangerous". And when I say "dangerous" I don't mean they're a danger to you (get over yourself, love ;) ). Anyone with any type of mental illness or mental health issue is more of a danger to themselves than anyone else. Fact.

To try and make it sound easier to understand, try to imagine waking up, looking in the mirror every day while knowing you are staring straight into the eyes of the one person who desperately wants you dead. You are your own worst enemy, both victim and perpetrator. I encourage anyone who reads this to fight the stigma against mental health. It's not fair and it's not helpful. When a quarter of the population will face mental health issues at some point in their life, you never know, it might be you one day. You can be the strongest person alive when you can muster the strength to swallow your prejudices and open your mind to let just one more person in, whoever they are.

Thank you.

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30/3/12

Mood: Hopeless (30%), pissed off (15%), frustrated (5%), apathetic (50%)
Medication: 4mg of diazepam last night.
Time: About 10 to 3 in the afternoon
Status: Alone in a playground
Weather: Overcast. I'm a little cold actually.

I've been walking quite a lot today. Went out about 10 past 10, found some fields, played guitar, drew my baby brother, thought about making a day out of my travels for missing work today, but didn't feel motivated enough. I'm not motivated for much nowadays.

Bad night. Woke up feeling hungover even thought I had nothing to drink last night. Had diazepam instead - 4mg. I panicked a bit when I swallowed the first - had nasty thoughts about it killing me. So then I called Lawrence and that was a BIG mistake. The loser couldn't wake up properly, even when I told him I was scared shitless about my supposed upcoming death. He, rather selfishly in my opinion, told me he was sleeping, told me to do so too and I was absolutely fucking GUTTED when he didn't call me back after I angrily hung up on him. Took a second pill and decided there and then to break up with him. So I sent him a text saying it was over. After all, who wants to be attached to anyone when they kill themselves?

Must admit, it completely disgusted me sending that text. It was done before I knew it and mostly because my neurotic mother was pestering me to tell her what was going on and if Lawrence and I had just had another argument. I guess she assumed it was my fault too. It usually is.

Furthermore, dumping Lawrence by text only made me want to die even more. I told him I didn't care if the drugs killed me now. I suppose I just kept telling myself it was time to die. I had made no plans, but the drugs made me feel so sick in the head and stomach, I supposed that it was time for me to write a quick suicide note. Had a quick, dramatic meltdown though - went staggering around the room half-crying, half-whimpering how I didn't really want to die and I hadn't even made any plans for it but it was happening anyway and I had just potentially broken Lawrence's heart. Again.

In the following hours, I loathed and abhorred every single thing about myself. One really pathetic thing was I was also convinced I could make myself vomit up the pills (I felt nauseous enough by far). But I'm so pathetic when it comes to being sick. I didn't want to do it. Nevertheless, I hated myself and I hated my life and I was probably going to die, despite only taking a minor overdose. I was worried for my heart too - the drugs had slowed it way down, which is something I'm not used to. Funny thing was, I thought these fucking drugs were supposed to knock me out completely. I mean, if I'm having one of my insane fits where I'm lying on the floor kicking and screaming with all my might and trying to kill myself, these fucking pills weren't going to do shit for me. It certainly didn't stop me from totally hacking my arm up with a pair of nail scissors I found. I then sat in the dark, back to the door on my bedroom floorboards, watching the flashing lights of police cares outside my window where a car crash had rather poetically occurred earlier that night.

I waited for death.

I don't know for how long, but it must have been ages. The drugs might not have taken away the energy to cut my arm up, but it definitely made me hideously drowsy. I didn't sleep though. I felt too sick. And the flashing lights through the trees casting fragmented shadows on my walls were too pretty to close my eyes to.

As for the "suicide note", it was carved into my floorboards. It simply read "All is Well Now".

I'm so melodramatic. It's called the Art of Suicide.

I made it so only me, Lawrence and other Radical Face fans could understand it. It would have made more sense, retrospectively, to write something like "Goodbye, Cruel World" or some other Pink Floyd reference to The Wall because it felt just like that. This was me, overdosing, cutting myself off from the rest of the world, from all the people I love (or am supposed to love, more accurately), completely, soundly and utterly Comfortably Numb. The Worms were eating into my brain, and all that.

Here was me, behind my own wall. Apathetic and a completely sadistic bitch. I half-hoped Lawrence would be happy I'd possibly be dead by morning after the way I've treated him.

Poor Lawrence. I love him so much. If that's, you know, what you're hoping for me to say/feel/write/think. Just so I don't come off as a COMPLETE bitch.

It made sense to write "All is Well Now". Because:
1) It's only blood (geddit?)
              and
2) In death, in the peace and sanctuary of suicide, it always will be well.

To be even more of an indie music nerd, I could even be Morrissey, and die with a smile on my face after all.

That was me coming to terms with death.

Then after about an hour or so (I guesstimate) of sitting and waiting for death, I realised it wasn't coming. I was still breathing (very slow) and my heart was still beating (even slower) and I was still moving (slower still). And seeing as I had gotten blood all over myself, I decided to go and wash all of it off.

I went deeper than I thought. It dripped down my arm and on my leg were I had been sitting. Some marks are probably going to heal, but I think I may have gained some new scars last night.

It occurred to me that I wasn't even thinking about where I was going if I died. In a world where good things happen to me, I'd be right, God exists, Christianity (or this warped version I go by anyway) is right, I go to heaven, get smacked on the bottom by Jesus for being a naughty little girl, and then everything is hunky dory from there. The worst that could have happened being that I'm wrong, some other religion had it right, and I'm going straight to hell. Or Jahannah. Or whatever. In reality, I was actually kind of looking forward to just being stuck in the ground forever.

Before I got back into bed, I wondered if there was still a chance that I would die in my sleep. On the offchance of that happening, I wrote a note to stick under my door "CALL LAWRENCE", kind of just to tell him there's no hard feelings in me screwing him over and dumping him by text.

I felt sorry for it. I did. For one thing, if you're going to break up with someone, you should at least do it face-to-face. Another thing, it didn't make sense to break up with him just because I was super-ultra-mega pissed off with him. Okay, maybe on some level it does, but it didn't mean I stopped loving him (if that's what you want to call it).

The next morning, I woke up to a phonecall.
Lawrence.
(Really?)
No. The Pope.

ME: Hello?
LAWRENCE: Abigail?

(God, he must've been worried. He's never answered a phone call with me without going "mraaahh?")

ME: Oh, God...hello.
LAWRENCE: Sorry, did I wake you?
ME: Um...sort of.
LAWRENCE: I'm sorry.
ME: What's up?
LAWRENCE: I got your text.

(My stomach felt like it was going to fall out of my vagina at this moment, but I was willing to play casual, so I said something like:)

ME: Oh, shit...

The conversation we had is pretty sketchy in my mind, but what I remember most is when he said "Are we still an item?"

Yep. No crying, no urgency - just plain old "tone heavy with concern" thing going on. Boy, does this kid know how to fight for me.

Anyway, I gave it some thought. Maybe he wasn't taking me seriously. Maybe I wasn't done thinking. So I just said "Yeah, I guess."

Again, Lawrence was indifferent. No pleading or begging to be taken back, no apology that wasn't needed - though that came later in the day. It's almost like he wasn't that bothered about me telling him he was nothing to me anymore.

Bastard.

So we still are. I still hope we always will be, I suppose. We said "I love you" to each other, because that's simply what you do. Then we hung up on supposedly civil grounds.

It occurred to me today that I had deleted my facebook account without saving all the stupid poems I had written on there. I'll get round to saving them soon - I have 14 days before my account is permanently deleted or if someone can convince me to keep it otherwise.

God, life is so shit.

Especially when you've got bird crap on your favourite leather trench coat from your long day out of skiving off work because you can't be in a hectic workplace where you have to show off your arms to hungry customers with tiny kids.

Afternote: Fuck the social network.

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1/4/12

Mood: Sad, sad, very, very sad (35%), hopeless (15%), apathetic (25%), angry (10%), like crying (15%)
Time: Around half twelve pm.
Status: In the kitchen, alone
Weather: Sunny
Medication: 3 Natrasleeps last night. When I couldn't sleep even though it was about half past 4 in the morning.

I probably should have written here yesterday given how absolutely shit I was feeling. Maybe I should just blame it all on hormones? I suffer killer PMS. Nevertheless, it's been quite a long time since I've curled up on the carpet of a room and broke into torrents of tears. I liked the fact that no-one was paying attention. It was one of those moments where I just needed to get it out of my system. I felt especially shite yesterday - and it must have been noticeable since my parents didn't screw me over for swearing so much in the house.

I stink. Can not be bothered to shower.

I suppose the word you could use to describe me yesterday was "erratic". I seemed more or less fine when I started smashing up the piano and singing (?) Led Zeppelin at the top of my voice. Ended up being called Mrs. Plant by my dad. Damn, Led Zep stuff is GOOOOOOD! And I love to think that I'll get condemned and criticised ridiculously and illogically by a pack of bible-bashing fundies.

Then, when I started to think about stuff - my anger, my disgust, my guilt, my pains of life, the fact that life on this earth profits absolutely nothing and there's no hope for me whatsoever given the fact I have no talent, no friends and no hope in hell of getting better - things got really shit. REALLY shit.

I didn't eat so much. Just kind of sloped around looking like I absolutely hated myself and my life, which I did. The part that really got me sobbing, however, was when my parents, being lovely and kind and patient and motivating, encouraged me to call a friend and have them round for the evening.

Instant crisis - immediate flashback to the summer I was twelve, trying to call up everyone I knew to hang out with me - ALL of which either didn't answer their phone or told me they had better things to do.

I kid you not - ALL.

It was possibly the most crushing thing that's happened to me socially. I remember that summer I spent it indoors, reclusive and getting increasingly depressed. I believed then that I simply must be the most repulsive creature to walk this earth and I guess I still do.

My 13th birthday was probably even worse. My parents made up this amazing bonfire night with food roasted near the fire, movies and popcorn and a hair salon session, courtesy of my hairdressing mother. Of the fifteen people I called, two of them showed up. A girl two years older than me who I'd been getting along with due to our love for creative writing and a girl from church I didn't even like. Two. Out of my whole phone list.

Mind you, it was probably because of that absolute loose, stinking cunt, Ashling Baggaley that my life became so hellish. She had a distinct knack for manipulation and her hobby of year 8 was turning everyone against me. To this day, I still haven't forgiven that fucking bitch. I hate her. And there are not many people I hate.

I think I may have to quit my new job. I bit off more than I can chew - again. First York College, now this. I think I've developed a knack for jumping into things I'm not prepared for.

I don't think I ever will be prepared for life, really. I'm weak, talentless, pathetic and so unbelievably hopeless on many levels. Life is far too big a hurdle for me.

I guess that must be where the whole Jesus part about my life comes in. Except you're not allowed to be a Christian if you have mental problems, it's the law. Having Jesus supposedly means all your problems go away. Fucking posers. "Oh, look at me, I'm so holy and full of God! I've seen the light and that makes me better than you! I have such a lovely, comfortable life with all of my personal issues ironed out due to the strength of God and the government to put a roof over my head and take away my abusive parents! Now my life is so perfect, there's nothing better for me to do but pity other people whose lives aren't as good as mine - but not the mentally ill ones because they've been with the devil. That's the only way you get mental problems."

Posers.

They might as well say "My wallet is too small for my fifties and my magic genie is on holiday - poor me! Oh, but I'm so blessed!"

I could go on. But apparently, I'm possessed by the devil and God will heal me, but only if I let him.

Religion, of all things, is probably the most fucked up system of the history of mankind.

No-one lives in religion. They claim life in Christ, but having life isn't necessarily living.

It's complicated and I don't feel like going into it.

Cameron McCulloch-Keeble, my boyfriend's best friend, had his eighteenth yesterday at his house and didn't invite me. Lawrence, in all his kindness, told me it was because Cameron's house wasn't very big so he was only inviting him, his girlfriend Julia, Joanna and Peter. Oh, SPARE ME, my dear, sweet love! Spare me the bullshit.

I wasn't invited, despite the fact I've known him since before St. Paul's sixth form, despite the fact I consider him my friend enough to invite him to my own eighteenth, despite the fact I'm friends with his friends, despite the fact I'm friends with his girlfriend, despite the fact I've helped extensively with pretty much all of his videos and despite the fact I'm his best friend's girlfriend.

Spare me the bullcrap. Cameron, for no reason, doesn't like me.

And it's not so much the fact I wasn't invited. It's not - trust me. This isn't a fucking popularity contest. This is about me, having a break from having shit thrown at me all the time. Cameron had a party and didn't invite me. Just another thing to add to my generous supply of missed opportunities to look for the nice things in life. You know, while I've been sitting at home, too afraid to go outside in case I run into someone that could hurt me, getting a job I will ultimately fail at in the end, watching my newsfeed on facebook to see how all of my friends are doing on their trip to Ireland or how they enjoyed the new Spiderman movie at the cinema that I couldn't go and see because everyone knows I run the risk of having a violent mental breakdown in the cinema just like I did a few weeks ago at the theatre. Me, the girl who spent the majority of secondary school befriending people in posters and photographs, because they're much easier to make friends with and can't even hurt you.

Kind of makes me want to kill myself thinking that.

It helped when I reactivated my facebook account and deleted all the facebook friends I don't need. I think I went from around 194 to 42 last night. While my slutty little sister basks in her glorious 9 hundred and something of people she's barely even met once and probably just want to track her down and fuck her like they did to her friend.

Can't say I don't think of either of them were asking for it, personally.

I like that. I can be an absolute BITCH when I'm in the right mood.

Anyway. Looking at my cute little 42 helped. It DIDN'T help when I looked on Georgia Hayward's page and discovered one of the cast members of that completely ABYSMAL production of Les Mis I was in was inviting her out with Alex and Andrew to the cinema.

I would have thought by now that they'd all hate Andrew as much as I do.

No. Because they're normal. They don't have mental health issues. They can have comfortable, happy times together at the cinema. They don't have PTSD to hold them back from meeting each other, despite the fact that Andrew Robert Green is THE most attention-seeking, blame-dodging, backstabbing, bullshitting, lying, slandering, manipulative, spoiled, scum-sucking, motherfucking CUNT in Leighton Buzzard. There are crack-snorting zoophiles I would rather go out with.

Anyway, I hate him. And I thought everyone else did after the way he treated Frankie and me.

Clearly not. He has obviously really out-manipulated himself.

Just so ya know, these are the people I hate:

1) Ashling Baggaley
2) Paul Coveney
3) Lindsey Way
4) Andrew Green

I hope they all anal rape each other, get appendicitis and die very slowly.

I woke up this morning actually thinking things were going to be okay. This is how stupid I am.

What do I do now? Call up another answer machine like yesterday?

God help me, I just don't know what to do to extinguish my anger, my grief and my shame.

Need to sleep and never wake up. Shakespeare put it so perfectly.

To be or not to be - that is the question. Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune or to take arms against a sea of troubles and by opposing, end them. To die, to sleep no more, and by a sleep to say we end the heartache and the thousand natural shocks which flesh is heir to. Tis a consummation devoutly to be wisht. To die, to sleep. To sleep perchance to dream. Ay, there's the rub.

Hamlet is, as always, my favourite. But seeing as how a promising life of acting has thoroughly betrayed me, Shakespeare and I are not friends.

I fucking hate my life. It's a cliche, but I actually mean it, you prejudiced cunts.
      - Hamlet, translated.

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2/4/12

Mood: Tired (80%), apathetic (10%), excited (5%), sad (5%)
                  - what a weird combination.
Time: 10 past 10 am
Medication: 1 Fluoxetine hydrochloride (trade name: Prozac)

OMG, THEY'RE GREEN! THE GODDAMN PILLS ARE GREEN!

And I'm just about to swallow it.
     *Takes pill*

...well, that was gelatine-y

No. of facebook friends: 40
Terry Brooks, the autistic guy who is enormously self-centred, blocked me, so I half-retaliated by deleting his girlfriend. Never liked her much anyway.

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3/4/12

Mood: Generally happy
Time: 20 to 1
Meds: 1 Prozac

Random thought that may not be so random: It might help to write this journal at the end of the day when I have gained a good perspective on how the day's been rather than how it's going.

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9/4/12

Mood: Sluggish (90%), apathetic (10%)
Time: 10 to 10p,

So...I'm manic-depressive. That's the theory, anyway. Lawrence's sister, Elle (pronounced "Ellie") who has cyclothymia and has had close friends with different types of the illness was the first to suggest it. And based on her experience, I'd say she knows what she's talking about. It would explain a hell of a lot, and after rigorous studies, I have concluded that I do show quite a lot of the symptoms and have a chance of meeting the diagnostic criteria.

Main symptoms:
- Major depressive episode(s)
- Hypomanic episode(s)
- "Mixed" episodes

I've definitely had these three things. But to be honest, most of the time, I've never thought much of it. When I was in York, my impulsiveness and erratic behaviour wasn't a problem until I tried to kill myself to get out of it. And when I'm not depressed, I feel completely fine if not rather loud and excitable. I'm going to see a psychoanalyst in a week's time, just to see if I can get an early diagnosis, but I've secretly been doubting I'll get one. I mean, despite my sometimes impulsive self-destructive behaviour and suicidal ideation, I get by okay. Sure, it's sometimes difficult, but my only real current worry is what to do about my goddamn future - which is something I tend not to think about nowadays. What I'm trying to say is, this is basically all I've ever known. So it kind of just feels like people are putting together all my quirks and calling it bipolarity. Which is a little weird.

*Goes to take laundry out of the washing machine and reload it with my 3rd/4th load today. Loootttts of washing today*

Weird in the sense that I once considered the possibility of being bipolar shortly after I came back from York, but I disregarded it, convincing myself that I was just excited to be at college doing drama.

(Scene: Elle's car, 7th April, night)
ME: So what makes you think that I could be - ahem - bipolar?
ELLE: Well, aside from the fact you're very intelligent and extremely creative,

(I thought "wow, thanks Elle, you lovely lady!")

the mood swings really...triggered some insight...

(She then took extra-long time to think, park the car and plan what she was going to say next)
ELLE: (eventually) Don't take this the wrong way or anything, but there's something about you that really...I dunno, speaks to me. Like, a spark in your eyes that just says it all that I've only ever seen in my other friends who are bipolar.
ME: (intrigued) Really? Like how?
ELLE: It's...it's really, really hard to explain, but you can just see it in your eyes. Like you've seen and really felt a lot of really bad pain, but you're still looking at the world like it's an amazing place and it's just...I don't know, it's very hard to explain, but being bipolar also means really having a huge high, you know? Not hyperactive or anything, but just really, really happy and excited and motivated and you have so many ideas...have you ever had days like that?

(I gave a short pause for thought, then...)
ME: Well, yeah. I mean, when I was in York, I was just on top of the world. I mean, I felt AMAZING. I've never felt anything like it, I felt like I was on my tiptoes all the time, my eyes were always wide, I was ALWAYS doing lots of things at once - I could go on about it, but I just felt incredible!
ELLE: And you felt like you could do anything?
ME: Yes!

(I paused, coming to the revelation. It was written all over Elle's face. I sighed and took a wide-eyed moment of strenuous enlightenment. Elle smiled sympathetically and took my hand)
ELLE: Welcome to the world of bipolar, honey.

Sleep did not come naturally that night - and it was midnight by the time I got into bed. I got four hours sleep, woke up naturally and went to the sunrise service for Easter held in the Titleys' back garden. I spent a lot of time in the bathroom both before and after I slept to reason with this new observation. Before I slept, I had myself a bit of a panic.

I have a mental illness? What does this mean?

On the one hand, it frightens me to the core. Up until a couple of nights ago, having mental health issues was fine with me. Having put up with them all my life, I've accepted them as part of me and either found ways to stabilize them or get rid of them completely. Mental illness, though - that's a whole new kettle of fish. Mental illness implies having it for the rest of my life. Does this mean that the hell I went through at ages 11-16 - will I have to go through it again and again every few years for the rest of my life? Supposedly so.

On the other hand, it's rather satisfying in a way. There's been no change at all, just everything I've ever known - all my quirks and rather extreme moods and behaviours - are being grouped together and justified with (or explained by) a title. No biggie. Plus, some of the most amazing people I know have bipolar disorder. Aside from Stephen Fry, Emilie Autumn, Beethoven, Edvard Munch, Nietzsche, Van Gogh, Sir Isaac Newton, Mel Gibson, Carrie Fisher, Linda Hamilton, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Tony Slattery and many other celebrities, there's my great aunt Susan, great aunt Anne Marie (supposedly), Stella Torr, a good family friend, and of course, Elle. =)

On top of that, I've learned some very interesting and highly valid things about bipolar disorder. For starters, I didn't know there were different types of it until a couple of weeks ago when Elle first suggested it. I've also learned a great deal about myself, such as how loud-mouthed and fast-talking and obnoxious and opinionated I can get when I'm being supposedly hypomanic. Also like what a dirty little ho I am by dating 13-year-old boys and making out with my best friend and wanting to make out with a guy and his bi-curious girlfriend at the parties I myself have thrown - me, possibly one of the biggest recluse spiders you could find.

As I said before, a consultation with a psychoanalyst should straighten things out a bit. Nonetheless, I sort of wish I had written here yesterday and made my first really happy entry. Easter with the Titleys made the best Easter of my life so far and I consider myself the luckiest girl on the planet to have Lawrence Titley as my boyfriend. I really do =)

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10/4/12

Mood: Mournful (50%), apathetic (50%)

1 Fluoxetine capsule daily. For nine days now. And I still feel like dying/killing myself sometimes. Not all the time, thank God, but enough of the time to wear me out completely. Maybe I'm just having a bad PMS.

Listening to My Chemical Romance, of course, doesn't help at all, because it's a pop punkish reminder of all the beautiful, lovely yet rather sad things I used to be - a depressed teenager, self-sacrificing, empathetic and hopelessly in love.

Fuck love. It doesn't mean anything. It never did and (shockingly) never will.

It's bullshit. It's all fucking bullshit. What's the fucking point?

There is no point. That's the thing. The very thing that pushes my stomach into my throat whenever I think it and I'm just about ready to vomit my own guts. I can't do this. I can't live. I want out. I want to lie down on the floor and just die right now.

Except I feel weighted down into my seat by my own pathetic load of sorrow that I can't move.

Just like old times.

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15/4/12

Mood: Fucking shit.
Time: 1:13pm

I've noticed it takes a lot for me to cry these days. I've theorised it's because I've spent the majority of my life so far thinking and feeling to such an intense degree that I've burnt myself out and become increasingly apathetic over the past few years. Or maybe it's just the happy pills. Still, whatever the reason, I've managed to cry twice in the past 18 hours. And properly cry as well - not just a single tear rolling down my face. I mean like sobbing - racking my brains and heaving my body, soaking the pillow sobbing. It felt kind of amazing, actually. I mean, it's not very often I have the mental capacity to relieve myself of my pain in such a way.

A way that doesn't hurt.

I feel so tired with everything. I've lost the heart for absolutely everything.

There is absolutely nothing except apathy left. That and selfishness. I feel like the only person left in the world sometimes. Everything around me has dissolved and become unreal. I'm the only thing left. And sometimes I truly loathe myself.

I'm the most foul, detestable, useless, pathetic little cunt in the world. Ironically, the only thing this world has to offer.

How the fuck does that make sense?

Last night, I attempted to make sense of all the fucked up things that happen in my head. In my head, there are three people: me Lenore and some other girl who keeps changing her name whenever she feels like it. For now, we'll just call her Jo.

Jo is a very, very, very cool person. She's completely crazy, full of energy, carefree, confident, daring, cheeky and outrageous in every way. There is never a dull moment with Jo - it's like she never sleeps. And yet, she's bad-tempered, foul-mouthed, completely self-centred and quite slutty. She believes she is God's gift, a genius, and that she can get away with absolutely anything because she's oh-so-invincible. She only thinks about herself. She probably doesn't even realise how little true friends she actually has, but then again, friendship is something almost impossible for her to conceptualise.

Lenore is a total mystery. She hates me - that's for certain. She wants me dead.

In completely contrasting ways, both these girls are the devil.

Right now, I'm on the mend, but Lenore is in my head again. She's telling me how worthless, how pathetic, how stupid we are and what blemishes we are on God's creation. She says we're better off dead.

I wish I couldn't believe her sometimes.

She keeps telling me that Lawrence is far better off without us. Again, it's hard not to believe her. I screw everything up. I don't even have to try - I just screw everything up by nature. She says that thought I've found some way to swallow my shame, I'll have to face up to the damage I cause someday. And she says we've damaged Lawrence. And we'll continue to damage him as long as we're with him because it's just in our nature to do so.

She tells me that we won't survive the world.

And once again, the brutality of this pessimistic truth drowns me. I don't think I'll ever make it out of here alive. And damn it, none of us will, but whatever the afterlife brings, I shall walk though it in the stocks with my eyes gouged out and my tongue seared down to a stump. I will march blind and dumb in purgatory and every angel, spirit and demon will know: This is Abigail - the fool of fortune and slave to her own invisible demons. How pitiful. Pitiful, pitiful, miserable little creature.

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23/4/12

Mood: Neutral, contemplative.

Those happy pills have really done their stuff. I just feel better, like a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders. Now I'm faced with a possible diagnosis of either bipolar disorder or borderline personality disorder. Or maybe even both. That could be fun XD

I hit Revelation Street last night - I realised why I actually hope that I'm bipolar. The reason being that I had a very, very shit time being majorly depressive and I want the chance to do it all again, only this time, do it right. I should have been institutionalised. I'm half-hoping that I will someday get to that point again so that when I ask to be sectioned, it will happen. I hope.

1993 - born. Trauma. PTSD begins.
1994 onwards - unexplained violent outbursts regarding certain stimuli on television.
2000 - first suicide attempt, aged 6.
2001 - obsession with Rugrats ends, obsession with Sonic the Hedgehog begins. She idealises a romantic relationship with Sonic. Suicidal ideation.
2004 - obsession with Meat Loaf/Jim Steinman/Ellen Foley starts. From ages 11-13 she's convinced she's adopted and her parents are Jim Steinman and Ellen Foley.
2005 - trauma in school involving sexual harassment and bullying. Depression begins with cripplingly low self-esteem, dissociation, anxiety, panic attacks, nightmares, sleeplessness, no motivation, little energy, uncontrollable rages and crying fits, visual hallucinations, voice hearing, overwhelming fear, detachment from reality, self-loathing and suicidal ideation.
2007 - self-harming begins, age 13. She starts cutting over failure to make a relationship with a boy. At 14, she makes her second suicide attempt by cutting her wrists. Obsession with My Chemical Romance begins. She starts to feel deep, deep attachment to the band, particularly with lead singer Gerard Way. She says she "doesn't give a FUCK what anyone else says" and that she was "hopelessly in love with him and every day was like being dragged through hell but it was still a paradise to [her]"
2008 - third suicide attempt by overdosing on paracetamol. Drinking habit starts. Self-harm is at its worst. At age 15 on December 8th, she discovers that Gerard Way is expecting a child with his wife and makes another suicide attempt by cutting her wrists. Dependence on others at its most intense.
2009 - drinking habits persist. Fifth suicide attempt by hanging.
2010 - she leaves the "godforsaken hellhole" that is Shenley Brook End school. Obsession with wanting to have a boyfriend ends. 1st boyfriend - Lawrence Titley (22nd Oct - 16 Nov, 2010)
2011 - 2nd boyfriend - Andrew Green (4th Feb-13th March, 2011). Very hung up on this guy even though he was a complete and utter TWUNT. She goes manic/hypomanic, especially after she drops out of sixth form and goes to college in York. Sixth suicide attempt. Again, dependent on other people, but not as intensely as before. 3rd boyfriend - 1st boyfriend, Lawrence Titley (8th Nov - present). She becomes depressed around New Year.
2012 - another high and another 2 suicide attempts by walking into roads (after significant PTSD-related triggers)


Evidence to suggest bipolar disorder
- It runs in the family.
- "Major depressive episode" and "hypomanic episode".
- Drastic mood swings.
- Only rare days when I feel neutral.
- HUGE rages, sometimes for no apparent reason.
- 1st suicide attempt at age 6.
- Creativity.
- Supposed intelligence.
- "Mixed episodes" (the ability to feel both manic and depressed at the same time).
- Racing thoughts, quickened speech, elation, impulsivity, hyper-productivity - basically all the classic symptoms of a manic episode.
- Alternating between feeling great and feeling shit.
- Swinging between mental dullness and huge, wild surges of creativity and productivity.
- Characteristics have been noticed by other people, including people with a bipolar illness.
- Suicide attempts in "mixed episodes".
- Seemingly random mood swings (not based around menstrual cycle, no specific triggers).

Evidence to suggest borderline personality disorder
- History of an unhappy childhood based on physical abuse from the father and sexual trauma in school at the age of 12.
- Female (majority of sufferers are young women).
- Symptoms were hugely distinct at the ages of 14-15.
- Huge dependence on other people.
- Confusion of identity (years ago, convinced that I was the secret child of a rock star).
- Changing view of self based on people I'm with.
- Imaginary relationships with men.
- Sensitive to rejection (of any kind, not just romantic).
- Overall sensitivity.
- A feeling of emptiness.
- Self-harm.
- HUGE rages.
- Very negative reactions to arguments.
- Mood swings.
- Impulsive and unpredictable.

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30/4/12

Mood: Happy
Weather: For once - sunny

I really should write in this son of a bitch more often. I've had a couple of swings, some days I've been so high and spaced out I can't function, but recently, I've been feeling pretty darn happy. Let's just hope it's the drugs taking effect and not a hypomanic/manic episode.

I'm getting my creativity back, I think. I was up half the night thinking about these awesome things like how I'm going to be a writer of gothic fiction and my first story shall be a short children's horror of a very dark and twisted version of Little Red Riding Hood. Lots of dark imagery and fantasy creatures like the Centripod and the Scuddlehog.

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1/5/12

Mood: Happy
Weather: Shit again

Mum thinks I'm getting manic again. Okay!

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2/5/12

Mood: Tearful, emotionally achy and tired.

Most drastic mood swing of late. Went from insanely hyper, dragging my boyfriend around to old Primary Schools and invading the premises, getting into arguments to sleeping like a log and crying when I'm not. It feels so refreshing to be crying again, but I can't deny it makes me feel rather uncomfortable.

Reasons why I could have had this swing:
- PMS
- Energy drinks (???) <-- A Lucozade? Really don't think so.
- Started taking my pills at a different time of day.
- Sleep deprivation (?)
- Mood disorder (?)


Evidence of hypomanic episodes:
- Hyperactivity
- Egocentric
- Feeling like a genius
- Ecstasy
- Impulsiveness
- Risky behaviour
- Very loud and fast talking
- Extremely active
- Increased sex drive
- Hyper productivity
- Increased creativity
- Decreased need for sleep
- Complete obsession with work
- Doing something illegal (in possession of class B drugs)
- Poor judgement
- "Racing thoughts" (that just won't SHUT UP)
- Overall feeling of intense excitement and bliss
- Leaping from one idea to the next
- Loving the world as opposed to hating it

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11/5/12

Mood: Apathetic, desperate
Weather: Sunny

They've upped my fluoxetine dose. You know how they say that antidepressants make you feel worse before they make you feel better? Well, I've just cut myself because I wanted to feel SOMETHING. I want to feel real again. I have felt pretty much nothing but apathy for years now. I'm sick of it. I've even been having suicidal thoughts. I feel completely useless and a pathetic excuse for a human being. I hate my life and I hate myself. For fuck's sake, even the word "hate" means nothing to me anymore. I don't want to eat anymore, I will starve myself, I swear to God. I don't have any reason to live. I'm a useless cunt with no purpose in life.

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16/5/12

Mood: Really happy. REALLY HAPPIEE
Weather: Mostly sunny

Okay, all of a sudden, I'm crazy again. IT'S SO COOL! I LOVE IT! I WANT TO STAY LIKE THIS! You know, aside from the fact that this racing thoughts business often does my head in because my mind is being, like, splattered all over the place, but I'm starting to get the feeling that my therapist thinks I could be bipolar as well. What a total freaking surprise!

But I'm so happy and I feel so great =D I don't want it to stop! I really don't!

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22/5/12

Mood: See previous entry
Food: 1 mint - 11:45am
2 small chicken burgers (no gluten) with salad and mayo - 2pm
Chips and peas and gluten free ketchup - 5:45pm
Non-alcoholic Pina Colada - 10pm-ish

Keeping a nice little food diary now. Should make Shona very happy indeed. Anyway. Shoulda written here before really because I went on another downer last Friday (and it was a pretty vicious downer) and I ended up clawing through the day. Now I'm completely manic again. As usual, it feels awesome, but I'm gonna try and sleep on it.

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25/5/12

Mood: Surprisingly normal
Weather: Beautiful - very sunny, but with a cool breeze
Sleeping hours: 3:30ish-11:30ish. My fault. Stayed up watching South Park and then couldn't sleep because it's so freaking hot in my room.
Food: Nothing today yet. That's a little worrying. I also had only one meal yesterday. I was on a downer and didn't feel hungry. Not good. Must eat!

I'm gonna have a late lunch. I'll probably eat at the Titleys' if they'll be kind enough to invite me - which they always do because they're so awesome. I feel pretty darn spoiled, but that's the way my diet is probably going to be shaped for today - it's the best I can do, at least.

Question: Why does most if not all gluten free bakery taste like crap?

10 past 3 pm: 2 crumpets (gluten free), orange, 4 gluten free crackers with cheese, chutney and cucumber plus squash.
Around 8:30pm: Salad (celery, lettuce, coriander, home-made salad dressing and salmon)
11:10pm - gluten free, nut free, egg free chocolate bar. It's surprisingly a lot tastier than it sounds.

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26/5/12

Mood: Stressed
Weather: Same as yesterday
Sleeping hours: About eleven hours
Food: 2 crumpets w/ butter, smoked salmon, melon, 2 spare ribs, 1 bit of sausage, 1 burger, 1 chicken wing, 1 mini eclair.

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27/5/12

Mood: Normal, happy, passionate
Food: Some mini doughnuts and mini eclair, spare rib, fetta cheese salad, sausage, chicken, coleslaw, raspberry pavlova, 3 cocktails (blue lagoon, koko colada, jumbled julep)

Felt pretty darn tipsy. Lawrence said it was endearing.

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29/5/12

Mood: Confused, desperate, low, hopeless, having thoughts that life is not worth living and wondering how I can be so damned calm about it all.

Tonight, I will write a fake suicide note and get to sleep by pretending that I'm dying very peacefully.

SUICIDE NOTE

Dearest mourners,

I am so sorry to put you through this, but I was right. I can't do this anymore. I want out. I just want to sleep and never wake up. I am so tired of this constant parade of falsehoods that is my life. I've gone to ask God flat-out why he made the world as one big sick joke. This is not a cry for help. I have come to accept that I am simply beyond help and I shall live with psychological cancer for the rest of my life. As you can see, I no longer speak in tongues and these pages are no longer splattered with nonsensical word salad resembling Sarah Kane's dramatic masterpiece "4.48 Psychosis". My mind is still. Everything is clear. The obvious conclusion stares at me right in the eye: I have to go.

Anyone who even thinks of following me, I'll make sure you end up in hell. You know who you are and I won't have you realise the devastating revelations of life and death as I have. I have loved you more than I can say and I am so sorry the end has been so coarse and so crudely illustrated in this notebook.

But as you can see, I will never succeed now. Not that there has ever been any point in trying in the first place.

We'll meet again soon. I promise.

Abigail Rosemary Thomson-Smith
23/10/1993 - 29/5/2012


Locked in his bedroom,
He saw the world:
A web of answers
And cumshot girls.

Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick tick.


Don't bother blaming
His games and guns.
He's only playing
And boys just want to have fun.

He picked a soundtrack
And packed his bag.
He hung his Walkman
Around his neck.

Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick tick.


It is so simple -
The way they fall -
No cry or whimper.
No sound at all.

Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick tick.
Tick tick tick tick


...Boom.


- "Strength Through Music" by Amanda Palmer.

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30/5/12

Mood: Kinda normal. Perhaps just a little bit loopy. I'm still talking to photographs.
Food: 10:30am 1 slice of toast
1:30pm potato cakes with cheese and bacon, gluten free cake w/ squirty cream.
Fuck this fucking shit.
6:30pm Shepherd's pie w/ peas, gluten free gravy and carrots. Trifle.

Mood update: I'm feeling a little scatty. Like psychological tourettes. I think I need to sleep.

The Identity of This Blog

I have decided the identity of this blog. It is the blog of a supposedly mentally ill girl. Man, that looks much worse written down. As if an extreme phobia and post-traumatic stress disorder weren't enough, it becomes somewhat apparent that I could be bipolar. Whoop-de-doo.

It is the eighth of June (yay, me and my beloved's seven-month anniversary - boy, what a girl am I!) at ten past ten at night and in the past twenty-six hours, I've felt two big extremes - going to bed hyper and full of life, waking up drained and wanting nothing more than to die.

Sounds dark. Sorry. This is called my reality.

I've been told I'm at the age where symptoms would be becoming more noticeable. And yet, I still think, deep down, it's a little too early for me to be diagnosed. Most people don't get diagnosed as bipolar until they're at least twenty five years of age. I could be just hormonal, or it could be something I'm eating. Either way, today was the first day when I felt the reality of the possibility of being mentally ill really sunk in. I mean, it was strange before - like I wasn't taking it seriously - carrying around the bipolar label almost like a badge of honour, taping the diagnosis onto myself before it was even confirmed. Only today I've realised how arrogant and cocky I've been.

I arrived at a Costa's today to meet with said beloved. I was fifteen minutes late and I spotted him immediately. Holding a door open for two voluptuous women clutching various items of luxury, I slipped inside - a black-clothed, greasy-haired bundle of jangled nerves.

Lawrence said: "So you're on another downer."

My best friend, my darling boyfriend - blunt, straight to the point and sees right into my soul at light speed. Awkwardly, I nodded, clamping my hands together and not meeting eye. A wonderful defence, of course.

"So last night you were on a high, and now..."

"I've crashed," I completed for him in a weak voice.

He brought his forehead to mine. I brought my eye level to his. His eyes sparked with recognition. Manic-depression runs in his family. His experience with the illness has brought his knowledge thus far.

The bill came up to around £120. It started with a CD and a T-shirt. Then it was dresses, corsets, hair extensions, more T-shirts, things I didn't even need but I bought anyway. Dancing on tables never felt more exhilarating, I felt like a junior Amanda Palmer on the piano, only ten times sexier and disgusting and loving it far more than anyone else in the world. I drew on my face because it seemed like a fun idea and kissed the ceiling while trying to gulp down as much alcohol as I could because I believed alcohol could help slow my brain down while giggling hysterically at the fact that I've never actually noticed the colour of the living room carpet while calling Lawrence on my mobile while trying to make a prank call on the house phone because that also seemed like a fun idea.

The typical high - lots of dancing, singing, shouting, running, jumping, screaming, laughing, juggling ideas and projects a million times at once and talking, talking, TALKING like a leprachaun on E.

The world is so beautiful all of a sudden when you're as happy and excited as this. I wanted to catch all of the bright orange lights that blurred past the car when my mother took me for a drive in an attempt to calm me down. If it weren't for the diazepam being chugged down into my system, I probably wouldn't have slept at all last night.

I've never gone on a shopping spree like that before. And, comically enough, I tried very hard to justify it. "It was an online shopping spree, so it doesn't count", "It's not like I was just randomly buying stuff - there was at least some logic in purchasing all that internet crap", "It was a one-off, I've never spent as much as that before in one go" and "It wasn't a real manic episode! A manic episode lasts for four days at least!"

"There are no set rules for a thing like this, Abi," Lawrence confirmed. "The human mind is a very complex thing. It is no respecter of rules and regulations. Whatever your brain has thrown at you is now written all over your grandiose ideas, drinking binges and shopping sprees. You had a manic episode."

It was then I snapped.

"Don't call it that," I said, my voice dangerously low. "I've had enough of that."

In my mind, I was crying. At least call it hypomania - hypomania isn't as bad as full-on mania. It's not like I believe I'm Jesus, for crying out loud! I'm just a moody person - depressed one day and hyperactive the next. I felt like sobbing, moaning and pleading for some sort of sanctuary where I could hide and sleep for a very, very long time. For the first time, I was firmly in denial that I could be bipolar. Suddenly, there was a new, scared and alarmed voice in my head screaming: "You can't be bipolar! You're already a mental fuckup - no more! No more!"

In an attempt to look at things rationally, I've been conducting a mood diary since earlier this year. I will let you, the glorious public, attempt to make sense out of my cynical ramblings that I've crudely scrawled in my little red book known as my mood diary.
I would resort to mostly anything now to make this whole mental illness thing easier to swallow.

Let's just hope Gabriel sees this shit and passes it right on to God. SOS, Lord, S-O-fucking-S.

The Letters to Gabriel

Look. I'm an actor. Every post is likely to have a different voice. I've now opted the less darkly flamboyant and pretentiously pompous tone. The more "normal" one. Having said that, there are likely to be so many different voices, ranging in eloquence, grace, passion and pace, some days will bring rich, poetic wit and others will bring ragged, coarse and brutally honest prose - it's hard to put a title to each and every one.

For now, I'll settle for the "fairly normal" thing.

While on the subject of titles, the "Letters to Gabriel" I feel needs elucidating. It sounded like a nice title for starters. I like to think that my incessant online ramblings go somewhere. And by that, I mean, I might address my posts to certain people I feel the need to speak to (e.g. Dear Kate Bush, You rock. Why can't I sing like you?).

And Gabriel, I think, is a nice name.