Am I still me?

Learning to walk again

2010-09-28T18:06:00.000+01:00

I started blogging in 2005 a few weeks after a suicide bomber changed my life for ever. Of course I didn't realize at the time the impact that day would have on my life, I didn't even realize it a year later but now when I look back I cannot help but wonder 'what if'?

What if Tony & George had never invaded Iraq?
What if those young boys had not been so angry?
What if they had changed their minds at the last minute?
What if I had never got on that tube?

These questions are not new and they spiraled through my head in a never ending circle of negativity at the time. But now, 5 years later, they take on a different significance, I wonder 'what if' in a positive way.

What if I was still working in an office in London, never seeing the ocean, rarely glimpsing the sky?
What if I wasn't living the life I am living now?

That bomb on the tube woke me up. It was a long, slow, painful process but 5 years on I can safely say I am happier than I have ever been. I love my life, and that is what life is for; for loving. Loving yourself, loving others and loving life itself.

Those boys did not love; themselves, others or even their own lives. Ironically, though, the direct result of their actions of hate has been love. It started the second those bombs went off, the love, companionship and camaraderie between strangers. Those of us involved in the events of that day have a bond that will hold us together for ever. We helped each other out of that tunnel and we have been helping each other ever since. Gradually though we drifted apart. The bond, the friendships, the love is still there, but we all realized that eventually we were going to have to learn to walk on our own again.

This blog was incredible therapy and it also introduced me to the joys of writing. I realized I wasn't bad at it. People were actually reading it and newpapers started asking me to write for them. Gradually my interest and motivation in my job declined and I started to question where I was going with my life. I had worked hard, trained hard and was a successful Architect who had worked all over the world, but suddenly I didn't really care any more and all I wanted to do was write.

I had grown up sailing as a child and my parents have a boat in the Carribean. Several months after the bombings I joined them for a couple of weeks. I was still depressed, suffering from PTSD, and I remember swimming in the ocean one day towards the horizon and thinking 'what if' I just keep on going? Well I did keep on going; not with the swimming but with life. We cruised between the islands at the very south of the Caribbean chain. We spent a mere two days on one particular island which I will call Taino. Something on this remarkable little rock reached out to me and planted a seed, a seed which took a year to germinate and has now flowered into the life I live now. Taino is now the place I call home.

So I am still Holly Finch, I am still me. But I have a different life now, and hence a different blog. I hope you enjoy Blowing in the Wind

Old Year’s Night in Bequia

2008-01-02T16:28:00.000+01:00

Well the day of New Years Eve (or old year’s night) was spent pretty virtuously. I took my land lord and lady’s 7 year old son to the beach, shell collecting. He has always had his eye on my shell collection, which is scattered across my porch, he even told me that he comes to look at it sometimes when I am not here. So, after a bit of gentle encouragement from him, I promised to take him to gather his own,

A you can imagine, the sight of me wandering around Bequia with a 7 year old child (who is clearly not white at all) was enough to set the flexible tongues of Bequia wagging. I have only been away for 3 months and I come back with a, rather large, child. Everyone was intrigued; ‘who tha boy?’ they kept asking with surprise. Someone even said ‘it’s about time you adopted!’. You have to bear in mind that the girls start young here, 14 is a pretty standard age to start child bearing in the Caribbean. I don’t think they can quite get their head around these old childless white women who keep appearing on the island!

The shell collecting, however, was a great success. We lugged a heavy bag of clinking shells back up the hill at the end of the day. We took a water taxi to the beach which seemed to be quite a novelty for Shami. He was intrigued by my application of sunscreen and copied just about everything I did. We swam and dived and fought with sticks until the most almighty downpoor obscured the whole harbour and sent us shivering for shelter to the nearest beach bar. We ordered a bitter lemon each which came in a bottle, accompanied by a glass. I could sense Shami hesitating, waiting to see if I was going to drink from the bottle or poor it in a glass. When I emptied the bottle into the ice filed glass he quickly did the same. I felt quite the local as we both sat shuddering, wrapped in towels, and the tourists wandered around half naked, looking at us as if we were mad. Having lived through the summer months, winter really does feel like winter now. The air is cool and fresh, the water is freezing, and the evenings can hold a little nip in the twilight air.

My baby sitting duties complete I met a friend and we went and supped a sneaky sundowner on the beach, a quiet little moment before the festivities of the evening ahead. Then it was time to go home and get ready. We were going out for a ‘posh’ 5 course dinner at the fanciest restaurant in town and had decided to make a bit of an effort – well the girls had anyway. It felt peculiar putting on a dress and dusting off my hair dryer, dress standards in Bequia are pleasantly relaxed, but it was a treat to get a little glammed up for once. The only downfall was the shoe situation. I have hundreds at home, but opted to leave them behind when I left. My shoe collection now is an almost full colour palette of Havaiana flip flops. At least I had a coordinating black pair to go with my dress!

The much awaited dinner was a Caribbean travesty in itself – even though the restaurant is run by Swedes. If I had been back at home I would have kicked up a fuss but although we griped we had to laugh, there is no point getting stressed in a place like this. We had sat at our table for over half an hour before we were served. The menu was fixed so there were no choices to make. The hors d’oevres arrived, yet still no wine, and we hungrily munched our way through half of them. Before we could finish the tiny plates the heavens had opened and the little delicacies were quickly floating around in a slushy sort of soup. We ran for cover and loitered at the bar whilst polishing off the wine which appeared with the rain. The rain finally cleared as the stars started to reappear. We changed the sodden table cloth, emptied the glasses of water, wiped the seats down with napkins and started again. We ate our way through two exquisite courses before it was finally time for the main when suddenly the unfortunate result of the little interruption became clear. Our table was situated at the edge of the dance floor. we had planned to be finished before the band started up (a band we have listened to twice a week throughout the summer months) but our meal was interrupted by the squeal of feedback and Jackie addressing the crowd!. Our table was plunged into silence as we struggled to hear over the noise; and our sea view was quickly replaced by wiggling bums and bouncing bodies.

The meal finally finished and with midnight fast approaching we jumped into the moke and raced around the harbour to the Frangi where the throngs were gathered awaiting the New Years fireworks. We scrabbled to find ourselves a bottle of champagne in time, fought our way through the bodies to the beach and sat back and watched the show. We were sorry not to have a countdown or a clock but gradually cries of ‘Happy New Year!’ floated through the crowed and we guessed it must be the midnight hour. The fireworks were added to by some of the many yachts in the harbour letting off flares. We joked that New Year’s Eve was not a good night to be in trouble at sea. You would let off your flares to signal distress whilst anyone watching would remark at the pretty display (I shuddered to myself at the horror of the reality of this joke). The fireworks complete, the bar soon was filled by the arrival of the ‘bang gang’. The team who, so valiantly, had let off the display. They were dusty and shell shocked and some were even bleeding, but there was a buzz, a high, a rush of adrenalin as they all grabbed their first drinks.

The night lead on from there; a street party at Penthouse, then a beach party at De Reef. Everyone was out, everyone was dancing and everyone, of course, was drinking. But as far as I know the only trouble was a dinghy missing from the dock in the morning. The atmosphere was happy and calm and there was none of trouble-brewing-in-the-air feeling which can sometimes fill the harbour late on a Friday night. I staggered home by sunrise, legs weary from dancing and glad of my shortfall in the feet dressing up department as I climbed the hill in my Havaianas.

I awoke on New Yea’s Day feeling weary but surprisingly well. I caught a ride to the beach where we struggled to find food in either of the only 2 places open. Everyone, it seemed, had had the same idea. No-one wanted to cook on this day of recovery, we all just wanted to be served and fed. I managed to beg some fishcakes which filled a gap, but I could have eaten more. A swim and a nap on the beach and the previous night could never have happened. We sat and watched in awe as the Maltese Falcon, the largest, expensivest, fastest sailboat in the world, pulled into the harbour and narrowly missed a collision with a ferry. Then a call from a friend who was flying to England that day; I had left her in a bar as the sun was rising and I have no idea how she made that journey to Barbados a few hours later. She had arrived at Bequia’s little airport to find it closed. If it had been me I would, at that point, have turned around and gone back to bed. She, however, got in touch with a friend who has a water taxi, but then they needed fuel. The gas station was closed but she managed to find someone who had a tank. Enough to get them to Mustique, to where her plane had been diverted, but not enough to get her friend back. He had had to beg steal and borrow more gas once he got there to get himself home. She had arrived in Mustique drenched and battered (those boats throw you around some in the seas out there), it was not only her who was wet, her luggage was soaking too, but she had made the flight and was waiting in Barbados to catch a soggy red eye back to London.

So, as the sun was setting, it was back to the Frangi for evening New Year’s Day cocktails. We all sat at the bar and recounted tales from the night before. Some energetic souls showed up who had not yet been to bed. They were kind of wobbly but impressively still standing. Then Stan appeared out of the night astounded to find ‘Fix-man’ at the bar.

‘I been trying to call you all day’ he said ‘the fire truck’s broken at the airport, people have been having to get boats all day, they need you to come and fix it’

Fix-man looked at him in thoughtfully, stared deep into his rum, and said ‘Perhaps tomorrow’.

Happy New Year from this island in the sun!

'You put on some size man!'

2007-12-27T16:49:00.000+01:00

I left this little Island some 3 months ago, in the height of the summer sun, the raging heat, the island fever and the empty streets. Now I am back and the season is here (although not as much as it should be by all accounts). The harbour is filling with boats, the streets are peppered with lost looking tourists. It feels strange to see so many foreign white faces after a summer of being one of the few pale skinned souls remaining.

But it is lovely to be back, after so much time on the road, on the water and living out of a bag. It is lovely to stop and take stock and be somewhere which feels like home again. I flew in last week, from Grenada, after leaving the boat, Osprey, which had carried me some 3000 miles across the Altantic Ocean. That became ‘home’ too for a while, but this ‘home’ doesn’t move, it doesn’t rock and it doesn’t throw me across the galley when I am trying to make a cup of tea. This home will do for now.

In the strange way that things go sometimes, the first person I met at the airport was Harvey. Last seen waving me off as we sailed out of Tenerife over a month ago. We sat together on the ferry, swopped crossing stories and photographs and watched excitedly as the Christmas lights of Bequia came into view through the gloomy wet night. It was a good way to come back, with someone who had just done the same journey as me, it brought me back slowly and made me feel as if I belonged.

I awoke the next day to the sounds of roosters and dogs. The strains of dancehall reggae Christmas Carols were blasting out of most of the speakers on the island or so it seemed. The day was spent ‘catching up’. There is much to catch up on after 3 months away from an island like this. The old summer crew were still here, their numbers swelled by the incoming winter faces, some old and some new. There was talk and chat and gossip and news; burglaries and stabbings, break ups and get togethers, paternity riddles solved but murders not (solved but ‘sensitive’ is the word on the street so nothing has been done) it was all too much to take in.

I had missed the slow Bequia build up to Christmas, but was here in time to catch the end. Each night of the preceding week there had been ‘light-up parties’ around the Island. It is an intensely fought competition between villages with months of planning and fund raising to get the lights in place. Then one by one they turn them on, with music and sound systems and chicken stalls and rum. These parties go on all night, until dawn, then the next night someone else does it all again.

So I have caught up with the chat and spent my first Christmas in the Caribbean sun and now it is time to make up for those weeks at sea where I sat, and read, and slept, and ate. There is a much vented theory that it is ‘good for you’ being at sea. You don’t drink, I suppose, so that is a bonus. But people say that your muscles are constantly compensating for the movement of the boat, even when you are asleep, it is like a 2 week pilates class, crossing the Atlantic, 24 hrs a day. ‘It’s good for you, you’ll lose weight’ or so they say. It is a theory I have never bought into, much as I would love to. It’s rubbish. You move very little. Sails are raised, reefs are put in, things are fixed, ropes are winched, there is activity, of sorts. But when you are not asleep, or winching, or cooking, you are eating; all the time. I don’t think I got hungry once on that crossing. We had always put something into our mouths before the hunger had found time to kick in. I ate, solidly, for 2 weeks. So maybe they are right about this pilates thing. It is a 24 hour pilates class, but one you eat your way through too!

Well if I thought I could slip back into Bequia with this little fact unnoticed I was sorely wrong. Apparently it’s a complement with these VIncy boys, it wasn’t the women but the men who commented, 3 or 4 times a day I was greeted by ‘well you put on some size man!’. A complement, they say, it means you’re looking well, happy, healthy, or something. It didn’t really work like that for me. I have dug out my old running shoes from beneath the bed, dusted them off, checked for scorpions nestled inside, and hit the early morning streets with a vengeance.

So I am back, in the sun, for the winter, and I am glad. Another season looms with countless adventures to unfold, I am sure.

A belated merry Christmas and a Happy New Year (or oldest night as they call it here) to you all!

Rumbled!

2007-12-27T16:46:00.000+01:00

I have crossed an ocean in a 44ft sail boat since I last posted on here. In fact I have done an awful lot since I last posted on here. I have been slack and not blogged, I have even started to wonder what this blog is all about any more. It started off as a therapy of sorts, I suppose, looking back. Not only did it help me but it helped many others, they wrote and told me so, and that was really what kept me going; that and the joy of putting down words and creating a sentence which sounds sort of right. Eventually the bombs and the politics and the incessant study and analysis and the TRYING (and how could I ever have expected to succeed) to understand the minds of suicide bombers started to fade from this blog and it grew into a more inherent study of minds in general. I guess it became a kind of mental health blog for a while. I have seen enough of those close to me losing their minds and then for it to happen to me, well minds started to occupy my mind so I blogged about it, and that seemed to help people too so I blogged about it some more.

Now I have left a lot of that behind. I am living a sort of wandering, spontaneous, plan less life, a life free of bombs and politics, full of people and sunshine and oceans and rum so that is what I write about now. I suppose you could say that I am trying to show anyone who may pass by this blog that anything is possible. I suppose I am trying to say that sunshine after darkness can be found, no matter how black the darkness and how deep the tunnel, there is always a way out. A way which I have found, for now, but never a way which I will take for granted, I am done with taking things for granted any more.

So a natural progression has occurred in this little blog of mine, but now another, more confusing dimension has come along. I have always been anonymous in this blog, and with most of what I have written for anyone, even on TV and radio I never use my real name. I have people who know me who read this blog, but they are people who have known me since then, since the beginning and before. Now I am living on a little island in the Caribbean, starting afresh, I suppose. I have told very few people here why I came, why I left my job, my home, my friends and my commute to work. Any who have asked usually assume there was a man involved (if only that was all it had been!) but generally I have managed to live in the present out here.

The past is always there but it is fading back to where it should be, into that file named ‘past’ instead of the file it remained in for as long as it had to, named ‘current and not yet ready to go into ‘past’’. It is really not so important any more, it is not what defines me. I am not a ‘survivor’ or a ‘victim’ or any sort of label which the media so adore. I am just me, living a life which makes me happy. But now I have been rumbled on this island in the sun. People know who I am, they know I am ‘Holly’. I have only discovered that since I returned last week and I don’t know how it makes me feel. I don’t want this blog becoming another gossip column for Bequia. I don’t want to be talked about as a ‘victim’ any more, I didn’t really want anyone to know. But now they do, what do I do? I love this blog (slack as I have been lately) and I love to write. Not a day goes by when I don’t scribble or jot a thought or a passing little moment which I don’t want to forget to write about later. My mind is always full of ‘writing’ much of which never makes it onto here, but still, I don’t want to give up on Holly Finch yet. So I suppose I will go on, knowing that now I know my audience more intimately than I did before, and trying not to let the fact that I will be passing them in the street or drinking with them later inhibit what I write on here. It will be fine, I am sure, it always somehow is.

Sailing across the Atlantic...or not...yet?!

2007-11-17T16:44:00.000+01:00

Well we are back where we started – in Tenerife; the land of bleak rugged volcanic landscape and tacky white Brits thumbing through copies of the Daily Mail which are printed on this very island.

It is Saturday and it is hard to believe I only arrived on this boat called Osprey a mere 5 days ago. We are docked in a floating marina of waiting boats. Hundreds of yachts of all shapes and sizes, with crews from around the world, inhabit this pool of protected water. There are French and Americans, Germans and Swedes, and even a friendly face from Bequia to make me feel at home in this transient world of strangers. I last saw Harvey 5 months ago in the Eastern Seaport of Manhattan and here we are now crossing paths again, if only to reinforce what a small familiar circle I am travelling around on this great adventure of mine.

We are all here waiting; for the day, the weather, the boat, the crew, for the moment to be right to leave and cross that great gulf of 3000 miles of Atlantic Ocean to the glistening isles of the Caribbean. We are all playing the same game, the difference being that we had found our day, we took the moment and we left, on Wednesday, but now we are back after 2 days and nights at sea and we are no further on from where we started.

A dripping salt water pump was the cause of this return. It was discovered on the first day at sea but for another 12 hours we carried on. The wind, which had been forecast as non-existent, was pushing us along gently from behind. With our foresail poled out we were surfing down the following seas at a happy 10 knots, a state of affairs which would have landed us in our first port of call in a mere 4 and a half days time. We didn’t want to stop, to turn back and fight our way into the wind and the swell, to bash our way through the night back to the place from where I had yelled at Harvey ‘See you in Bequia!’ as we quietly slipped out of our cramped little berth. So we spent the night gathering more information to enable us to decide if it was foolhardy to carry on. Calls to New Zealand on the satellite phone, part numbers and Volvo dealers located across the world. What if we just DHL it to the Cape Verdes? No turning back, it will be there by the time we get there, a plan to keep the crew happy and motivated, but on further examination not necessarily safe. What if the pump blew before we got there? No pump, no power, who aboard could navigate by the starts? What if that angry looking low we had seen lingering to the north west didn’t get swallowed up by the spiralling Azores high? What if, instead, it was pushed down to the south gaining momentum as it headed our way? What if we couldn’t fight into it, had to head further south and missed the Cape Verdes all together. ‘What if?’, What if ?’ rumbled through the night until at 4am it became to much. The pole was brought in, the main was gybed over and back to Tenerife we went. Back in a longer, bouncier more tortuous way; zig zagging towards our destination, jumping over waves. What had previously felt like a gentle rolling wind, by the change in angle to our little vessel, suddenly felt like a gale. Even my, usually hardy stomach, was beginning to feel green. I started to wonder if I had taken on more than I could swallow, if I wasn’t actually cut out for this crossing of oceans. 18 knots of wind, granted on the nose, but still it was only 18 knots and I was already feeling sick! But then Craig appeared, rapidly through the companionway; he knelt over the leeward rail and threw up whatever he had eaten last over the side. Instantly I relaxed. He had endured worse seas than this for 10 days on the trot when Osprey crossed the north Atlantic, beating their way into the lows, yet he was throwing up and I was (barely, but still I contained it) managing to keep it in. There was hope for me on this ocean crossing after all!

12 hours later, weary and hungry, we arrived back into the unfathomably peaceful Marina del Atlantico. A different berth gave us a different view, hey, we could almost be somewhere else. Thankfully my already rehearsed explanations went unused, a new boat was nestled against the concrete wall where Harvey had stood and waved us off. Sea Hawk had left, taken the same window as us, but they were still on their way, and we were not, we were back here searching for a part.

A stationary 4 hours sleep and we awoke to the day, hardly believing that the previous 2 days had occurred at all. Emails had been answered whilst we slept in our bunks and phone calls were made over cereal and tea. Parts were located in New Zealand and Belgium and eventually to our surprise in Tenerife itself. We hired a car and drove to the side of the island where package holidays are contained. We found our man on the first floor of a shopping centre inhabited by aimlessly wandering tourists who seemed unsure as to what they were supposed to be doing on this much anticipated break in the sun. Young and German and fluent in our lingo he produced our part like the trophy it was. He explained how to fit it, what had worn and how the leak had meant it had been sucking in air. We shuddered at the thought of our engine overheating and seizing itself up into a lump of motionless metal without the steady flow of sea water to cool it. Coming back had been the right thing to do after all.

He wished us luck and added as what seemed like an after thought ‘I’m going across the Atlantic too’. We nodded in acknowledgment; another person crossing from here was hardly an occurrence to stop us in our steps. We were nearly out through the door when he casually added ‘but I’m rowing across’. It took a few seconds to absorb what he had said, then we turned on our heels and stared at him in disbelief. He showed us a picture of a vulnerable looking little open boat with 2 people sitting and pulling on oars. Twenty five or so boats, it appears, do this race of madness every year. They row across the Atlantic. The record, held by Kiwis, is forty three days. Our friendly German was proud to explain that they were the first ever team from Tenerife and they were hoping to do it in fifty. Fifty days, rowing across the ocean?! We exchanged satellite phone numbers and promised to keep in touch whilst we were out there. We left that shop suddenly feeling the scale of our insanity for attempting to sail across one of the world’s great oceans diminishing rapidly beneath our feet. He was the nutter, not us!

Last night we celebrated our success with Spanish steak and beers and I survived my third cigarette-free night. (The boat is a smoke free zone so I stopped once we set sail. Now we are back it seems pointless to pick up the habit for a token few days, it will only make the proceeding days at sea harder to bear.) We may have not come far geographically over the last few days but now we are a team who have been coerced together by the shared goal of wanting to get the hell back out of this joint. Everyone, it seems is getting ready to go. The industrious sounds of tapping on metal fill the marina from every corner, last minute checks and double checks and repairs. We have found another hitch, but this newly formed team is unperturbed. The adjacent part to this one is worn as well. In hindsight we should have removed it before. But Peter, the German, is on the case, we will have to wait until Monday to find out whether one exists on the island, if not then the wait will be longer again. But eventually we will leave and perhaps the wind will come with us, perhaps our new window will have been worth waiting for in the end.

Sooty, for one, is happy that we returned. His owners are expected back any day now after a hurried return to France. When they left here, their cat with a strange French name was missing. They put a notice on their boat, the cat was found, renamed and Osprey became his home. Yesterday he was lounging on the deck of a mega-yacht looking down at us snootily pretending he had never known us. But today he is back, curled up happily in the cockpit, waiting with us for the part that, hopefully, will be our long awaited ticket out of here!

We can't see the goal!

2007-09-14T23:44:00.000+01:00

My house sits perched on the edge of a valley that is Port Elizabeth. From my porch I can see straight down this tranquil valley and out to the crescent shaped harbour of Admiralty Bay. The bottom of this valley is a flat, fertile flood plain, not peppered with patches of small domestic agriculture, as you would expect, but a patch of grass that is the hub of this town, a green rectangular playing field.

Throughout summer it was cricket which inhabited this space, with a tiered concrete stadium on the north side. Now autumn is upon us (although no leaves are turning here) and the football season has begun. Matches are played as the heat falls out of the sun. They finish just before the great glowing orange ball immerses itself in the harbour and extinguishes its heat for another 12 hours. At around 4.00 every Wednesday and Friday evening I can almost track the highlights of the match from my house through the jubilant and derogatory noises of the crowd.

Just below my house there is a wall which holds the road to the edge of the valley. People sit and linger here and watch the football as they pass. Tonight I joined them to watch the game. There was the white team and the fluorescent yellow team. Most of the white team had dreadlocks and any time one of them touched the ball the crowd would cry 'go rasta go!'. They even addressed each other as rasta, 'here rasta", 'pass rasta'. It struck me that this was a trifle confusing and may account for the team of flying dreads being 3-1 down to the belisha beacons.

The pitch is still raw from the season of cricket, with a gaping brown scar down the middle where the crease had been. It is tended to, it seems, by grazing goats in the day and in the season becomes a place for sound systems and dancing after dark.

Young boys, seemingly oblivious to the match, played their own game as they kicked a ball around behind the sidelines. The crowd exploded with cheers and taunts every time the ball approached a goal. From our elevated seats on the whitewashed wall we could only tell when the white team had scored by the reaction of the crowd. A beautiful young 'dread' with Egyptian cheekbones had greeted me when I perched myself onto this exclusive viewing spot. Not with a word or a sound, just a nod. As the game progressed he ventured a bit further down the conversational field, the talk was preceded by the customary offering of a half smoked joint which he pulled out of his back pack and lit as if he had been saving it for this precise moment. He asked me where I was from and if I was enjoying the game. 'It's a nice spot' he said 'only problem, you can't see the goal for the mango tree. It doesn't matter tho' he said 'we like it'.

I liked it too, high up above the pitch, looking out to sea as the sun was setting. Watching the vibrant colour washing itself out of the island as the evening haze marched in. Taking in the game which seemed to have drawn every inhabitant of the town to participate in the accompanying vocal chorus I emptied my mind, smiled again at the beautiful cheekbones and felt a deep seated sense of being part of this place. I didn't mind either that we couldn't see the goal.

UPDATE:
Last night I met Egyptian cheekbones man in the street. He hailed me from the darkness and greeted me with the handshake of a clenched fist; knuckles touching knuckles. He introduced himself as, wait for it, 'Specialist Ninja Man'. Not just any Ninja man then, a specialist one to boot!

Local lingo

2007-09-08T17:23:00.000+01:00

There is feeling, simplicity and clarity in the local lingo which is easy to be seduced by and eventually embrace. That is when you can understand it of course! The locals are fully aware that once they slip into their personal patwa they may as well be speaking another language as far as us whities are concerned. I would like to think that my ear is gradually tuning in and beginning to make sense of the hidden vowels and consonants but it may all just be an illusion. The only clue I can usually grasp which hints that I am being talked about is the proliferation of the word 'she' in every sentence.

When I first arrived I joked about the cat's mother but really I found the overuse of 'she' when referring to women as mildly offensive. On further examination though I have noticed that the men cop it too. 'He' and 'she' is used here in the traditional sense in which we use it at home. It is, however, also substituted for his and hers. So if someone is talking about 'her father' they will say 'she father' instead. This can lead to a lot of shes in one breath. For instance:

'She went to pick up she child from school and take he back to she house where she cooked he some dinner'

Once you have clicked it makes perfect sense and being referred to constantly as 'she' is no longer a problem.

They use the same words here but in different ways and sometimes to great affect. If you are thinking about a person or a situation too much, so much so that you become preoccupied or stressed, you are said to be 'studying' . If your girlfriend has run off with someone else and you hit the bottle to drown out the hurt and the pain then you are 'studying she too much'. I like that. For that is what you do. You are not just 'thinking' about her in a situation like that. You are going over and over the whys and wherefores. You are studying the situation and trying to work it out and usually it is best to stop. I have been told many a time not to study something or someone too much and usually it has been fine advice.

If you are going somewhere for lunch, let's say to Dawns, a lovely little Creole restaurant on the beach, you are not going to Dawns, you are going by Dawns. This has the added advantage of being slightly unspecific. I am forever calling people on their cell phones and asking them where they are; 'by Andy's' they will say. Which means, in all reality, that they can be anywhere in the near vicinity of Andy's, they do not actually have to be at Andy's. This can make tracking people down an exasperating experience. You usually find them in the end though. This, as I have said many a time, is a small small place. It is uncanny the amount of times you are talking about someone and lo and behold a few moments later they will show up, as if they knew.

You are always hailed and acknowledged by people who know you as you pass. They shout your name, a greeting or sometimes just a sound. Some will stop and chat and some will walk on by. The ones who acknowledge you but do not stop are known literally here as shouting friends. People you know, who also know you but with whom you do not have a personal relationship. Acquaintances, we would call them at home, but I much prefer shouting friends.

And what do these shouting friends of mine shout at me? A long time ago I wrote about the myriad of terms, mostly derogatory, that have been assigned to me over the years due to my elevated height. Lamppost, Giraffe, Lofty, Gangley, the list goes on. Here, I have found myself a new name and it is I want to hold on to. It is celebratory and positive, complementary in the way it is spoken. When I walk the streets of Bequia I am greeted from bars, from beneath the shade of trees, from the markets and from boats. 'Tallest!' echoes across the streets and the waves. Tallest by name and Tallest by nature, Tallest I will forever be.

What do I do all day?

2007-09-06T17:16:00.000+01:00

The sultry season is well and truly upon us. The harbour front is closing down and the staff of the little restaurants and bars are taking their much needed holiday. They work all year round until now, the summer, the quiet season, the hot season, when they close for a month and we all retreat to our homes waiting for life to return in November.

They say if you can survive a summer in Bequia you are 'hardcore'. We are getting there but are not yet through the worst. 'The worst' of course is all relative. What can be bad about living on a Caribbean Island? Nothing really, nothing is bad. But it is trying at times, a test of something. 'Silly season' they call it; the summer. There is little to do and even less people to do it with, but still we pass our time.

People at home ask me what I do all day. 'Nothing' I reply playfully. I try to convince them that it is a fine art this nothingness. You wrestle, at first, with guilt and restlessness. 'I should be doing something, I should be busy'. It takes not weeks but months to wind yourself down to a state where you can happily wake up each morning with no idea of what you are going to do. But still the day passes and happily, usually. I still fight the inbuilt urge of list writing. If I have more than a couple of things to be achieved in a day I feel I should write it down. But I don't, I stop myself, I just get on and do it. If I forget something there is always tomorrow.

I have moved house again this week and extended my visa; these have been stressful times. House hunting here, like everything, is done by word of mouth. There is no register or list of places to rent. You carry on with your daily life and ask everyone you know or pass whether they know of anywhere that's free. I was passed from person to person, driven from this place to that. I discovered secret gems and art studios high up on deeply vegetated hills and finally landed in the new place I call home.

Extending your visa is always a nerve wracking experience. There is no rhyme or reason to how the system works. When I first arrived I was given 3 months. I went away, sailed to North America and on my return was given only a month. The visa extending process usually involves going to immigration, filling in a form, showing them your flight ticket out of here and stripping yourself of all the freedom you have ever known by leaving your passport with them for 3 days. You return, anxiously to collect it, are met by an expressionless face which gives nothing away, and are eventually told to go to the next desk to buy your $25 stamp. This is the signal that you are in, you have made it, you can stay.

This time however it was different. For starters I was given a new form to fill in, a 'sponsorship form'. This worried me slightly, why was it different? The form involved me tracking down my landlord and asking him for various details. He had to make a trip back up the hill to find his passport number for me. The form explicitly stated that even if you had a sponsor you were 'prohibited to work'. The next section asked for details of your employer! A trick question perhaps? Who knows, I left it blank. When I finally arrived back at immigration with all my forms complete they were closed, for lunch. An hour of loitering and chatting to friends and I finally went back and submitted it, gritted my teeth and handed over my passport. Without looking up he told me to go and buy my stamp. I looked at him perplexed, this usually happens when you collect your visa. I bought my stamp, carried it back across the room, he stuck it on the form, stamped my passport, and handed it back to me. That was it, no stripping of one's identity, no nervous 3 day wait, my visa was granted right there on the spot. No-one I know has ever had this happen to them. I have no idea whether it is to do with me or the mood of the man on the desk, but I walked out quickly, without looking back, in case he changed his mind!

And so the days go by. The laundry gets washed, the floor is swept and meal after meal is made. The beach is walked to, the length of the bay swum, talk is talked and gossip is passed.

And sometimes I actually sit down and write my blog!

Back to basics

2007-08-27T19:03:00.000+01:00

I am having what could be construed as a minor crisis. But I am not letting it become one. It is only a computer after all, stacked full of photos and the writing I have been doing since I moved out to the Caribbean. It has died, kaput, just when I had found a wireless connection from my house.

Technically speaking it is not actually dead. A light flickers when I turn it on, it even makes that celebratory de dah! niose of welcome as the hard drive starts whirring and I wait for the apple to appear on the screen. But it doesn't. Nothing does, the screen remains blank. Until yesterday when there was a moment of hope, the screen glowed, an apple appeared but was sliced from all sides by horizontal bands of colours and greys shooting across the screen, building up on top of each other until they swallowed the apple and just left a screen of flickering pixels which hurt my eyes so I turned it off.

So now I am back in the internet place. My lovely office with a harbour view lies abandoned. I have no tv at home, so internet and laptopless I am really back to basics. I have books, but they are running low. Having read every book with a gold embossed cover on the island, I was overjoyed to discover that Amazon deliver here. I have a consignment of literature to last me a year arriving ( I hope) in a couple of weeks.

It is a basic existance on this island of ours. I have bought nothing but food (and mostly local food at that) since I arrived 6 months ago. This is a girl who shopped for England. Nothing to do on a Saturday, well let's go shopping! I have a wardrobe large enough to clothe a (tall female) army back home. Yet in 6 months here I have bought nothing. And do you know what? I like it. Unecessary shopping is an unimaginable extravegance out here. But what you do have becomes emminantly valuable. You lose or break a watch, or a laptop, or a bikini at home; someone will fix it or you treat yourself to a new one. 'I was fed up of that old thing anyway' you convince yourself and lo and behold another days shopping is legitimately on the cards! If it breaks or disappears on an island like this, that is it, no more and no replacement either until you can get yourself on a plane and back to the world where retail rules.

My laptop will have to lay dormant, until I go to Florida next month to deliver a boat. It is good timing in that respect. I am planning to be doing a fair amount of travelling over these next few months. The Caribbean is hot in the summer, and although I love the heat even I feel disabled sometimes when I emerge from under the shade of a tree and feel my scalded skin sapping the energy from my legs. Yesterday was spent in the sea and the sea alone. The sand on the beach was too hot to walk on so I had to wait until sunset until the soles of my feet could bear to bring my body out of the water. Everything is hot and everyone is hot too. The place is emptying out like an upturned skip, fewer and fewer people grace the streets and the bars. People are leaving, to escape the heat and the poverty of summer. No tourists equals no money for most people here. So they follow the crowds and make money elsewhere until the trickle of sparkling skinned whities begins again in November.

For those that do remain times are tough and tempers run high. Everyone is living off each other. Deals are struck from person to person as there is no one else left to do business with. I swear the same money is just passing around the island, each person taking his cut as it goes. I just hope that it lasts until the season, lasts until the trade winds and the tourists come back to freshen the air and the wallets.

Calm after the storm

2007-08-19T23:39:00.000+01:00

It is one of those evenings of summer tranquility in the tropics tonight. A pinkish haze is spreading across the watery sky; the intensity of its daytime colour fading away with the hours. The air is motionless and the valley is alive with early evening sounds. These are the precious hours, the cool hours. The disabling heat has dissipated with the falling sun yet there is still lingering light to work by. There is the steady chipping sound of hoes in the ground and music wafting from homes all around. The children are shrieking as they play football in the playing field which sits at the base of the valley, a rare patch of horizontal ground on this island of crumpled hills. The birds are singing their twilight melodies, the dogs are barking warnings to each other across the town and harmonious, heartfelt voices are gliding from the many churches. Two local speed boats are cutting a streak across the harbour, on their way back to St Vincent, no doubt. The seas must be calm enough for them to make their Sunday trip, to come and join the gathering that is Lower Bay on a Sunday. The day when locals and expats go to the beach to eat, drink and play.

There is still debris around the harbour’s edge thrown by the waves which pounded the shore when hurricane Dean passed 100 miles to the north of us. The roads and footpaths are hidden under a film of grimey brown mud; residue from the torrents of rain which produced rivers along every gulley. The, usually dry, storm drains are trickling with water still, 3 days after the storm hit its peak. The harbour is glassy flat and back to its natural blue. For several hours on Friday there was a sharp line across the bay, the boundary between brown and blue. The run off from the hills poured into the harbour, filling it with deposits from all over the island. The storm drains are often used as garbage disposal ditches, people chuck everything in them. Then when it rains the waste ends up in the harbour.

Everything, it seems, has gone back to normal here. It is hard to believe that the southern coast of Jamaica is being pounded by 140mph winds as I type, by the very same hurricane which has since grown into a monster. The Prime Minister has asked people to evacuate their houses to one of the many hurricane shelters set up around the island in schools, churches and hospitals. They have instead stayed at home. Fearful of crime and looting they prefer to put their lives at risk than abandon their properties. I hope for them all that the gamble pays off.

The gunshot murder, the first, remains unsolved but someone has been charged with the drunken brawl one. So tomorrow is Monday, another day in paradise as we like to remind ourselves here. Perhaps this week will be quieter, without killing or storm, but doubtless something will come up to write back home about!

Here he is......

2007-08-16T17:33:00.000+01:00

Hurricane Dean. Looking likely to hit Dominica and/or Guadeloupe or Martinique...tomorrow. Still sunny in Bequia but the wind is freshening and there is a sinister haze in the air.

7pm Thursday: UPDATE

A dark black cloud crept over the hills, the wind picked up from the deadly tense stillness and the rain began; the thunder and the lightening.

Dean has been upgraded to a Cat 2 hurricane. Only tropical storm conditions are expected here. He is expected to hit Martinique, Dominica, Guadeloupe or St Lucia. Still, the prime minister has addressed the nation, said the conditions could be life threatening; winds, rain, flooding, landslides, sea surges, suddenly it seems a bit scary. The excitement has turned to nervousness. The neighbours have hammered corrugated iron sheets over their windows. The dogs have been fighting and the roosters squealing and the cat has just dashed in, soaked.

Midday Friday

Well we got off pretty lightly. That initial storm last night was almost the worst. After that it was calm again and remained so until I went to bed at 2am. I heard pounding rain through the night, but not for long, an hour or so.

I awoke this morning to an overcast, pleasantly fresh Bequia. The wind is streaming in from the SW, the opposite direction to the prevailing Trade Winds. The boats in the harbour are facing the wrong way and waves are breaking on the usually calm shore. The bay is full of ferries from Martinique and St Lucia taking cover. Several have tried to leave this morning but beat a hasty retreat once they left the protection of the harbour and quickly came back.

The eye of the storm grazed the southern tip of Martinique. So luckily no-one was directly hit. However wind and rain has been raging in Martinique, Dominica and St Lucia. Buildings have lost roofs and landslides are expected.

Dean is set to intensify, however, and become a very dangerous hurricane. The heat of the Caribbean waters will fuel it up and it may reach category 4 or even 5. We have got off lightly but it is looking bad for others out there.

Tropical storm Dean is on his way

2007-08-15T02:09:00.000+01:00

Forecast to be Hurricane Dean by Friday....and damn near us!

UPDATE:

Currently most models show him passing about 100 miles north of us (St Vincent)and making landfall in Martinique, Guadeloupe and/or Dominica...keep watching.

eek...I am becoming a weather geek....like my dad!

My new office

2007-08-14T16:26:00.000+01:00

complete with wireless!....

Somebody else dead

2007-08-13T02:25:00.000+01:00

Sunday night again, but this one was earlier. No gunshot, as far as I know. The man was taken away in an ambulance and, apparently, died in hospital. He had been found lying in the street by the power station.

Last Sunday’s murder is still unsolved. I do not know, yet, whether this one is being treated as murder, but the police are apparently all over the streets tonight and names are already being bandied about. Is this death related to the murder or is it entirely coincidental? Perhaps it was illness or a fight gone wrong. I can’t believe there is a serial killer on the loose. Perhaps the dead man was about to squeal on the culprit of the last one. These theories are all in my head, God knows what talk will be flying round the streets tomorrow. I am staying safe at home tonight with kitten.

My friend, Wilf, has now been questioned four times by the police about last Sunday’s murder. They ask him the same questions each time, he is getting scared. He went to see a lawyer who told him that the police couldn’t be stopped from questioning him,
‘They are just doing their job’ he said.
He told Wilf that plenty of others had been to see him complaining of the same thing. This calmed him down a bit, knowing that he wasn’t the only one. Every time they come they tell him that they’ll be back.
‘Why would they warn you that they are coming back?’ said the lawyer ‘it is just a tactic, they won’t be back, they are just trying to see if you will run’
‘Where would I run?’ exclaimed Wilf, sitting on this island of 7 square miles.
‘They think you might run like OJ’ said the lawyer. They both laughed at this, it lightened the atmosphere, and Wilf’s mind.
‘They need evidence, and you can’t do anything unless they charge you’
‘But I didn’t do it!’ cried Wilf.
‘Well I’m very pleased to hear that’ retorted this serene man ‘in that case you will be fine’.

This latest news has sent a chill up my spine. I hope it is a coincidence, this death, and not another murder. I saw the murdered man’s father in the street yesterday. He was dressed smartly in his Captain’s clothes, still working, still keeping on. I touched his shoulder and offered my condolences. He shook my hand and quietly said ‘I hope they catch someone soon’.

UPDATE:

It was murder. A fight, extra strong rum was involved. Someone has been picked up for it. It is seemingly unrelated to the one last week.

The first ever murder in Bequia was 7 years ago. Since then there has been 1 every year. Now there have been 2, unrelated, in 1 week.

Murder she wrote

2007-08-08T16:45:00.000+01:00

The peace in paradise was shattered at 2am on Monday morning by the sound of a gunshot which woke me from my sleep. I was snoozing on the ‘bed’ on my porch and was confused about what had woken me. I stumbled inside in the darkness and climbed into my real bed, enclosed and protected by a mosquito net. I didn’t remember the sound of the gunshot until I heard the stories the following morning.

The previous night I had been walking home in the twilight when I came across a huge gathering of people outside Julie’s guest house (Julie is a man!). People were spilling out into the road dressed in more than just their Sunday best. They were sporting suits and shiny silk dresses, rubber slippers had been replaced by sparkling stilettos and the women had plaited and straightened and woven their hair. It was a spectacular sight. We are usually a shabby bunch us residents of Bequia, so I changed my route so that I could wander through this gleaming crowd and take the spectacle in. A wedding party and most of the island seemed to be there.

As I walked into town in the morning a small boy playing with his sister in the dry storm drain by the road shouted something to me, or at me I wasn’t sure. I didn’t catch what he said so smiled at him and continued to walk. As I rounded the corner I was confronted by a yellow police tape stretching across the road. Suddenly the penny dropped ‘you can’t go down there!’ is what the boy had yelled. I turned and climbed back up the hill telling him ‘I should have listened to you’ as I passed. ‘What happened?’ I asked him, ‘Somebody dead’ he solemnly replied.

I wandered down into the harbour through the back streets. For anyone unfamiliar with the place the town would have looked a picture of tranquillity. But I could sense a change in atmosphere. The gaggles of people sitting on steps in the shade and under the leafy protection of the almond trees was normal, it was the looks on their faces that were different. Dark and serious, something had happened.

An old lady standing by the police barrier told me someone had died, but she was still unsure of the cause. The area that was cordoned off was yards from where the wedding party had been held, there had to be some connection, I thought. Sitting outside the, ironically named, Rush Hour eating my chicken and rice I listened as facts were passed back and forth.

‘It was a gun’ someone declared as they walked in ‘shot in the head’. Everyone knew the boy. His father is the captain of the local schooner which I have been working on. It was his sister’s wedding which I had walked through. But the boy had been in trouble; ‘a vagrant’ and ‘a crack head’ he was variously described as. He had been “troublin’” everyone for months.

“But still he doesn’t deserve to be dead!” someone cried
“Not with a gun”
“If you’re vexed with he, just let he know, even attack he with a knife would be better, at least he has a chance”
‘Nobody has a chance against a gun”

Someone else bounced in for his lunch “what’s happenin’ man?” he asked as a casual greeting
“You not heard about the murder?”
“Wha’ murder?”
“Last night”
“Serious?”
They filled him in on what they knew and he hung his head in his hands ”I’m going home, not hungry any more, I feel different” and he left.

This murder has hit the place hard, not because of the death so much but because he was killed with a gun. The neighbouring island of St Vincent is gun city. A pointless killing every week and few of them are solved. But Bequia is different and proud of it, a quality which people seem to respect. Even the Vincy boyz leave their arms at home when they visit.

So now that everyone knows the facts, the next task at hand is to decide who was to blame. 30 officers have come over by boat from St Vincent. An island of 7 square miles and 3000 people all of whom know each other. A wedding party of hundreds and a night watchman on duty in the school yard where the body was found. Sounds like a straightforward nut to crack. But things in the West Indies have a habit of complicating themselves. There are stories and gossip and bribes and corruption. The watchman is still being held which has compounded the talk.

The dead man was gay, or so they say and the watchman was a ‘batty boy’ too. This is where the theories start to spiral.

“If they were having sex and the watchman was afraid he would talk, maybe he kill he”

The poor watchman is a marked man now, guilty or not. There were jokes flying too amongst the serious talk. My friend Wilf had knocked the dead boy out in a fight 2 nights before. “It’s you, it’s you!” “Murderer!” they laughed. The gossip and the jokes became less funny when Wilf was questioned by the police the following night. They made him take them around the town and meet all his alibis, the people he had been with when he heard the shot. But still they joke and taunt him. They know it wasn’t him so they think it is still funny. He, not surprisingly, does not. But that is the humour here, it is harsh and direct. There is no room for a sensitive soul in this Caribbean world.

There is a unanimous feeling that it is “someone not from here”. No-one from Bequia would do a thing like that, they say. I would tend to agree, but then what do I know.

There is a white man in the picture too. He is the one the locals are pinning it on. A German who lives alone on his boat. He is based here but frequently sails off on trips between the islands; ‘running drugs’ is the word on the street. He reappeared last week. Arrived agitated and aggressive at Penthouse (the local rum shack, another ironically named establishment!) an hour after the bullet was fired. And, it is said, he had blood on his shirt. Well the blood could have been paint, or any such thing, we are a scruffy lot here, as I said.

So, Wilf has hit the bottle again with the stress of the accusations, the German has moved his boat but has not left the island and the watchman is still banged up. I will keep you posted but the plot is thickening and these are tense times in paradise.

Feedback from Radio 4 Saturday Live interview

2007-07-20T17:45:00.000+01:00

Fi Glover and her team have kindly sent me some of the feedback from the interview which I did with them. I am posting it below as it is fascinating to hear other people's stories......

Dear Fi and team….,
Coming Off Antidepressants
I suffer from clinical depression and was on the infamous Seroxat for some seven years in the 1990s.
Getting on to them was a bit tricky, with giddy fits, dry mouth incidents of ‘electric head’, but this was as nothing to getting off them.

They did work to a certain extent, but they took the highs out of ones mood more than they took the lows, and I came to realise I could only deal with my depression if I could feel the whole range of my moods and not have them clouded by Seroxat.

So I came off them. Didn’t refer to my doctor, I just stopped taking them. A very bad thing to do, I learned later.
Coming off them the room would swim about before me I got periods of giddiness such that I could not get out of a chair. I live alone and I was not working at the time, so I just got on with it. My moods went up and down and my emotions were greatly heightened. I listened to the radio a lot and anything with a bit of pathos had me in tears and I reacted strangely to stuff I heard. Desert Island Discs never failed to make me weep!

The worst thing was the ‘electric head’ thing. I only heard the term afterwards but understood what was meant. ‘Electric Head’ are shocks a bit like having an instant hit of extreme pins and needles deep inside the head, with a sort of electric shock crackle in the ears. Alarming, more than painful, but something otherwise unknown in ‘normal’ life.

The whole coming-off-Seroxat experience lasted, for me, about a week to ten days, then I was through it.
I went to see my doctor. He was ‘alarmed’ at the way I’d taken myself off Seroxat, to say the least, but he accepted that I’d done it and let it go.

The controversy about Seroxat (a la Panorama programmes) is that it promotes suicidal tendencies. I dispute this strongly… I felt suicidal whilst on Seroxat. Now I’m off it, I still feel suicidal at times. I’m depressed for Chris’sakes… It makes you suicidal; ‘tis the nature of the beast!

Thanks for the show – I got a mention last week with my Saturday Live – An Audio Duvet. That one’s a bit weak. I like my Saturday Live – It’s a Morning Glory myself!

****************************************************
I came off anti depresseants (Prossac) two and a half years ago after about five years on them.

I suggested coming off to the GP and he had to reluctantly agreed when he saw my determination. I'd had enough of being made to feel mentaly and physicaly inferior by the side effects. I don't think the drugs did anything to help anyway. If anti depressants work, why is there so much depression around the place? I had to do my own research and told the doctor how to help the process such as, prescribing medication in liquid form to make it easier to cut down dose slowly. Also when it comes to small amounts of medication making use of baby spoons or child despensers.

I have never regreted my decision and I imediatly began feeling better having made the decision. find groups or similar people to talk to and barrack the doctor for alternative therapies with no hidden agenda don't let them automaticaly reach for the drug company manual.

**************************************************

Dear Fi
I can tell you with authority that there are 209 grains in every capsule of Effexor (Venlafxine). I know this because I spent 6 months opening capsules and counting them out so that I could reduce the dose by one or two grains per day, in order to get my husband off the dreadful things.

They seemed to help for about a month and then suddenly it was as if he had broken through the mood-containment they initially provide and suddenly, his mood swings up and down became even more extreme. I got used to receiving phone calls from him asking me to come and rescue him from somewhere as he felt unable to move and was terrified he was going to do something sudden like leap in front of a bus.

Stopping the drugs cold made his mood even more unhinged. He started self-harming, cutting his arms, saying it was only thing he could do that made him feel anything at all. He once played noughts and crosses with himself with a knife on his arm. This formerly gentle man would lash out at me at times, dragging me by my collar, tipping food over my head, and even threatening me with a knife.

Long story short, reducing grain-by-grain took 6 months. Even then, his depression through that time was worse than at any other time in his life.

He' doesn't take antidepressants any longer. He's still depressed but at least it's his depression, and he knows his feelings now are genuinely his own, not drug induced.

*************************************

I have just heard your interview with the lady who suffered PTSD. There are NICE guidelines which explain that anti-depressants are NOT appropriate treatment for PTSD - a course of expert counselling is appropriate, and the NHS are setting up centres that offer this around the country, although there is great ignorance among many GP's regarding the nature of PTSD and the effectiveness of counselling, and, sadly, we have, through our charity, many cases of victims of fatal and serious road crashes simply being prescribed anti-depressants, which can mask symptoms, not aid recovery, and be very difficult to come off. PLEASE ADVISE YOUR LISTENERS THAT THEY SHOULD READ THE NICE GUIDELINES ON THE NICE WEBSITE RELATING TO PTSD IF THEY THINK THEY ARE SUFFERING FROM THIS DEBILITATING CONDITION.

************************

Shock and trauma needs to be processed through the body not the brain. The anti-depressants suppressed your symptoms until you came off them – the shaking and coldness is the body’s natural response to trauma – it is in fact the shock discharging.

*******************************

Re treatment of people with PTSD
There is at least one very good non-medical intervention, the Rewind Technique, which can be used by trained therapists. It takes minutes to do and is very successful as it works with the brain's memory-forming mechanisms. Unfortunately it is not widely available, and to have it recommended by N.I.C.E involves extremely expensive clinical testing which, as the technique doesn't involve big drug companies, is too expensive to do.

Poeple should read a book called "Prozac Backlash" if they want to know how drug companies have "lost" damaging info on addiction and serious long-lasting side effects caused by their products. We should always remember that these companies ARE NOT OUR FRIENDS - although very useful!

********************************
I have been on 3 seperate kinds of anti depressants - the third time because the waiting list for counselling in the area I lived in at the time (Wirral) was over a year long, and I was in such a state that they were worried for my safety. I actually wanted counselling as it was obvious after 2 bouts that the anti depressants were only masking the problem. I ended up being off work for 6 months, as much because the side effects of the pills were so severe with fatigue and disorientation as the depression itself. Subsequently I was taken off the tablets, and received 6 mths counselling after moving area. I have been anti depressant free for a year and a half now, and they help I received has given me different ways to deal with the symptoms when they arise.

*********************************

I've just been listening to the story of Kirsty's experiences with PTSD after 7/7. You may like to investigate (and to pass on to Kirsty) a relatively new and effective non-pharmaceutical treatment for PTSD that has been developed by the 'Human Givens' school of therapy. Google 'Human Givens' (or 'Mindfields College') and contact Joe Griffin, Ivan Tyrell or Piers Bishop for further information about the 'rewind' method. At first it sounds like some sort of magical procedure, but there is plenty of evidence that it works!

************************

Listening to the sad story of the bad sad effects of anti-depressants, I wonder if anyone has tried alternative medicines? There are so many available now which do not have bad side effects. I have been using homeopathy for more than 20 years and am just now doing an 8 week evening class, which is of course not comprehensive but there are so many remedies according to the precise personal symptoms that under an experienced homeopathic doctor, I'm sure they could find help. I have also done a short course in Bach Flower remedies and maybe some of these could help with expert guidance. I have not heard any discussions about anybodies use of alternative medicines, perhaps it would be interesting to hear other peoples' experiences.

A completely different successful use of alternative medicine was my finding an Alergy expert who was able to test me and successfully prescribe the right diet and herbal pills which cured a very debilitating and excruciating skin itchy rash which I had had for 20 months. I had seen my doctor several times and seen the chief dermatologist at the Jersey Hospital and all they could prescribe was anti-histamines and steroid creams, which just soothed the symptoms slightly and were not good to take as a long term treatment. The dermatoligist wrote an article in which he said that there was a lot that is not known or understood about 'skin' and it is difficult to treat. So I would say try an alergy test with an expert!

I hope this isnt too long for my first email but I do believe in the efficacy of alternative medicines rather than fill myself up with chemicals that are alien to the body. I hope this may be helpful.

**********************************

Hello Fi Glover and Saturday live team,
I heard with interest your excellent interview with Kirsty, the woman who suffered post traumatic stress disorder after 7/7, and her experience of withdrawal difficulties from her antidepressant medication. At the risk of blowing my own trumpet, I hope you will take note of my latest book and let Kirsty know of its existence.

Although the book addresses the wider condition of depression rather than being specifically concerned with ptsd, I feel confident that she will find useful information and guidance from this modest but reliable book [see attached press release]. Plus, it has great cartoons!

“Someting’s happenin!”

2007-07-18T18:44:00.000+01:00

I don’t know what it is about me and mad people. Aside from having gone slightly mad myself (with PTSD after the bombings) I seem to attract the friendship of people with unsound minds. Or maybe it is that I am attracted to them, I just don’t know.

A friend had arranged to take me to Mustique for lunch on the anniversary of 7/7 this year. He had arranged for a boat to pick us up and whisk me across the high seas to the manicured millionaire’s island a mere 7 miles from here. It was to be a surprise, a treat to take my mind off things. I can see it now from my porch as I write, but we never made it there that day.

Wilf is a friend from Bequia. A ‘typical’ West Indian rasta man. He has dreads and smokes weed and is always immaculately dressed in complementing bright Caribbean colours. He doesn’t drink alcohol, which is a rarity around here, he says it makes him into ‘a bad man’. For a couple of weeks there was calm in the rum shack at the harbour’s edge. The crew of the boat bringing over the molasses had been arrested for carrying drugs and the extra strong rum had consequently run dry. The men here drink this potent paint stripper of a drink neat with a water chaser. It is 80% proof and fuels violence and fights. Now it is back on the grocery store shelves and island fever has returned.

Two weeks ago Wilf took the boat to St. Vincent, the capital of this tiny collection of Grenadine Islands. He was going to sort out a new passport so that he could visit his son in England. But whilst he was there he was held up by 5 armed police, guns held to every part of his body, and robbed of the $800 in his pocket. Corruption in paradise runs rife. Who can you report it to when you’re mugged by the police themselves?

This was the trigger for the ‘bad man’ to return. He hit the bottle to mask out his pain and anger. The money was to fix his boat, on which he relies for his living, and to pay for his new passport. He drank himself into despair. If he couldn’t fix his boat he would never be able to make the money back to get the passport and he would never be able to see his son. A thought which has made him weep before me many a time. Emotions here run high and are worn openly on people’s sleeves. A far cry from the British stiff upper lip, it is normal to see a grown man crying, hear raised voices in the street and to pass people dancing with joy as they walk.

A week of the ‘bad man’ then a mad man appeared. A desperate phone call on the morning of the 7th
“Something’s happening, come quick!”.
I found him, face gleaming with tears, standing in front of his house.
“Every time I lie down I hear voices talking to me” he cried.
He said he had heard his mobile ringing in the night, even though it had run out of power, and when he put it to his ear there were voices on the other end. All night these voices had raged in his head, he asked me to take him to the hospital.

There was a gathering of people at the hospital entrance, people waiting patiently on benches, in the shade, to be seen. As we approached his eyes filled with terror and he started edging away from them backwards, finally turning and running out of the gate. I caught up with him to find him sweating and shaking, terrified of all who approached.
“I’m frightened of everybody” he told me “what’s happening to me?”.
He wandered around the village eyes streaming and his body dripping with sweat. He picked out his friends one by one
“Something’s happening” he repeated “I’m hearing voices in my head”. They all looked concerned and tried to help. One contacted the private doctor, who can usually be seen straight away without the nerve wracking queues at the public hospital, but he is a 7th day Adventist and doesn’t work on Saturdays.
“I’m hearing voices in my head’” Wilf told a passing old lady.
She looked deep in thought for a while and finally declared
“You need somebody who believes in the Lord God Almighty to get rid of that!”. He looked at her in despair and walked away.

I sat him in the shade under the almond tree to try and calm him down
“Who are you?” he asked me “are you an alien?”.
Another friend approached with a portrait of Che Gue Vara on his T shirt.
“Who’s that?’ Wilf asked, clearly terrified again ”Who’s that on your T-shirt?’ as he cowered under the tree “Go away, you’re frightening me”.

With the help of an old friend of his who is also a policeman we finally got him to the hospital. We walked through a small wooden door with peeling paint to find a man dressed in white sitting at a rickety wooden desk.
“We are only seeing emergencies” he said, without looking up.
“Who defines an emergency? You?’ asked the policeman incredulously as he marched through the room and into the main ward behind looking for a doctor.
“You can’t go in there” said the man in white sternly “And this is not an emergency”.
“Well in my opinion it is” replied the policeman “I have known this man a long time and I don’t like what I am seeing here”. Eventually, more through stubbornly refusing to leave the room that tactful negotiation, the man in white, who revealed himself to be a nurse, started talking to Wilf and asked him what was wrong.

Wilf told the story of voices and fear again. The nurse calmly asked him if he used marijuana or cocaine.
“I’m a ratsa man!” Wilf replied indignantly, “I don’t use cocaine”. He told of his mugging and the drinking and said he was afraid of people in the street.
“Are you afraid of me?” the young nurse asked calmly.
“No” my friend meekly replied.
“What do you think they are going to do to you?”
“Hurt me” he said.
“Do you think I am going to hurt you?”
”No”.
I was impressed with how this young man was handling the situation. He asked if he had ever had a breakdown before, if there was any history of it in his family.
“My Nana went senile” replied Wilf “a lot of my family gone that way”.
The nurse nodded and continued to make notes.
“Do you think you have any special powers?’” he asked and I knew where he was going. I have sat in enough small rooms with men in white and mad friends at my side. I know that a common symptom of mania is belief in holding extraordinary powers. The voices, the delusions and paranoia together with this belief would set the perfect scene for a manic episode. In my experience, your every day GP at home does not even know this, so this young nurse was winning my respect.
“Yes I have special powers” Wilf told him, and my heart shrank inside,
“Oh no, not again” I thought to myself.
“What sort of special powers?’ the nurse persevered.
“I can see inside people”.
“Oh God no!” I inwardly cried.
The nurse looked unmoved and asked if he could see inside him.
“Yes” said Wilf
“What can you see?”
“I can see you are a good man”. Relief flowed through me but the nurse was not yet convinced. He picked up his stethoscope and waved it at Wilf
“You can’t see solid things like this inside me?’”
“No” Wilf solemnly replied, not even flinching at the absurdity of the question. “I can just see that you are a good man”.

The nurse seemed satisfied and picked up the phone, apparently speaking to the doctor. His mumbling and his accent made him hard to understand but I gathered he was giving the doctor a brief synopsis. More mumbling, more notes, the phone went down and he walked over to the counter and picked up a syringe.
“Your blood pressure is very high, I am going to give you something for it”. There was muttering of Valium and other drugs incomprehensible to me. The doctor hadn’t even seen him yet the nurse was ready to give him a cocktail! Wilf started to quiver again
“No! I am allergic to lots of things, I’m not taking no mad person’s medicine, I’m feeling much better, I don’t need no drugs”.
“Well” the nurse replied sternly “I have no idea why you came to see me then”.
“You have made me feel better” Wilf told him and hurriedly we left. He was right, though, the nurse had helped, just by listening and talking and diagnosing a tangible physical problem of high blood pressure.

I took him back home, fed and watered him and put him to bed. He slept fitfully for a few hours and awoke looking drained and exhausted. Over the last few days he has complained of a racing heart a couple of times but there have been no further episodes. He has been eating like a horse and is slowly regaining his strength.

His insight is remarkable. Not just in the aftermath, but even at the time he was acutely aware of what was happening to him. I have seen people talking to themselves, to their voices, unaware that they are doing so, unaware that there was anything wrong with them. I have spoken to so many men, particularly black men, in hospitals in London who stringently deny their illnesses. It is, I think, a matter of stigma and pride. To admit that you are mentally ill makes you less of a man, to admit it is losing, better to deny it and keep a glimmer of hope that it can yet be beaten. But this was different and fascinating because of it. No hushed whispers, no hiding away, no denials or refusals to seek medical help. He was out there in the street wailing, desperate, telling all that were passing “Something’s happenin, something’s wrong”.

Perhaps it is the security of a small island community that made him feel able to do this. His friends are still concerned, looking out for him, but there seems to be no stigma attached to the fact that he went a little doollaley for a while and he shows no sign of embarrassment or shame. It’s just something that happened, and everyone is glad that he’s better. Perhaps it happens here all the time which is why no one batted an eyelid, I suspect not, though. I suspect that this is just the way of dealing with things here. People are open with their emotions, their troubles and their joys and are not, it seems, judged for it.

We, at home, would do well to learn from this lack of inhibition and openness, particularly where matters of the mind are concerned.

2 years on

2007-07-07T21:13:00.000+01:00

Sometimes it takes your tube being blown up on the way to work one summer morning to put the hum drum repetitiveness of your life into perspective. I took that same journey every day for a year and a half after 7th July trying to prove that I wasn’t scared, fighting a non existent battle with the already dead bombers. I wasn’t going to change my life just because of them, I wasn’t going to let them win. Gradually it dawned that they would never win, they are dead along with their innocent victims who they murdered that day, but I am alive and lucky to be so.

A Christmas card came from friends in New Zealand, ‘Carpe Diem’ it signed off whilst planting a seed. Ten years of working and commuting across London in dark overcrowded tunnels did not, suddenly, seem like the best way of living my life. In January I resigned from my job of 4 years and by the end of February I was living in a timber hideaway perched amongst the tree tops on a luscious green hill with a porch overlooking the tropical Atlantic Ocean. I live on the wild side of this little island in the Caribbean. Nine square miles, 3,500 human inhabitants and hundreds and thousands of others which bear no resemblance to human beings whatsoever. There are bats and lizards, snakes and manacou, humming birds, fireflies, cicadas and frogs. Last week I found an albino locust blown over from sub Saharan Africa along with hazy dust from the desert. The trade winds blow in from the east keeping my house cool with fresh ocean air. As the summer descends dark storms pass through, short and sudden, with wind so strong that the rain feels like hail stones against your skin. The animals awake and the parched vegetation smiles with shiny greenness sucking up the moisture as the heavy clouds pass. There is no water resident on this tropical island, only that which falls from the sky. We collect it on our roofs and store it in large echoing tanks underneath our houses. Rain is a blessing here, not the cold curse it is at home.

I transport myself down from this hill in my red mini moke, canvas shading the sun from above and sides open to the breeze and cooling rain, down through the valley filled with a dancing coconut plantation. Pencil thin trunks with an ecstatic growth of palm leaves at their head, bulbous coconuts waiting to fall on the grazing goats below. I wind back up another hill, past the hairpin bend that is ‘jumbie’ corner. The old folks believe that the spirits of the dead live here and the youngsters delight in frightening them with their tales. At the crest of this hill the vast natural harbour, which has made this place a haven for boat men for centuries, comes into view. A small town has spread its way along the valley and the main street runs along the water front. The harbour is lined with sandy white beaches and is filled with boats, some resident and many passing through. The population here changes every day, new faces being blown in by the wind and old ones sailing out to pastures new. This is a place where people live off the sea. One of the few places in the world where whaling is still allowed, so steeped is it in their culture. The two traditional whaling boats, complete with sails and spears are permitted to catch two whales each a year. So far this year only one has been caught. It was taken to the whaling station (built by the Japanese) out on a little island off the windward shore. Hundreds of people descended at dawn, braving the rocky island in high seas to buy their whale meat and blubber. It was the talk of the town, spirits ran high and there was a carnival atmosphere in the air. In the days before refrigeration the blubber was boiled into oil with the meat cooking inside. This oil preserved the meat for up to a year, stored in a bucket in the shade under their houses. To this day the people of the small whaling village are known for the beauty of their singing voices, said to be lubricated by years of drinking oil from the whales.

It is a small but eclectic community who choose to call this place their home. Locals and expats living uneasily but peacefully together. There is so little crime that the theft of a flashlight is thought worthy of a report to the police. Little is done, and people accused of more severe crimes can buy their way out of a prison sentence. The main pastime here, as far as I can see, is sitting around and talking. The almond tree at the harbour’s edge is the unofficial town hall under which there is always a gathering debating the issues of the day. Sometimes political, but more often than not just plain old gossip. Talking about other people is a national sport here and one in which I happily participate!

Last week I returned from a journey through the elements which cleansed my mind deeper than ever before. I sailed, from this very harbour to another old whaling island in North America. 2,000 miles in a 50 ft schooner through an ocean that was sometimes 4 miles deep and I found myself in Martha’s Vineyard. Six days at sea before we found Bermuda and a further five from there before we reached our destination. We left Antigua to the sight of a humpback whale and awoke the following morning to dolphins over breakfast. After that we had 5 days of very very little. A bird spent an hour trying to land on our mast which was the only life we saw for days. Suddenly the little things become major events at sea. We saw a moon bow (a monochrome rainbow lit by a full moon at night) the green flash as the sun rose, shooting stars and satellites and a never ending expanse of ocean, sky & horizons. The clouds became our scenery and the weather our lifeline. We were lucky to only get badly knocked about for our last night at sea. Others had worse and one boat, along with their crew of four, is still missing. We raced through the Gulf Stream watching the water temperature rise and the seas grow as we approached. Eight hours of rolling ocean and waves breaking over our cockpit and suddenly, at midnight, the water temperature dropped by 20 degrees, the air cooled and the seas around us flattened. We were though the stream in one piece, ejected out of the other end and into the cold New England morning.

I have always nurtured the spirit of the ocean inside me. My father built me a boat when I was 8 and sailing has been my freedom and my passion ever since. It seemed like a natural place for me to come and heal my wounds this haven of sun and sea. For long enough I had tried to keep living my ‘normal life’, battled the tube every day through the height of my PTSD and fought off daily panic attacks. The day I quit my job I also decided to quit the anti depressants which my psychiatrist had prescribed over a year before. Two weeks of cold turkey followed, or SSRI withdrawal syndrome as it is officially known. This felt like the final blow, I had been through enough, struggled on and conquered so much of my illness and just as I was ready to spread my wings and fly I was grounded by yet another trauma. When I landed on this tiny island, the only passenger in a terrifyingly rickety old plane, I felt as if every last strain of energy had been drained from me and I would never be able to move again.

But the Caribbean and the ocean have worked their magic. I am tanned and lean and fit from daily swimming and walking. I eat fresh fish and rice, fried chicken and plantain, nothing processed, no packaging or advertising, just the fruit of the land and the sea. I feel healthy and alive, in tune with the weather and the stars. I can sense the tiny uplift in air movement which precedes an almighty rain storm, I can tell the time by looking at the sun and the date by looking at the moon. I am not afraid any more of the squawking and rustling I hear at night or the bats that swoop from the eves to welcome me home. I have grown used to the enveloping darkness that is night on my hillside. This girl from London has found her feet in a world very far from home. My hairdryer and straightening irons have lain redundant since the day I arrived. I shower in cold water and wash my clothes by hand. My make up bag lies unopened and the only mirror in the house is no larger than my hand. There are no shops to buy ridiculously expensive clothes and indulge myself in that old therapy of retail. The record shop is a hut where I sing the songs that I like to the girl and by the following day she has burnt them onto a cd and charges me the equivalent four pounds for the service. I don’t read papers or follow the international news. That is a conscious decision to break the never ending trawling through the internet for stories of terrorism and government incompetence. Gone is the anger I felt towards our leaders for fuelling the terrorists rage by illegally invading Iraq, gone is the girl who could only talk politics at dinner parties, and ranting raving politics at that. Gone is the obsession, the hurt, the outrage and the fear.

The ultimate test, though, of the extent of this healing was found on my journey back. A bus ride from Martha’s Vineyard took me to New York from where I flew, three days later, back to the Caribbean. Arriving at the Port Authority Bus Station I felt like Crocodile Dundee in the Big Apple. Shocked and fazed, scruffy and dazed I met my old friend and we headed for her apartment. Without a second thought she lead me to the subway. Down into the dirty dark tunnel. A different subway, a different kind of under ground, but still the same cold fear. I could feel that old familiar tightening of the chest, quickening of the heart and cold sweat dripping down my neck. I breathed deeply and tried to use some of my old calming techniques. ‘What are the chances of this happening again?’ ‘And if it does what are the chances of me being on that tube again?’ But it didn’t work, this was a different city, a different subway, and one which had not been attacked before. The chances were higher, so my panicking mind told me, ‘it’s rush hour in New York and I am on the subway, the chances of being bombed are pretty bloody high.’ Eventually we emerged into daylight, out into Queens and above the ground and I began to feel my rigid body relaxing. We walked a couple of blocks to her apartment and I found myself entering a wobbly old lift with barely enough space for the two of us. Another phobia borne from my PTSD, small spaces with too many people, and lifts are one of the worst. We bounced our way up to the 6th floor and I hurried into the safety of her apartment. Safe until I heard the sirens and the car horns blaring outside. Sirens that always took me back to that day, and it seems they still do.

I wandered the city for a couple of days, caught up with friends and tried to shop, but that old instinct just wasn’t there. I walked into my favourite stores, 2 dollars to the pound I told myself, but just turned around and walked right out. I felt cramped and confused, I couldn’t see the sky, where was all that space that I had left behind? An instinctive urge took me back on the subway and down to the site that is Ground Zero. I have been there before, but this was the first visit since 7th July and it hit me like a thunderbolt. This vast empty hole in the middle of the city, gaping and raw, the site of such destruction and death, this is where it had all began. The empathy I felt for the thousands of people involved on that day was so powerful that it reduced me to tears. I thought of those that were there, those that died and those that are still living with the trauma of having been there and survived and the families that are still grieving for their losses. The colossal amount of pain radiating out of this site made me weep for lives that were destroyed that day and the spiral of death and violence which it triggered.

Three days was enough, and now I am back in my house on the hill, marvelling about the journey I have travelled and wondering how the second anniversary will hit me so far away from home. There are very few people here who I have told my story to, another conscious decision to try & distance myself from having to tell the tale. I am torn between doing something special such as having a day alone on the top of a mountain or just carrying on as normal and keeping it in my head. I will miss my friends and fellow passengers with whom I spent a beautiful but emotional day a year ago, we let off white helium balloons into the sky in honour of the people who didn’t make it off that tube. I cried with them for the first time, in public, since the bombs went off. They have helped me through so much of this journey but this year I will have to do it without them. I have a feeling that I will be all right though, a feeling that this is the right place to be, for now. It is Carnival this week end, after all, and there is so much of life still to celebrate.

Me on Saturday Live!

2007-06-30T16:45:00.000+01:00

Here I am! Just hit 'Latest Programme' and forward to 16:38.

That was wierd. Here I am sitting in the Caribbean feeling (almost) a million miles from all of that when my phone beeps with a text message from my mum saying that she's just heard me interviewed by Fi Glover on Radio 4 talking about coming off anti depressants. Well I recorded that interview before I left, which was the end of February. I guess they sat on in until a relevant moment came up like John Travolta singing the praises of the Church of Scientology which doesn't allow anti depressants, and upcoming 7/7 anniversairies, and attempted car bombs. I guess now was a pretty good time to run it, but it did feel like listening to and old version of myself. It was also quite a good reminder of how far I have come on this little adventure of mine. I had pretty much escaped it all for a while, but the old anniversary is working its magic & I am feeling incresingly uneasy. I have received emails from journalists asking me about my rection to the car bomb, I even recieved a phone call from a journo on my birthday, on a boat, in Bermuda, asking my opinion on some report which had just come aout about how cognitive therapy helps PTSD. I have to say I foudn it pretty hard to gather my thoughts and recollections together enough to be able to coherently comment. (Plus I was suffering from a pre birthday rum drinking hangover!)

Anyway, the anniversary IS coming, even in paridise I am aware of that, and hearing that interview this morning has just made me realise a little more.

UPDATE:
Oh God and now I read that a blazing car has just driven into Glasgow Airport. It seems that Gordon Brown is being welcomed to the real world of leading the country with a bang. Let's see if he can be any less reactionorary than his forebearer. (I still can't believe he's gone...puff...just like that!...oh joy!)

what the f**k is THIS?!!

2007-06-14T17:58:00.000+01:00

Any suggestions greatfully accepted! I found it on my porch, in Bequia, last night. Looks like some kind of alien to me, and none of the locals have ever seen one!

Stormbound in Bermuda

2007-05-27T03:37:00.000+01:00

I have lost count of time and days but I think we have been here nearly 2 weeks now.

We left Antigua to the sight of a humpback whale, awoke the following morning to dolphins over breakfast. After that we had 5 days of very very little. A bird spent an hour trying to land on our mast which was the only life we saw for days. Suddenly the little things become major events at sea. We saw a moon bow (a monochrome rainbow lit by a full moon at night) the green flash as the sun rose (yes that really does happen), shooting stars & sattelites and a hell of a load of ocean, sky & horizons. The clouds become your scenery & the weather your lifeline. We were lucky to only get badly knocked about for our last night at sea, others have had worse & 1 boat is missing. So here we are checking the weather maps daily, watching the lows fly towards us across the gulf stream & making another decision to stay put.

The harbour is filling with familiar faces from Antigua & beyond, all with the same story, all getting restless, but all knowing that the worst mistake a sailor can make is to go to sea from frustration of being in port too long. So we are biding our time & trying to make the most of this strange island of coral that is Bermuda

It is the land of petty rules & cleanliness. A little Singapore in the middle of the Atlantic. Endless pastel coloured houses all with white stone roofs which gives the strange impression of snow covered buildings in a tropical landscape.

The weather here changes on a penny. We have felt cold that we thought we'd forgotten then burnt orselves raw the following day. We have dragged our anchor in 50 knot winds & ended up on the rocks thanking our lucky stars for our solid steel hull. We sank our dinghy with rainwater & killed the outboard so now we are rowing by hand. The captain has flown out his wife & 20 month old kid so now we have a baby on board & tomorrow perhaps a dog. Our last rations at sea but I'm not sure there is much meat on a 3yr old jack russell called 'bird'!

And we have partied our nights away, our internal clocks thrown by the late setting northern sun, it is always midnight when you think it should be 9. A birthday in Bermuda was not one to forget. Encouraged by our newfound kiwi friends the jaeger bombs were flying, a druken conversation to the only girl on board the yach(Odysseus) which has sailed from New Zealand and it turns out she knows the only person I know down there! Instant friendships are sprung overnight in this place a million miles from anywhere. They left this morning for the Azores, they are heading east so no Gulf Stream hurdle for them.

Two days of vists to the US embassy has left me the proud owner of a 10 year mutiple entry B1/B2 visa, so I am legal for a while and can sail boats into the states for a good long time now without ever having to go through the dreaded Bush security beurocracy

We entertain ourselves with rule breaking competitions;'loitering' is a federal offence here & yesterday we got our first warning whilst watching a local being ticketed for having his car stereo too loud. Carrying a beer in the street with your shirt off is 2 offences in 1 hit, and if you stop and loiter you do 3 in 1 go. Trying to get into a bar with flip flops is a no no, and the bouncer will tell you to remove your hat after 10pm. I don't know how we got away with sleeping in a park which you are not even allowed to eat in, but that was our biggest crime so far!

Anyway I am running out of time & everything costs money here, and a lot of it. The third richest country in the world and don't you know it by the prices. $20 for an hour on the interent whilst my laptop is lounging in Bequia goddam!

So I am signing off and counting the days....soon to sea I hope

pics to make you sick!

2007-03-10T20:45:00.000+01:00

Yo from the sunny Caribbean!

2007-03-05T20:17:00.000+01:00

Well I am sitting in the (freezing) airconditioned internet room at the Gingerbread cafe in Bequia; my new home. I am gazing out of the window at the windswept palm trees in front of the great harbour that is Admiralty Bay. It is filled with sailing boats from all over the world. People stop off here to taste a bit of paradise. I, on the other hand, am here for 3 months tasting it every day!

I am living in a little wooden house, high up on the hill on the other side of the island. Most days, so far, I have walked into town and am usually offered a ride along the way. People ask what I do up there alone. Well I can tell you that I am certainly not alone. There are lizards and bats, cicadas and birds. It is silent of the London noises at night but the air is filled with a cacophony of nature's music. I am woken sometimes, suddenly, by a torrent of rain or a gust of wind rippling down the front of the hill.

I am being broken in gently by the friendly full moon, I am slightly in fear of the blackened nights to come. The other night there was an eclipse and the space shuttle passed over, a night time display from my deck amongst the trees.

I have met retired Americans who live here and many sailors passing through. The locals seem to be staking me out. It, apparently, takes two sightings before they feel able to approach. Everyone who has spoken to me has seen me before.

Yesterday the tourists were shunned from the beach, sidelined in huddles watching on as the Sunday party commenced. Brightly coloured speedboats arrived from St. Vincent bringing hoards of revellors onto this shore. There were sound systems and Bbq's, football and volleyball. Girls and boys strutting their stuff and coyly approaching each other.

I supped at my Callacoo soup, drank a beer and took in the gleeful scene. This, I think, is a place I am going to enjoy calling home!

For now, this feels too much like an office, inside is a rarity over here. I need to get out and dip in the ocean before I head up the hill and sup rum in my garden.

It’s late and I’m tired…

2007-02-25T01:43:00.000+01:00

…and my schizophrenic neighbour just jumped off his roof. I shouldn’t have stayed, I shouldn’t have watched but I couldn’t walk away. He was standing on his roof talking to the sky. He wasn’t angry, didn’t seem like he wanted to jump. He was just revelling in the freedom of being up high, away from the confines of his house and talking to himself or his voices or no one. He was up there for about half an hour and I wanted to be up there with him. I wanted to hug him and help him and try and do something to save him.

The road was cordoned off and the street was swarming with police and firemen. It brought everything back from when my friend was ill and the police stormed in and scared the wits out of him and he ended up in the Old Bailey. I ducked under the police cordon and asked them if there was a psychiatrist coming. ‘We’re handling it’ she said, ‘please move back behind the barrier’. It was all too close to the bone and I snapped back ‘well in my experience you don’t usually handle these things very well’. It was out of order and unhelpful, but as I watched this sick, paranoid man ranting from his roof surrounded by blaring police sirens and men in body armour I knew it wasn’t going to end well.

There was an extraordinary collection of people spectating; the orthodox Jews in their Saturday garb and the teenage gay black boys who live across the road. ‘Are you a model?’ one of them asked as I hugged myself in fear for this man’s life. ‘I wander what’s going to happen to his dog’? ‘I knew I should have slept with him when he came to our last party’. ‘It’s not funny’ I snapped, ‘that man is ill and the police aren’t helping, there should be a psychiatrist here’. ‘Don’t worry honey’ he said as he hugged me, ‘he’s a nice guy, he wears lovely clothes, he’s not going to jump’. I tried to laugh, to find humour in blackness, I’ve managed it before but tonight it wasn’t there. He realised I was upset and hugged me harder. He was 19, he told me, just out of prison for cocaine trafficking. Such a gentle young queen, he had got off with a £5,000 fine and 4 months in jail. Meanwhile the neighbour waved his arms to the stars. ‘He’s going to be alright’ my new friend said. But I knew, without a doubt, that he wasn’t.

The American neighbour was beside himself with worry. ‘I saw him on the roof and I called the police, now I wonder if I’ve done the right thing’. The screaming sirens continued to arrive and still he ranted into the blackness. At one point he looked as if he was climbing back in through the roof light. His nephew was down below shouting his name and trying to connect with him. Occasionally he would answer but immediately continued with his torrent of words. No one could get through to him from that far away.

As the queens preened and the Jews mumbled there was suddenly a break in his rantings followed by an almighty thud. Three storeys up and he had fallen from the roof ‘you bastards’ cried his nephew ‘you fucking bastards’. The police restrained him as he tried to go to his uncle. I hugged myself harder and tried not to cry.

Stretchers and lights and men rushed into the alley way, then nothing. ‘This is really bad’ said the American ‘if he was alive they would be bringing him out’. We stood and waited and finally I could take it no more. I had to ask 5 people before a policewoman gave me an answer to my question ‘Is he still alive?’ “Yes’ she answered sympathetically and relief flowed through my veins. Finally they brought him out on a stretcher and into an ambulance, the ambulance didn’t move. ‘Why aren’t they moving?’ I asked, ‘why aren’t they taking him to hospital?’. She took the time to answer me and explained how they had to wire him up and make sure he was stable before they could take him away. Finally they drove off and I clung to myself in shock.

I wandered back to my house and as I opened the door the heavens opened with torrential rain. ‘Why didn’t that start half an hour earlier?’ I cried ‘if it had been raining he might have gone in’.

It was tragic and shocking and painful but inevitable. The police and fire services are not trained to deal with mentally ill people. It is not their fault, but looking down at a street swarming with blue flashing lights and people in uniform is not what a paranoid schizophrenic on a roof needs to see. Too often these situations end tragically, I am not saying I know how to do it better, but there should, at least, have been a trained psychiatrist on the scene.

I am still shaking and shocked and terribly terribly sad. I felt a moment of empathy with my neighbour, he looked happy up there, he didn’t seem like a man who wanted to jump. He has been let down by a system which hardly exists, even if he does survive his life for the next few years will be one of enforced medication and poorly resourced psychiatric wards. I wish I could have done more to help him.

The word is spreading

2007-02-24T19:55:00.000+01:00

In today's Guardian, a fantastic piece by Alex Linklater about antidepressant withdrawal. I'll let you into a little secret - Jane is me. Alex was asked by The Guardian to change the story as they had already run a piece on 7/7 survivors recovery. It still works even with the changed details, and most importantly continues the media trickle of pieces about SSRI withdrawal which can only be good in raising awareness.

Caribbean party!

2007-02-22T22:54:00.001+01:00

I am hanging on by a thread, so much to do, so little time. On Tuesday I will be on a plane headed for Barbados, what a relief that will be from the frantic hum drum of the last few weeks. I have bought bikinis, an air port card for my Mac that I had to go to Southgate for as they don't make them any more, a short wave radio to pick up the World Service with, shorts, flip flops, a humungous new bag on wheels, had my mobile unlocked so I can use a local sim card....oh the list is endless. And now, on top of all of that, I have had to find a lawyer to deal with a particularly friendly leaving present. All I have left to do is buy copious amounts of books, record an interview for Radio 4 for Saturday Live (to be run this Saturday I think), collect my car from the garage and leave it at my parents', clear up my flat for its new inhabitants and oh, of course, pack - carefully and within the BA stringent weight limits.

And amongst all of this I managed to have a humdinger of a Caribbean leaving party...complete with diy spray tans in my bath beforehand, rum punches with umbrellas, finger lickin' jerk chicken, rice'n'peas, thumping reggae and happy summer colours.

Almost an item...

2007-02-16T16:17:00.000+01:00

Does being mentioned in the same article as Robbie make us an item?!

My new house!

2007-02-13T20:36:00.000+01:00

THIS will be my home in 2 weeks time for the next 3 months. Still can't quite believe it!

My piece in The Independent

2007-02-13T20:16:00.000+01:00

Last week The Independent asked me to write a piece about coming off antidepressants. I was a bit wary about outing myself as it needed to be accompanied by a photo, but I felt it was important to get the word out so I sat down at the week end and recounted my tale.

The picture was HUGE which freaked me out a bit as it made it look as if it was all about me whereas I wanted it to be about the story and the horrors of the withdrawal effects of coming off these bloody pills. The story has been followed by a mini media frenzy which I had not remotely expected. Lorraine Kelly, GMTV, no no no! I'm sorry but I've done my stints on TV after 7/7. I don't enjoy it and I'm not really very good. I do a kind of Lady Di head down, nervously looking up thing! Radio, however, I am much more comfortable with. I've had a long chat with Radio 4 today and I'm going to do an interview next week. I want to get the word out, but I don't want to be some chat show freak who, like Robbie, got hooked on pills so I am choosing my 'yes's' carefully.

Here, thankfully, without the photo, is my piece.

Research frenzy

2007-02-04T18:12:00.000+01:00

Thank you everyone for your encouragement & support, I am getting there slowly & dreaming of the sun!

I have wandered off into a frenzy of research and am now the country's leading authority on SSRI discontinuation sydrome (hardly!). Rambling research notes to follow....everyone should know this stuff....

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs)

The first anti depressants were introduced in the 1950’s. It was not until 1987 that the first SSRI, Prozac, hit the market. By 1991 Prozac was the biggest selling AD in the world with a market worth $1 billion.

A group has now been developed: fluoxetine (Prozac), fluvoxamine
(Faverin), paroxetine (Seroxat), sertraline (Lustral) and citalopram (Cipramil).

On their introduction they were hailed as a miracle cure. They were thought to be safer and have less side affects than the older models and were said to be non addictive. They are also used to treat illnesses other than depression, such as OCD, Bulimia and PTSD. No-one really understands why work but they are still prescribed.
Dr Timothy Petersen (Clinical psychologist at Harvard) says ‘despite there being a lack of evidence in efficacy between old and new (AD’s) clinicians perceive the newer agents to be more efficacious than the older drugs’. He believes that the general perception is that the side effects of the newer drugs are less and that this perception is fuelled by marketing.

SSRI’s work on the chemical systems in the brain (neurotransmitters) which carry messages between nerves, muscles, glands and other organs. They boost activity in these systems and increase the levels of serotonin in the brain by preventing its reuptake. This in turn improves the patient’s mood.

It has since been found that they are associated with a withdrawal reaction on discontinuation after regular use. This usually occurs when treatment is stopped abruptly. But can also happen when it is reduced slowly over time and even if a dose is missed for just one day.

The exact mechanism is unknown, but one explanation is that it is a result of the brain attempting to reach neurochemical stability after an abrupt change. The drug increases levels of neurotransmitters which can reduce the number of receptors present in the brain. Once the drug is withdrawn there may not be enough receptors left which can reduce the amount of seratonin in the brain.
The clearance of the drug can occur faster than the brain can readjust to the absence of medication. The down-regulated receptors will remain in a relatively hypo active state for days to weeks.

Symptoms usually occur 1-10 days after discontinuation. The time of emergence depends on the half-life of the drug. The half-life is defined as the amount of time it takes for the quantity of the drug in the bloodstream to reduce by half. These times vary from 10-21 hours for paroxetine (the shortest) to 2-6 days for fluoxetine (the longest).

Symptoms are usually mild and last an average of 10 days. They can also be severe and last for much longer. They respond rapidly (usually within 72 hours) to the readministration of the same SSRI. They are sometimes confused for a recurrence of the disorder being treated. The symptoms are often mistaken for illnesses such as ME of Glandular Fever. Patients can go through months of tests before SSRI’s are found to be the cause.

In 2006 Dr Black (from Dept of Psychiatry at Dalhousie University in Halifax Nova Scotia) developed a system of diagnosis. SSRI discontinuation disorder was defined by 2 or more of the following symptoms occurring within 7 days of stopping: dizziness, lightheadedness, vertigo, feelings of fainting, nausea, headache, visual disturbances, anxiety, shock like sensations, tremor, fatigue, insomnia, irritability, gait instability and diarrhea.

These symptoms are reported to range between 35% - 86% of patients in controlled studies. This is much lower in databases based on reported cases as the majority of patients do not report them to their GPs.

72% of psychiatrists & 30% of GPs were aware that patients might suffer. Only 20% of psychiatrists & 17% of doctors in a survey of 100 said that they always warned patients of the possibility withdrawal effects.

Out of a study of 42 patients in 2000: 82% suffered after 1-2 days, 94% after a week and 100% after 2 weeks.

60% of people who talked to MIND said that they had difficulty coming off their medication, of all the psychiatric drugs SSRIs caused the most difficulty.

Most people (50%) recover within a week, however some can take longer and a small percentage still report symptoms after 18 months.

If symptoms persist patients will usually be put back onto their original SSRI. They can, however, be put on one with a longer half-life which may reduce the chance of symptoms when they stop.

There is much debate and disagreement over the terminology of this syndrome. The pharmaceutical companies argue that ‘dependence’ is a syndrome involving various features and certain of these don’t apply here. Patients don’t, for instance, develop tolerance to the drugs or cravings and they don’t use them for non-medical (recreational) purposes. Therefore (the pharmaceutical companies say) they are not ‘addictive’.

Critics argue that the pharmaceutical industry has a vested interest in creating a distinction between ‘addiction’ and ‘dependence’. They say that the arguments against the term ‘withdrawal’ are used primarily so as not to frighten patients or alienate potential customers. ‘Withdrawal’ is a symptom of ‘physical dependence’, they say, not ‘addiction’.

Hugh James Solicitors are investigating compensation claims on behalf of 550 patients in the UK who have experienced adverse reactions to Seroxat. It can be very difficult to come off after as little as 2 days. They are bringing litigation under the Consumer Protection Act. This can, at the moment, only be based on it being the ‘worst in class’. Prozac actually rates as the worst for incidents of suicide and aggression so they can only bring action against Seroxat for withdrawal. They are currently trying to overturn this ruling so that they can take action for other SSRI’s. They told me that they constantly had people contacting them about other drugs such as Citalopram. Their medical experts agree that it is very difficult to get patients off Citalopram.

History:

Dr Breggin was the first to warn about SSRI withdrawl in his book ‘Talking to Prozac’ published in 1994.

In 1999 David Taylor (head pharmacist at the Maudlsey Hospital) published a paper called ‘Truth Withdrawal’. He had not only studied withdrawal symptoms of SSRIs but also had first hand experience of them. He dismissed the claims of the pharmaceutical industry and wrote ‘the real truth is that, for many people, antidepressant withdrawal syndrome is neither mild or short lived’. He raises the question that clinicians might be blinded to the negative aspects of new drugs by the wish to find harmless new cures. The selling point of SSRIs had been that people were not supposed to become physically dependent on them, unlike older drugs.

In 2001a US jury ordered GlaxoSmithKline (the manufacturers of Seroxat) to pay £4.6million to the family of a man who killed his wife, children and himself after taking Seroxat for 2 days. David Healy was an expert witness in this case. He showed that studies indicated rates of problems on discontinuation of paroxetine in over 30% of patients. Hence he argued that for GSK to ‘characterise paroxetine withdrawal reactions as very rare, transient, mild and/or virtually impossible to detect and distinguish from underlying psychiatric illness is simply an untenable position’

In 2001 GSK updated their label for Praxil (Seroxat) to include a specific mention of withdrawal reactions.

In January 2002 Br Peter Breggin published clinical evidence that all of the SSRI’s can cause serious withdrawal problems.

Some effective headway was made in 2003 by Dr David Healy and Charles Medawar of Social Audit, assisted by reporters at the Guardian, BBC Panorama and Richard Brook of MIND. The struggle is still ongoing.

In June 2003 the first Panorama programme was aired, this led to the Government stating that under 18’s shouldn’t take Seroxat and to the MRHA saying that adults shouldn’t suddenly stop.

In the programme Dr David Healy, an expert on Seroxat, said ‘If they aren’t the right drug for you they can cause a range of problems, they can make you suicidal, they can throw you into a state of mental turmoil and even if they are the right drugs for you, in some cases they can leave you hooked’.

The MHRA have issued warnings to prescribers about withdrawal reactions for SSRIs in 1993 and 2000 and warnings were added to patient information leaflets regarding suicidal thoughts in the early stages of treatment.

In 2003 the warnings were sent to all doctors and pharmacists in the UK however they added ‘the benefits of paroxetine in adults are well established in the treatment of depressive illnesses and anxiety disorders and are considered to outweigh the risks’. The MHRA are paid by the pharmaceutical industry who are in effect their employers.

In 2003 Seroxat was banned by the MHRA for under 18’s. They were the first regulator in the world to do so. Shortly after the US FDSA issued similar warnings.

In 2004 the MHRA issued a warning about sudden withdrawal of Seroxat.

2 months ago David Taylor (of the Maudsley) contributed to a paper published in the Journal of Affective Disorders which stated that it is not only Seroxat which causes withdrawal. The pharmacists information line for people with concerns about psychiatric medication told me my symptoms were ‘quite normal’. They said it doesn’t matter how slowly you taper off them you will still have effects. The symptoms will start any time within the first 2 weeks of stopping and last, they say, up to 7 days (although there are countless individual stories of them lasting substantially longer). If I had called 2 months ago (before the publication of Taylor’s paper) they would have told me that I had probably caught a bug.

MIND are still calling for other SSRIs to be looked into.

Yet the manufacturers still refuse to admit that they are ‘addictive’. User groups are not looking for a ban, as they agree that the drugs help millions of people, they are just looking for better information to accompany the drugs.

The information notes accompanying my particular brand of Citalopram contain no mention of withdrawal affects, only possible side affects during administration. In fact there is no mention of how to come off the drugs at all, not even a warning to do it slowly.

Cold Turkey

2007-01-27T20:43:00.000+01:00

I have been taking 20mg of Citalopram (an SSRI anti-depressant) a day since October 2005. I started cutting down 5 months ago, first to 10mg then to 5. Each drop in dose was followed by a psychological cocktail of mania and crashing lows which stabilised after a few weeks. Having weathered this storm twice I felt ready to stop, completely. ‘Take it slowly’ they all say. Five months to wean myself off a relatively (some people are on 80mg) low dose seemed slow enough to me. I’m not sure I could have done it any slower, and if I had whether it would have made any difference.

Three weeks ago I stopped. In preparation of tough times ahead I also cut out alcohol and caffeine and prepared myself for the storm. A storm, I hasten to add, which none of the medical professionals who have crossed my path over the last year and a half had thought worthy of warning me of.

It started last week end. The heavy head accompanied by apathy. There was a familiarity about the sense of drug fuelled sedation that washed my head. I knew what it was, it had begun. I had a list as long as my arm of things to be done last Saturday. I couldn’t get out of the house. I sat on my sofa and stared at the wall, for hours. The weight in my head held me down and locked me to the spot.

On Monday it began to get worse. I had a solid day of meetings (at the Royal Opera House no less) and sat in the same room all day. It was cold, although no-one else seemed to notice, and I shivered my way through the day. It reached my bones and my fingers went white (I have bad circulation at the best of times). Others shed layers as I wished for more, I had forgotten the feeling of warmth.

On Wednesday night it reached its peak (well so far at least, there could be worse to come). I woke up at 2 feeling cold again. As I slowly gained consciousness the shaking began, violent and uncontrollable. I shivered and quivered and forced myself out of bed. I threw on a jumper and socks and a hat; turned the heating up high and flung a blanket over my bed. I crawled back in and shuddered for another two hours, I felt like a heroin addict who hadn’t even had the highs. At 4am the nausea kicked in, I had been feeling queasy all day so hadn’t eaten much, the toilet beckoned and I stumbled in. Still shivering like a trooper I was as sick as a dog, where it all came from I cannot imagine.

Exhausted and drained I crawled back to bed. The cold slowly faded and sleep took its place.

I haven’t been able to eat much since. The nausea is constant and the headache keeps throbbing. I feel slightly distant, there’s a delay in my head, When I move it my brain takes a moment to catch up. It has been a struggle all week to keep my eyes open at work, I am continually on the edge of sleep. I had a full agenda of friends to be seen, the beginning of goodbyes before I head off on my trip. Cancelled one by one, I feel guilty and sad, this is not what I had planned for my last month of work.

Yesterday (about 18 months too late) I Googled the words ‘Citalopram withdrawl’. Oh if only I had done that before I agreed to start poisoning my body with those evil, potent little pills. The stories were countless, and comfortingly the same. I was not alone, this happened all the time. Some people go through worse; flashes and electric shock-like sensations are common, I should be grateful for my nausea and headache.

1 in 1000 people will suffer withdrawal, say the pharmaceutical companies, others disagree and say it is more. Maybe I am special, perhaps I am one of the chosen few, but I find it hard to believe that the percentage is so low. One support site prompted 260 responses when the topic of electric shock sensations was raised. I read about one poor lady, a single mother of three, who had been on Citalopram for 8 long years. She didn’t have time in her life to take a month out, she was needed, she was busy. She knew if she stopped she would be incapacitated for weeks, she didn’t have that luxury so on them she stayed.

The drug companies say they are not addictive. Well, not addictive per se. You do not crave them when you stop, that much is true. But when told that on resuming the symptoms will fade fast, it is no wonder that so many cave in. Just one pill and all this will stop, I don’t intend to do it but the temptation is there.

A clinical psychiatrist and countless GP’s have written that prescription out for me. And never, not once, has anyone taken the time to say ‘think long and hard, it could be hell when you stop’. Thank god for the internet, thank god for my friends, at least I now know what is happening to me and why. It is frightening, exhausting and depressing as hell.

Would I have taken them if I’d known? I don’t suppose I can say. I would like to think not, but I just don’t know. The PTSD had taken my life as it was, I couldn’t sleep, eat or work. My bosses were pressurising me to get back to work. I wanted to go part time but they said 'No. We only want you back when you’re 100%’. When anti-depressants were dangled I just thought ‘why not?’ ‘Your brain will sort itself out in the back ground and the pills will stop the pain’ said my shrink. Well he was the expert, a specialist in the treatment of trauma, I naively presumed that he would know best. Maybe he did, perhaps he was right, but I would have like to have had all the facts in front of me before I made such a decision.

I cannot change the past, what’s done is done, I just have to get through this and free my body from its addiction. I’m annoyed and angry, but mostly with myself. The facts were there to be found if only I’d taken the time to look. Someone should have told me, of course, but I could also have taken more responsibility myself.

It’s too late for me, but not for others I hope. Perhaps by writing this I might help someone else to make their decision and for them it will, at least, be informed.

Following are just a few of the articles I found on my trawl through the world wide web yesterday. They make terrifying reading.

Withdrawal of the truth
Hard habit to break
Coming off anti depressants
Are anit depressants addictive?
Drug firm issues addiction warning
SSRI Discontinuation Syndrome

And here is a list of possible symptoms of what is now known as SSRI Discontinuation Syndrome:

Neurologic symptoms include:
• Dizziness
• Vertigo
• Lightheadedness
• Difficulty walking

Somatic (bodily) complaints include:
• Nausea/vomiting
• Fatigue
• Headaches
• Insomnia

Less common difficulties:
• Shock-like sensations
• Parasthesia (skin crawling, burning or prickling)
• Visual disturbances
• Diarrhea
• Muscle pain
• Chills

Non-specific mental symptoms:
• Shock-like sensations
• Agitation
• Impaired concentration
• Vivid dreams
• Depersonalization - sense of unreality and loss of self
• Irritability
• Suicidal thoughts

And this will make timely watching

Panorama
Mon 29 Jan, 8:30 pm - 9:00 pm 30mins

Secrets of the Drugs Trials

Reporter Shelley Jofre investigates claims that one of Britain's biggest drug company misled doctors into prescribing the antidepressant Seroxat to teenagers even after one of its own clinical trials indicated that they were more likely to become suicidal after taking it. She reveals a secret trail of internal emails about the drug.

The winds of change

2007-01-20T16:14:00.000+01:00

It may look, from blogland, as if I have been a lazy old slacker over the past few months. I can assure you that I have not! Today is, honestly, the first day for weeks that I have owned every minute for myself. I have been sleeping and bathing and pampering, hiding myself from the countless competitors for my time. Today and tomorrow are for me and me alone. What an almighty relief it is to have carved out some space at last.

I have taken it upon myself to instigate change. I have pondered and discussed, compiled lists of pros and cons and finally taken the plunge (or should I say plunges as the actions I have taken are multiple). Change can come unbidden, shockingly out of the blue. Or it can crawl up from behind, slowly and silently, drifting over you like a mist, unnoticed and new. If it doesn’t choose to grace your life and you feel the need for a new course with consequences unknown, the change has to come from within. Actions must be taken, decisions made and hence an adventure is born. An expedition into the future, full of excitement and fear with new beginnings and unknown endings, that is the place I have chosen to go.

Two weeks ago my unfinished packet of anti depressants was shut away in a rarely visited drawer. Having, painfully, weaned myself down, over a period of months, from 20 to 5mg a day the time had come to stop. In anticipation of rough times to come I have also knocked the booze upon the head.

As if that wasn’t enough for my chemically challenged brain to deal with, on Monday I quit my job. There was shock and horror, anger and support, but the deed is done and is slowly sinking in. Four and a half years I have been trekking across London and back, under the ground on the line called Piccadilly. Enough is enough. I have climbed back upon the horse which threw me, proven to myself (for I am the only one who needs to be convinced) that I have conquered the fear, and now I am free to stop.

I am going to read and write, rest and run, and best of all I will be doing it in the sun. Today is an exception, but soon it will be the norm; time for myself unbounded is ahead. I am off to the Caribbean, taking 3 months out of the hum drum of London living. As I write these words I still can’t quite believe it. But I have done it, I’ve quit, and for a while at least, my life will be my own.

A year of false peaks

2006-12-26T17:20:00.000+01:00

It is nearly a year to the day that I started this blog in an attempt, so I said at the time, to discover whether 'I am still me'. I will always be me, but I am certainly different. Apart from my grumpy, snappy, anti-depressant withdrawal days, I think I am different for the best.

I have discovered new abilities over this past year. One is the joy of writing. For although I have let this blog drift of late, I am constantly composing in my head. The other is something which has taken me by surprise and that is the ability to act. Not up on stage or in front of a camera but just throughout every day life. I have found the strength to put on a show, to smile and entertain and put on a very convincing act of being alright.

There are only a few who can see through this screen and they are not necessarily those who know me well. But mostly I have them fooled and duped and sometimes I actually enjoy the performance! I know that beneath the smokescreen of withdrawal there is an ‘alright’ me hiding inside. I know I have to sit it out and patiently wait and the horizon will eventually clear. This is not sickness I am dealing with now; the PTSD is something I have learnt to manage. The hell of getting off these pills is not something, I think, that anyone could manage or control. It is something I am learning instead to blag my way through.

But all the while I am learning. Seeing and feeling the world anew. I feel stronger and wiser (and much much wearier) for having weathered this particular storm. It has been a year of false peaks for me. I was there, I was better, I was floating on air and so I came off these pills. Then bang, out of the blue, there was another peak creeping up from behind the first. I wasn’t there at all. So I replenished my supplies, threw on another layer and continued my climb up the rocky slope.

This slope is rockier but more regular than the first. A drop in medication is followed by a gentle hill. 3 weeks of ambling comes to an end as a craggy cliff presents itself ahead. A week is spent climbing this wall, all the while the mania rising inside me. By the end of the week I am ready to explode, I reach the peak and collapse. A heavy sleep is woken with relief at the lack of mania, there is no cliff ahead. A day of rest and revelling in normality as I wander along a flat green plateau. It is a short-lived moment, and now I have learnt, it will always be followed by a fall. A deep and crumbling ravine into which I tumble. Rolling, bouncing and spiralling out of control. It is a canyon whose bottom is never reached, for that would be the end. You get caught on a ledge which holds you from the depths of the abyss. You lie and stare, hypnotically, into the blackness. It holds you and tries to suck you in. You can see no way you can climb off this ledge, you wonder if the only way is down. A month or so after skipping across the plateau, the mist begins to lift. Suddenly you see a way, a route out of the hole, there is an escape after all. So you reach the level play ground of life and marvel that you ever found it again. But you can’t stay long, the job is not done, it’s time to reduce the medication again.

Even Green Lanes…

2006-12-20T02:11:00.000+01:00

…looks beautiful on a cold and crispy foggy night. The lights glow through the misty haze and the street is filled with christmas romance. The familiar is obscured and the streets are covered with an exotic newness. A translucent white blanket wraps your world, the faults and the cracks are hidden and suddenly it’s a place that you love, a place you know and a place called home.

Was there radiation in my tea?

2006-12-09T10:05:00.000+01:00

I have just woken from a 24 hour bout of something which I never want to experience again.

It could be blamed on yesterday's 5am start for an early train to Leeds, coupled with the same on Monday, a heavy week-end in Copenhagen and general December exhaustion. But it was a pretty extreme reaction to exhaustion alone. Perhaps it's something to do with very nearly being off my anti D's or drinking too much red wine to get me through the bad days. I don't know, but there was a moment or two on the 1.05 GNER train from Leeds to Kings Cross yesterday when I thought I wasn't going to make it.

Sipping a cup of Yorkshire Tea at the start of a meeting, the first meeting with a new client, at Leeds Art Gallery, I started to shiver and feel slightly sick. An hour later I was visibly shaking uncontrollably and convinced I was going to chunder imminently. We had a full day of meetings ahead and I wondered how on earth I was going to make it.

As we left the room to change location I muttered to my colleague that I wasn’t feeling too good. I went to the loo & the client followed, I could hardly chuck up in the cubicle next to her! I called time out and went to Browns, had a full fat coke and curled up on a sofa. The sugar might do the trick I thought. But I continued to shake and feel overwhelmed by nausea and I just wanted to be home in my bed.

So I called my colleague and told her I was leaving her to it, headed for the station to get the next train home. It was cancelled. So I waited an hour quivering like a junkie in cold turkey and restraining myself from groaning aloud. I needed more clothes to stop this insufferable chill but there was no-where to buy anything in the station and I was too cold to leave its enclosure. The train was packed with the passengers from the cancelled one and even First Class was hell. I wrapped myself up in my hat and my scarf and tried to go to sleep. This is when the alarm bells started to ring. Every time I drifted into sleep I felt even more nauseous and nearly passed out. So I spent the journey fighting off sleep, terrified of fainting and never waking up, I must have visited the loo over 20 times. People tried to hide their confused looks as this strange shaking woman walked passed again and locked herself in the smelly cubicle. By the time we hit Kings Cross there was nothing left to throw up. It was the longest journey of my life.

I crawled into a cab and finally made it home. I couldn’t get into bed quick enough. As soon as I slipped under my duvet the shivers subsided and were quickly replaced by the sweats. I have spent a fitful night in a drenched bed but this morning it seems to have gone. I’m exhausted and drained and dehydrated but whatever it was has passed.

I feel like I now have a better understanding of what poor Mr Litvinenko went through!

Genius....

2006-12-09T09:44:00.000+01:00

...from Matthew Norman in the Independent yesterday.

"Together they rode off into the sunset...

If the one was a soupcon less blithe and swaggering, and the other a smidgeon less slippery and self-righteous, you could almost have felt a twinge of pity for the Butch Cassidy and Sundance Kid of global statesmanship as they met in Washington yesterday. Almost."

Read the rest here.

Why don't they see it coming?

2006-12-04T19:40:00.000+01:00

Mental health services are failing to spot patients who are homicidal or suicidal, a report warns.

One person, on average a week dies at the hands of a mentally ill patient and 25 a week take their own lives.

29% of patients who committed homicide had seen mental health services in the previous week and 49% of those who killed themselves had done the same.

This is shocking and unforgivable. What will this Government do about this? Legislate I don't doubt. Problem = legislation should be New Labour's new mantra. Well before you try to change the law why don't you have a look at your system and see how it could work better?

The people who know best in situations like this are all too often ignored. How can a doctor, or social worker, or anyone else, who has known the patient only a short time, have more understanding of that person's condition than their friends and family? They can't and they don't.

Just before my friend went completely doolaley I remember calling his social worker, relentlessly. He had only known him for a matter of weeks. I told him he was ill, getting worse and something needed to be done. The social worker went to visit him. My friend is not stupid, even when he is mad he can pull the wool over a novice's eyes. I got a call the next day 'he seems fine to me'. His mother and sister and brother did the same, but still, apparently, the social worker knew better.

Too often in secure wards I have been treated like the enemy. I have ranted and raved and told them so. There is little effort to engage with supportive friends and families who are all desperately trying to help. The staff are there to clock there hours, do their job & earn their cash (there are gems who are invaluable and I don't want to generalise, but the committed staff are few and far between). People like me are just a pain in the arse.

The system needs a mind shift, not a law shift. We may not be qualified but we know the 'patients' better than anyone. It is time they started to listen.

Wonderful Wonderful

2006-12-03T19:18:00.000+01:00

I was looking forward to my (god is it really?) 5th office Christmas party at the same company with a feeling of dread and trepidation. It sounds like a ball, but really; 2 days and a night with the people you spend every day of the week with is a bit over top for me.

A few drinks and a good meal would suffice for me, but we go one step further and have a Christmas mini break! The destination is secret and we are drip fed clues over the proceeding weeks. Sometimes we guess, sometimes we don’t. This year we though we had it narrowed down to two, someone even brought their guide book to Prague. Happily we were way off mark and on Friday morning we boarded a flight to Copenhagen.

The entertainment started early with a celebrity spot. Lily Allen and her band were in the row behind us. Still travelling cattle class, she said she liked to ‘keep it real’.

Well, Copenhagen was a delight and I am utterly smitten. It’s a little bit of Amsterdam without the stag do tourists. It is elegant and classy whilst keeping ‘it real’. And best of all, the men are all tall!

The shops are crammed with objects of practical beauty. I bought an insulated coffee maker, a pastry brush and a spring with which to hold tea towels. I was sucked into Georg Jensen and seduced by a design of no practicality but striking simplicity.

We ate and drank and danced till dawn. They were still queuing outside when we left the club at 5. There were ice rinks and roller coasters and sparkly Christmas fairs; straight backed cyclists and pickled herrings galore.

So the trepidation was in vain and a blast was had by all. I think I have found my spiritual home!

Go see this...

2006-12-03T18:45:00.001+01:00

Forget turning a modern art gallery into Alton Towers in an effort to draw in the punters (although I haven’t been so shouldn’t judge), the V&A have installed an experience of meditative beauty into their garden courtyard instead.

This you cannot miss. Go when it's dark and wander through a forest of charcoal grey pillars. Your journey will be illuminated by ripples of changing colour flowing up and down the columns. Your step is the trigger for transforming a coldly inert post into a glowing, throbbing source of light and ambient sound. Written by Robert Del Naja (aka 3D) of Massive Attack and co-writer Neil Davidge the music is haunting. It will suck you in and hold you in it's world compelling you to stop and inhale, then take another step and add another strain to the symphony. Each path is unique, a moment in time never to be repeated but savoured and remembered.

Stand back and watch as others venture in. The rippling lights will dance with their route, converging as two cross, increasing in volume as more people enter. You cannot help those goose bumps from echoing the movement and fluttering up the back of your neck. You might not be able to leave.

Rude awakening

2006-11-30T15:16:00.000+01:00

6 am this morning in the slumbering midst of phase 1 of my wake up process (Radio 4 gently raises me from the dead, a quarter of an hour later alarm number 1 goes off, followed 15 minutes later by my mobile – even then I am sometimes still asleep!) I am startled by a violently aggressive hammering on my bedroom window.

I awake, confused and flustered. My immediate thought is that I have overslept for something and someone has come round to wake me. I mentally check my day in my head, no nothing, I am right where I am supposed to be; in bed.

Now that the friendly option has been ruled out I am paralysingly struck with fear. Someone is trying to break in and not very subtly either. I pull my duvet over my head, hide, ignore and it will go away. But it doesn’t, it comes back, even harsher than before. They are knocking so hard I think the window will break. Then they ring the door bell.

The fear dispels and anger takes over. ‘For fuck’s sake!’ I mutter out loud. I stumble, glasses-less to the door & pick up the intercom, ‘Hello?’.

‘Home Office’ they growl, ‘we have reason to believe there is someone in this building who is in this country illegally’. As I press the button to let them in two simultaneous thoughts rush through my head. The first is guilt, ‘what have I done?’ The second is suspicion ‘they could be anyone’.

They fall against the door and flood into the hall, 10, 15, big burly, John Reid type thugs. They are ‘the enforcers’, cloned like their boss. They repeat their charge ‘well not in here’ I say, standing bleary eyed in my dressing gown. They throw their faces too close to mine and glare with suspicion. ‘How many other flats are there here?’ they bark. I describe the layout of the house to them and they ask if they can get into the garden. I let 3 of them in, tramping through the flat. They peer over the fence and up at the back of the house. Begrudgingly they apologise ‘sorry to disturb you’ one mutters. ‘It’s ok’ I lie, ‘you just frightened the living daylights out of me’. ‘Sorry about that’ as they march out of the door without looking back.

A woman thrusts a photocopied passport photo in my face. ‘Do you know this man’ she says. He doesn’t look familiar, but I don’t pay much attention to most of my neighbours, I tell her ‘no’.

They stampede up the stairs and I remember the dodgy Columbians who moved out 3 years ago. It could be him. I am tired and pissed off and still shocked from a startled awakening. I decide not to tell them, they can figure it out themselves.

UPDATE:
Due to my blurry vision at the aforementioned time I missed a vital detail...according to my upstairs neighbour they were armed. They hammered on his door too, then said 'you're obviously British so sorry to bother you'! As he said, why go to all that effort and expense then not even search people's flats?

7/7 victim 'unfair dismissal'

2006-11-28T19:18:00.000+01:00

I am watching this case with interest....

Top blogs, published soon…

2006-11-28T13:31:00.000+01:00

I received a copy of The Blog Digest 2007 on Saturday. It’s a great collection of the best of the year’s blogging, featuring yours truly amongst many other notable characters.

Thanks to The Friday Project and Justin for including my ‘Meeting the Home Boy’ post. I felt a kind of warm glowey pridey sort of a feeling on seeing myself printed and bound inside a proper, grown up, book!

Mad, sectioned and black

2006-11-27T23:19:00.000+01:00

Alex Linklater is a journalist who focuses on mental health issues. He wrote one of the most intelligent, informative and thought provoking pieces that I have read on the psychological sufferings of some of the victims of 7th July (myself included). He is also the associate Editor of Prospect Magazine.

Today I happened upon a piece he has written with Robert Drummond, a psychiatrist. It looks at the phenomenon of black (mostly) men being incarcerated under Section 3 of the Mental Health Act. I dropped him a line as it is a subject which has long fascinated me. Black people in this country, he tells me, are 9 times more likely to be psychotic, whilst south Asian migrants are only twice as likely.

My friend (who has just come out of hospital) is black. The first time I visited him in a secure psychiatric unit, many years ago, I thought it was a ward for black people. It wasn’t.

Every hospital and ward he has stayed in since has been the same. It is a situation that most of us are utterly unaware of, something rarely mentioned in the media, a subject which is tricky and sensitive but needs to be known.

In his article Alex ponders over the reasons, all of which have crossed my mind as I struggled with this troubling statistic.

“No one really understands why. Schizophrenic symptoms occur in all ethnic groups. The competing explanations, biological or social, of why some groups experience higher rates are fraught with tension. Perhaps the close family networks of south Asian immigrant groups act as stabilisers in an isolating city, while the more fragmentary family circumstances of Afro-Caribbeans have the reverse effect. Some argue that such findings reveal an inability among researchers to understand black culture; some that a prevalence of cannabis use plays a part in shaping Afro-Caribbean psychosis; others that racism either causes the disorder, or causes white psychiatrists to over-diagnose black patients.”

He goes on to say that schizo-affective disorder is “sometimes nicknamed the "Brixton psychosis," because the combination of schizophrenic delusions with mania appears more commonly among Afro-Caribbean patients. Research shows differing rates of mental illness among different ethnic and migrant groups, with the black population suffering less from anxiety disorders but significantly more from psychosis.”

So why is this happening in our communities? Are the causes social, genetic or racial? Is it that black people are more likely to live in poverty and battle the stresses and strains that this brings? Well plenty of white people do too. Is it the trauma caused by racial taunting and prejudice which brings it on? But Asian’s are as likely (if not more, in this day and age) to experience that too. If either of these were the cause, it seems strange then that Afro-Caribbean’s are less likely to suffer from anxiety disorders, a common reaction to an over stressed life.

Is there something in their genetic make up which means they are more predisposed to psychotic illnesses? Or is it simply that a (and most of them are) white doctor is more likely to section a mad black man, through prejudice or ignorance, than the less threatening (to him) mad white man?

Alex talks in his piece about a young man, named Victor whose “basic problem was his reluctance to stick to his medication”. This was true of my friend, and so many others. Is there a stronger feeling of pride amongst young black men? A machismo which prevents them from admitting that they are ill? Lack of insight is a hard nut to crack (it has taken 3 years of weekly sessions for my friend’s psychiatrist to get there), is it more prevalent amongst black sufferers of mental illness?

“Section 3 of the Mental Health Act is perhaps the most authoritarian piece of legislation in the British statute book. It allows doctors to lock up a patient for compulsory treatment for far longer than anti-terror legislation can hold a prisoner without charge.” There is uproar and outrage amongst human rights groups and the black community at the disproportionate number of black youths who are stopped and searched. No one out there, seems to be up in arms about the same situation in our mental health hospitals.

Is it too much for the media to bear? Two taboo and sensitive subjects wrapped up in one. It’s bad enough being black (if you are the Mail) even worse if you are mad, but God help you if you’re unlucky enough to be both.

How did THIS happen?

2006-11-24T00:47:00.000+01:00

I am number 76 in the Technoranki charts! HUH?

Chicken Yoghurt, for instance, is only number 185

Something must be wrong!

Kick up the backside

2006-11-23T14:10:00.000+01:00

Thanks for the kick up the backside tag Rach. I needed it. I am suffering from a severe case of the 'to blog or not to blog' dilemma. Blogging, for me, over the past year has been both therapeutic and inspirational. It has helped me to share my ups and downs and rants with you all. I have received support and advice which has warmed my heart and strengthened my resolve to keep on keeping on. I have also discovered a love and the joy of putting words together to convey thoughts and feelings and sights and sounds. It is sometimes a struggle but always a satisfaction and having discovered this secret I never want to give it up.

BUT there is a hovering but. I started this blog to help me through the aftermath of the bombs. It has got me through and perhaps given a little strength to others too. I don’t much write about bombs any more, but there are days when I do, when I must, when I need to. I am moving on, traveling forwards and leaving some of the aftermath behind me and writing this blog somehow always takes me back there. I am wondering whether the time has come that it is no longer a positive thing in my life. My mind is constantly racing through words which could be posted, I never want to lose the thrill of writing, but recently it has felt like a burden. Like homework which has been hidden under the bed. I haven’t wanted to write it, but have been nagged by guilt at the same time. ‘Don’t give up, you know you love it says voice number one’. ‘It just takes me back, it’s becoming a chore’ says the opposing voice in my head. I enjoy it once I start and wonder why I’ve been putting it off, but I wonder I wonder, would it be healthier to stop?

Meanwhile, from Rach, top ten things I would never do:

1 – Refuse a drink
2 – Regret anything …ever
3 – Play the Lottery
4 – Trust a politician
5 – Use cheap moisturizer
6 – Cancel a holiday
7 – Give up dancing
8 – Read Harry Potter
9 – Let down my friends
10 – Go pot holing

Time with myself

2006-11-16T14:25:00.000+01:00

Six days alone, completely, on the edge of a cliff. Not only did I survive but I thrived. Apart from shop keepers and fellow walkers I spoke to no-one but myself. And do you know what? I made a discovery, I am pretty bloody good company! I think I may even invite myself on holiday again one day, we had a blast.

I have been away on my own plenty of times before, but have never actually spent so much time alone. I usually meet people, make holiday friends and enjoy being anyone I want. This time it was me and me alone.

I walked and walked, laughed and cried and let my mind wander with me. I traveled miles both by foot and in my head. It was liberating, refreshing and relaxing beyond belief. My face is smiling my eyes are bag-less and my mind is still full of expansive skies and thundering cliffs. I broke through barriers and felt freedom I had never know, I am hanging on to it as hard as I can, fighting off the walls that are slowly closing in and swallowing back the sky.

I was expecting, possibly hoping, to come across life changing realisations. I didn’t. The only resolutions I have made to myself are to do it again and to buy a milk jug. Breakfast in the bay window overlooking the Atlantic was refined by the presence of a blue and white stripy jug in place of the opaquely plastic, green topped, bottle which usually graces my breakfast table. I cooked local fish and knitted. I devoured newspapers, books and dvd's and all too soon it came to an end. But I have dispelled a fear, a fear of alone-ness, which has given me a strength never felt before.

Something, I feel, has changed inside, clicked back into place and made me whole. I am moving on, striding forwards and getting over things that need to be archived in the past.

I am still trying to figure it out, but I noticed something strange. People in ‘the country’ seem to spend an awful lot of time sitting in parked cars.

The Lone Cornish Rambler

2006-11-16T13:45:00.000+01:00

Everbody's changing....

2006-10-31T17:21:00.000+01:00

This last week has been a time of beginnings and endings for all around me it seems. I have been carried away with this wave of change and tried to be there as solid ground for those caught up in the motion. Many have done the same for me and I have learnt how much it means.

Baby Rudy seemed wary of what was ahead, he arrived a full two weeks after the world had been expecting him and now he is here making up for his absence. He shocked his parents by not being a girl and wakes every hour to remind them.

I saw two other shattered faces last week, but these were broken with sorrow not joy. Their 29 year old sister, who was born with Down’s Syndrome, was taken away by a cancer only just discovered. They are being so brave and trying to stay positive. ‘She has done what she came here to do’ said my friend,’ it was time for her to go’. Tomorrow is her funeral, I hope they manage to set her free.

Yesterday, after four long patiently lived years, my friend was released from the high security hospital which had become his home. His room in the hostel is tiny and he has more clothes than sense. Last night I helped him to move some of it to his mum’s so he could at least get in the door. I left them to enjoy their first dinner together as a family. My friend waved me off with his 13 year old nephew’s arm draped tightly around his shoulder. So proud and happy to have his uncle back.

Other friends have fought through a terrible year with their beautiful daughter born with a physical deformity. She is a cheerful smiling little angel who can entertain me for hours. They have decided that Palmers Green is not the place to bring her up. This week end they packed up their house and headed to the sea. Excited and scared, they are off to start a new life, one in which their daughter will hopefully thrive and grow. They have not gone far but it seems like another world. I will have to start planning my road trips and getting over the mental block of the distance.

So apologies for the quietness. My brain has been taken up with taking it all in. There has been no space left with which to write.

Next week a rest by the sea for me, I am counting down the days.

Knife culture hits home

2006-10-27T17:30:00.000+01:00

There is a teenage boy I have known for many years who, last week, admitted to his dad that he carries a flick knife.

This is a boy who snuggled up on my knee aged five years old and affectionately stroked my arm with his hand. Out of nowhere he asked ‘Do you like being white?’ flabbergasted by this from someone so young I stuttered a response ‘Of course’. As I composed myself I was drawn to ask the same, ‘Do you like being black?’ I said. He looked up at me with his beguiling brown eyes and sadly answered ‘no’.

It was ten years ago that this exchange took place yet it has never left me. It pierced my heart that someone so young could already sense the injustices of life. I wanted to hold him and protect him and tell him that everything would be alright. But he had a point, in the scheme of things he was right, my chances were better than his.

I proudly sat in church as I watched him and his bother serve as altar boys for many years. I was there at his confirmation as he stood shyly in his suit. He is a teenager now (and taller than me!) but has never lost that open affection. I am still greeted by an all-embracing hug, even if he only has a grunt to say. He is a boy I love dearly and he is carrying a knife. It breaks my heart and strikes fear inside.

He doesn’t have a great relationship with his dad, he hardly ever sees him in fact. Yet still he was inclined to tell him. Is this because it has become such commonplace? Was he saying it with pride? Or is this just what kids do now?

I can see how it happens, the peer pressure building up. If all your mates do it you will too. They all say they will never use it, but you never know. It only takes a moment, a second of blind panic and someone’s blood could be on your hands.

I am sending his uncles to try and talk some sense into him, but I fear it will take more than that to break the culture that is surrounding him and his friends.

Kitchen update

2006-10-25T12:50:00.000+01:00

Just returned from a very grim few days up north, more on that later.

However, I am pleased to report that a semblance of normality is in sight in my kitchen...

Firework frenzy

2006-10-22T20:32:00.000+01:00

It’s time again for the annual month long explosion of fireworks in our streets. They seem, these days, to begin before Halloween and extend long after the celebration of the rumbling of Mr Fawkes.

Don’t get me wrong, I used to love fireworks. I remember, as a kid, the 5th November was cold, I mean properly cold. It was a Michelin man quantity of layers and still toes go numb kind of a cold. Not this dark soggy humid pretend sort of cold that seems to have come hand in hand with the noughties. That is fine by me, as I am not one of those people who relishes my blood being unable to heat up my furthest extremities. Give me heat and humidity every time.

It is not the apparent change in temperature which has marred my enjoyment of these colourful explosions. It is, I think, what happened to me on that tube last year. I wasn’t very close to the bomb, the explosion I heard wasn’t shocking or deafening, but now I am pathetic with any sort of sudden noise. They do not have to be loud, or even unexpected. Last week I watched as a bottle of Champagne was opened in the office. I have cracked open enough in my time to know it will result in a noise, a pop and a fizz kind of a noise. I watched, I waited, the cork flew out and simultaneously, unexpectedly, I screamed. The shriek was met with surprised stares followed by nervous laughter. ‘Holly that was pathetic’ someone said and don’t I know it, but it’s beyond my control.

I have seen glorious displays of fireworks all over the world. I greeted each explosion with a whoop and a laugh whilst revelling in the thud deep beneath my ribs. One day I hope to rediscover that exhilarating joy but this year I fear it will remain far from sight.

I know what they are when I hear the boom, it doesn’t even help when I can see them. Each bang and blast hits me with a sickening horror and fills me with terror and sadness. It’s stupid and irrational but I cannot overcome it. Fireworks take me back to bombs and death, sadness and guilt, all wrapped up in a beautiful display of glowing colour.

Last year I barricaded myself behind closed doors, turned the TV up loud and hit the bottle. This year I will be in a craggy fishing village on the north coast of Cornwall. I hope to join the locals at the mouth of the harbour and watch the explosions amongst the rapturous crowds. Perhaps the excitement will be contagious and they will help me to dispel my fears. I think it’s too soon to hope for enjoyment, but I am not going to run away and hide. I will force myself through because I want to overcome it. I don’t want to be a firework fearing casualty for the rest of my life. I want to be able to ooh and aah with a smile across my face that is true and heartfelt.

I don't know when that day will be or if I will ever find it. I don't want to forget but I want to move on and fireworks still take me back. I wrap myself in the comfort that others will be going through the same. Not only those from the tubes that day but our troops coming back from Iraq. The dogs will not be the only ones cowering under the kitchen table on the 5th November, and I will be thinking of all of you who will be down there with me.

Now the Home Boy is breaking ranks

2006-10-19T14:24:00.000+01:00

Yesterday the Independent reported that even John Reid has realised that his back is up against the wall (a situation sorely familiar to him from his days as enforcer for his comrades in Glasgow I’m sure). A huge about turn is occurring out there and I take my hat off to General Sir Richard Dannat for sticking his neck, and his job, on the line and adding much needed fuel to the fire:

‘Sir Richard said the presence of British troops in Iraq was exacerbating the security situation. On Monday night, the Home Secretary, John Reid also broke ranks by admitting for the first time at a private meeting of the Parliamentary Labour Party that foreign policy was contributing to the radicalisation of young Muslims in Britain.’

We tried and tried, at our meeting with Dr Reid , to persuade him to accept the contribution of British foreign policy towards the ever increasing threat of terrorism in this land:

“The question of the influence of Iraq came up and was, again, dismissed. 4 terrorist attacks have been prevented in this country in the last 15 months, he told us. I asked him how many had been uncovered prior to 7th July. I was hoping for it to be less and that giving me an opening to ask him why he thought that was. He was one step ahead though (that is why he is Home Secretary and I am not) and didn’t answer. Instead he told us that the first al Qaeda plot to be foiled in this country was in 2000 in Birmingham. He kept doing that, throwing in facts that we were bound to not know thus tripping us up on our way. In his opinion the first war in Iraq had a greater radicalising affect than this one. ‘Jermaine Lindsay, at the time was 4’, someone helpfully pointed out ‘I doubt he was radicalised by it at that age, do you?’”

We tried, without success, and yet he too is now beginning to accept that it is undeniable.

Today we are told by the front page of the Guardian that , according to anti terror chiefs Britain is now the No 1 al-Qaida target in the world.

I may have been tempted, some months ago, to dismiss this as propaganda and scare mongering, but now I’m afraid that I believe it, and I am scared. Scared, not really for myself, as we who have been involved in incidents of terrorism before are statistically the safest people in the country, but scared for others. The thought of the lives that could so needlessly be lost and destroyed fills me with fear and despair. I cannot bear the prospect of watching what we have been through being replayed in front of my eyes with others as the victims. It hapens every day in Iraq and God forbid it should happen again here too.

One senior counter-terrorism source sums up the threat in a terrifyingly simplistic way. "It's like the old game of Space Invaders," he said "When you clear one screen of potential attackers, another simply appears to take its place."

Where are all these Space Invaders coming from? What is the cause of their radicalisation and the endless supply? We have been so busy throwing our men into Iraq that we have taken our eyes off the ball. Al Qaeda have been free to replenish and create a more formidable structure than ever. According to the Guardian report today they are now a group united by far more than just ‘an idea’, they are becoming an organisation as formidable and professional as the IRA was in its heyday.

I am suddenly willing Tony Blair to stay on, the tide is beginning to change so fast now, he may have to finally admit that mistakes were made. I don’t think he should be allowed to escape from this, he should stand up and apologise to his country. For he, who is ultimately charged with ensuring our safety, is putting our lives at risk.

Let's pretend

2006-10-17T21:37:00.000+01:00

I’m holed up in my bedroom playing make believe. In the days when I used to travel incessantly on business I loved retreating to my hotel room at the end of a day and decadently eating my room service dinner whilst lying on my bed and watching movies.

Tonight I am doing the same. The difference being that I am surrounded by an in orderly heap of everything I own. The rest of my flat (‘the rest’ being one other room) is a building site. The downfall of open plan habitation is that when you have your kitchen re done your entire living space is wiped out in a single blow.

I have managed to blag dinner at friend’s for the rest of the week. But the rag doll exhaustion which has been afflicting me since I cut down my anti D’s makes that a surprisingly unattractive prospect. I am quite revelling in the debauchery of slumping on top of my duvet, fag in hand, with a glass of red teetering on my bedside table.

I am old enough to admit publicly to my anal tendencies. My flat (with the help of my ever faithful cleaner) is usually immaculate with everything having a place of it’s own. My built in wardrobes are my pride and joy. My (abovementioned) cleaner infuriates me with her inability to learn, after four long years, that there is one pigeon hole for long sleeved tops, one for T shirts and another for summer vests. It’s not that difficult. She slips those vests into the long sleeved hole on purpose I think, to try and lighten me up. She fails every time.

The deep rooted cause of these anal tendencies, I suspect, is total disorganisation and a non functioning memory. If I don’t keep everything in a constant location I will lose it in a flash.

I am trying to maintain order throughout this chaotic existence, if only to maintain my sanity. Once I start losing things I will lose my mind. I am playing at make believe to the best of my ability, I’m in Milan, in a hotel, room service is on its way.

It will all be worth it when my gleaming kitchen is in place, I’ll have a dishwasher and a laundry room (cunningly disguised as a broom cupboard). I will feel so grown up I won’t be able to look myself in the face. I feel a domestic goddess in the making.

Eight days they said, but then they are builders.

What a Bore

2006-10-17T12:40:00.001+01:00

Do people not read books in this country any more? David Blunkett has published his recorded diaries, as a book. Fine, if you want to read it buy it. But it seems there is a countrywide mission to ensure that they cannot be escaped….newspaper serialisations, radio serialisations and last night I caught a TV serialisation! What a load of self pitying, self absorbed, not to mention badly written, and unbearably dull old twaddle it all is.

He is clearly looking for the sympathy vote, God he has had two chances and messed them both up, now he’s threatening to come back for more. Are we supposed to forget his dangerously draconian days in office? Are we to believe that he was really against invading Iraq and so was Gordon but Bair bullied them into it? Is he trying to get into bed with Brown so that, should he be the next to lead the party, it might actually be third time lucky for the Blunkett Boy?

And then there’s the sycophantic, almost maternal, voicing of his concerns about Blair’s health. I am not even going to credit him with spending the time to find the stuff and quote him, but along the lines of ‘I am worried about him, he looks exhausted, I fear he is pushing himself too far’….blaah blaah. Whilst at the same time telling us how he himself was crumbling under the pressure.

So the Cabinet is composed of a bunch of over tired, over worked, over emotional yet over egotistical politicians. It’s hardly news and hardly worth a book.

I hope the press interest crashes and burns..fast…I had already heard enough from that man before he chose to throw himself into the public eye yet again.

Speaking your mind

2006-10-15T21:32:00.000+01:00

This morning I passed a young man in the street happily chatting away. Initially I assumed he was on the phone, but as I overtook him I realised he was chuntering away to no one in particular.

When my friend was at his most ill he talked to himself almost incessantly. It was hard work to break through, to get him to focus on you and to hold a conversation for a moment or two. I have never known if he was conversing with himself or the voices in his head.

He was living in squalor, never washed or shaved, hardly slept and ate almost nothing. For someone usually so proud of his outward appearance he seemed oblivious to his shabby attire and skinny frame.

Despite his total lack of conscious awareness something seemed to kick in when he spoke aloud in public. Somewhere within his muddled mind even he knew that it was not right. He was unable control it or to stop his constant mutterings but he did his best to disguise it. He held a clenched fist to his right ear, cocked his head to one side and chatted away as if talking on the phone. It was an ingenious act of deception and totally subconscious, I think.

The old saying tells us that ‘talking to yourself is the first sign of madness’. This is not strictly true as you can be extremely sick without engaging in the act of solo conversation. Something about this anecdote from the past has stuck with us throughout the centuries and talking to oneself remains a social taboo. This was the only piece of social etiquette that remained with my friend throughout his illness so strongly was it ingrained.

Yet we all do it, every day I suspect, well I certainly do. Only yesterday I opened my broom cupboard as a plastic bucket crashed to the floor. I squealed and cursed out loud. I talk to myself as I walk through the streets, particularly when I am lost. Little words of encouragement; ‘this must be it’ as I near the next turning, or a telling off for losing my way.

I wonder if we would all do it rather more if we weren’t so conditioned into thinking it was weird. You don’t find dogs inhibited about barking if they are alone for no one to hear. Birds joyfully chirp from the top of a tree ‘It’s time, I’m horny, come shag me!” So why do we humans fight so hard to keep it in? Perhaps we should let it out more. It only seems to come out when our guard is down, whether from shock, frustration or illness. This might lead us to believe that our natural instinct is to talk away whether in company or not.

The voice in my head is always there. I think in words as well as emotions and the voice is definitely mine. Sometimes I wonder if, when I speak, it is really that voice coming through. It may always be influenced by company or situations and adapt itself each time. I am certain that my sentences, when spoken to clients, are constructed slightly differently to when I am in the pub with my mates. The words in my head however are constant and true.

A part of me envies those with the freedom to let this voice out. I am not sure I ever do when I open my mouth. The only way I feel able to manifest my true words is to write them down in silence. Perhaps that is the pleasure, the joy and the release of composing your thoughts into written words. Words that are ultimately pure and unaffected in every way.

So maybe we should all learn a lesson from our uninhibited friends and chat and chunter a little more to ourselves. Try it tomorrow and see how it feels, go on, be brave and speak your mind.

Drastic action is required

2006-10-13T16:11:00.000+01:00

This morning I forgot to straighten my hair. Let me repeat that in case it failed to sink in .....

This morning I forgot to straighten my hair!

I will put this into context for those of you unable to grasp the shocking nature of this small but significant occurrence. I am a hair straightening addict. The day I brought my hot irons home was a turning point in my life. No longer would I fling my overheated hair dryer across the room in frustration as I tried to blow out every crimp and curl.

No price is too high for these ceramic babies which glide across my frizzy locks transforming them into a glistening mass of straightness. I never leave the house without them packed in my overnight bag. I favour hats over umbrellas for guaranteeing immaculate hair at the end of a rainstorm. A bandana never leaves my head when sailing or swimming, for although I cannot fight the curling affects of salt water, I can at least hide it.

My hairdresser recoils in horror as I present him, every few months, with a burnt and shriveled excuse for a hairstyle. ‘It just needs a little trim’ I try to convince him, ‘then it will be fine’.

This morning, as I sat on the tube, nose buried in my paper, a lone ringlet floated before my eyes. I swept it aside and seconds later it sank it; that was MY hair…and it was CURLY!

I had confidently emerged from my house with a curling mass of locks adorning my head and been oblivious. I had left the building without a burning piece of ceramic coming within sight of my hair. What was I thinking?

This is too much, it’s gone too far. It’s time to call my shrink.

UPDATE: Sunny et al, you will be pleased to hear thatI have given my hair the freedom to curl as it wishes all weekend and the unanimous feedback has been positive. The ceramics will come out again tomorrow though I'm afraid, the ringlets are not quite ready for a weekday appearance yet!

We're all in this together

2006-10-11T21:16:00.000+01:00

Ruth Kelly today announced that she is going to, ‘in the future’ increase funding for ‘organisations that are taking a proactive leadership role in tackling extremists and defending our values’.

I am getting tired of this Government’s continuing message that it is up to the Muslim community to sort out extremism. I have said it before and I’ll say it again, of course they have a responsibility, but so do we all.

In the same speech to the Commission on Integration and Cohesion, established after 7 July, she says’ In our attempt to avoid imposing a single British identity and culture, have we ended up with some communities living in isolation of each other, with no common bonds between them?’

So on the one hand she is advocating cohesion and on the other she is telling Muslims to sort it out themselves and if they’re good she’ll bung a bit of cash their way.

How can she complain of ‘communities living in isolation’ whilst at the same time advocating faith schools? The phenomenon of extremism is deep rooted, there is no quick fix solution to this, we need to be looking at long term solutions, not headline grabbing policies. Whilst tackling the current problem in our midst we need to look to the future, to the next generation, to the children.

I was born, bred and schooled in London. I am used to living and working with people from all sorts of ethnic origins. My parents and my grandparents, however, are not. It is ignorance and unfamiliarity which grows the seeds of prejudice and fear. My parents have come out with some clangers in their time. If I ever have children I will want them to grow up in an even more multicultural environment than I did, I will want them to be familiar with those that are different from an early age and to learn judge people by what is inside.

How can we expect children, being educated in all white, all black, all Muslim, all Jewish schools, to name but a few, to be any more accepting than our grandparents? We can’t.

The way to instil common values, is to teach common values, together. Not to separate us at birth then expect us to grow up the best of friends. We need to learn to know each other before we can find respect.

At the same time we cannot ignore the current problems of alienation. We need to embrace that too. We need to work together as a community and let the moderate Muslims know that we are all striving towards the same goals. The majority of Muslims want peace in this land, as do the majority of citizens. The extremists are a tiny percentage. We need to take their target away from them.

When I saw the video of Mohammed Sidique Khan, telling me I had been attacked because I supported this Government and it’s policies in the Middle East I shouted back at the TV ‘I didn’t’. I marched against the war, I voted against this Government after the invasion of Iraq. I fundamentally didn’t support it. And you know what, I can see why they are angry and so can thousands of others. The ‘them and us’ in this battle of wills needs to be between moderate peace loving citizens and the extremist violent ones. We need to embrace the majority of Muslims, tell them we are on their side, we understand their frustrations and fight the injustices together.

That way we start to diffuse the target, we isolate the extremists from their community, take away their justification for their actions. They are not just attacking the values of non Muslims any more, they are up against their whole community. We need to stop this media frenzy of demonisation of Muslims and start talking to them as friends, as allies, as people who are threatened as much as we by this hatred amongst our ranks.

We are all in this together after all.

They’re all coming out of the woodwork

2006-10-09T22:28:00.001+01:00

What has Stephen Fry started? Or is it the fact that tomorrow is
World Mental Health Day? Whatever it is, depression suddenly seems to be the thing. First there was Stephen and Robbie. Hot on their heels came Ulrika. On Saturday David Blunkett told the Independent of his 'madness and depression' caused by the Quinn affair

‘At one point, I really did think I was going mad. My whole world was collapsing around me. I was under the most horrendous pressure.’

Yesterday it was Alastair Campbell’s turn to talk about the devastating affect David Kelly’s death had on his mental health:

‘He talks about the "nightmare" impact of the Hutton inquiry, how the death of Dr David Kelly was his "worst day" - and how his experience of a crippling breakdown in his 20s helped him to cope. He said: "It [the Hutton saga] was one of those episodes where things spiraled out of control... I felt completely confident in relation to the facts but during the whole period it was a nightmare. And you are thinking, 'There's this guy for whom it's been such a nightmare he's killed himself'."’

He goes on to say:

‘Depression should be properly recognised as an illness and openly talked about like "a broken leg".

"There is a lot of stuff in the media which quite frankly doesn't matter a damn. But this area [mental health] does have an impact on how people are treated. The most worrying thing is the constant association between violence and mental illness. Mental illness is not just about risk or violence. It's about all of us."

Good for him, good for all of them. I have always made a point of talking about everything my friend has gone through with his schizophrenia, and I do the same with everything I have been through in the last few months. It is amazing when you do bring it out in the open how many people start to admit what they have been through.

I’ve just watched Channel 4’s Dispatches. An undercover reporter worked in several psychiatric wards over a year and came back with some shocking footage. Shocking, perhaps, to some. Sadly it was all too familiar to me, it echoed what I have seen nearly every Sunday for the last 6 years and what my friend has reported back to me. 3 people have killed themselves on his ward in the last 2 years and one of those was a nurse.

‘One patient sums up her experience by saying: "It's the best way to make someone have a nervous breakdown, being in this place." Another says: "If you're not mad when you come in, you will be by the time you leave."’

We all need to keep on talking and the Government need to keep listening. The way the mentally ill are treated in this country is something we should all be ashamed off. The patients and the staff are being let down by under funding and poor management, and there is absolutely no excuse for it.

Tomorrow is World Mental Health Day, so do your bit; listen and talk and share a thought for all those we are letting down. I am going to UCL to help them in their research. They are evaluating the NHS response after the London Bombings, it seems like a fitting thing to do.

And in the meantime here are some stats you may care to ponder:

· In the UK, there are more suicides on Mondays than on any other day of the week.

· 1 in 10 people will have some form of depression at any one time.

· By the year 2020, it is estimated that depression will be second only to heart disease as an international disease and disability burden.

· Around half of all people with depression do not go to their GP. Two-thirds of those who do see their GP present with physical ailments or sleeping problems rather than psychological symptoms.

· In 2002 / 2003, the economic and social cost of mental health problems in England stood at £77 billion.

· Among teenagers, rates of depression and anxiety have increased by 70 per cent in the past 25 years.

· 40 per cent of older people living in care homes are depressed.

· Approximately 2 million people of working age in Britain are currently taking psychiatric drugs.

· Job applicants with a diagnosis of diabetes are significantly more likely to be offered a position than applicants with a diagnosis of depression, all other factors being equal.

· One in ten children aged 5 to 15 experience clinically defined mental health problems.

More over here.

Take that paper bag off your head before you talk to me!

2006-10-06T16:34:00.001+01:00

There are days, and this is one of them, when the thought of venturing out of the house would be so much less daunting if I could throw a paper bag over my head. Peeping out of two, roughly cut, eye holes I would feel protected, comforted and hidden by my anonymity. Much as I imagine celebrities feel when adorned with base ball hats and sunglasses. Some days you just cannot face the world, nor do you feel that it should be subjected to facing you. On days such as this a paper bag would do nicely.

There is something about wearing a crumpled piece of brown paper on your head which is not yet socially acceptable in this country. I yearn for the day when our society is integrated and open minded enough to enable me to walk, head held high, adorned with my chosen headgear without fear of rotten apple throwing, name calling or taunting.

The etiquette of head garment wearing is steeped in history. Hats to a wedding, but not to eat in. Many a time I have munched my way through a five course dinner, chit chatting politely to strangers, with a deep red welt across my forehead and an indented ridge around my crisply ironed hair. Hiding the hat beneath my chair, only to be tripped over by fumbling waiters, I puzzle over the logic. Do your hair, ruin it with hat, remove hat to expose disastrous hair for all to see. It is at this point I long to reach for the brown paper bag.

There is a side of me which has always thought that a burkha was a damn fine substite for a head covering bag. What a relief it must be to wake up with your bad face on and to engulf your body with a piece of black cloth. I think everyone should have a burkha wearing day in their life.

The problem arises, however, when you wake up feeling great and want to proclaim this to the passing world. You plough through every garment in your wardrobe, trying to find the ultimate combination of clothes and accessories with which to accentuate your best and hide your worst. Successfully having achieved this goal, you strut your stuff in front of a full length mirror admiring your handiwork and applying various coloured substances to your face. It all comes together in a vision of confidence and style, you feel like a million dollars. You pick out a co ordinating coat, the finishing touch, grab your keys and prepare to rock the world with your morning vision. As you open the front door, smell the breeze in the air, your husband’s hand descends upon your shoulder. ‘Don’t forget your paper bag’ he says and shatters your world.

What's with the moose?

2006-10-04T22:36:00.000+01:00

The most common random Google which leads people to this site is something along the lines of 'moose loose about this hoose' which takes them to this post I wrote an age ago.

What's that all about?! It's something my dad used to say when we were young in his Scottish twang. Why so many people are Googling it beats me!

I'm half way there

2006-10-03T22:34:00.000+01:00

It is now seven weeks since I halved my dose.
It’s been a hard slog but I’m starting to win.
I made the decision to do this alone, visiting the doctor seemed pointless.
My mind was set and it couldn’t be changed, I was ready and that was that.

After weeks of fighting the turmoil inside I finally succumbed to the advice of my friends.
‘You can’t do this alone, go get some support or you won't come out the other end'.
I picked up the phone and found a slot that was right at the end of the day.
At least it meant the week end could begin before it usually does.

I don’t really have a GP as such. I usually see whoever I am given.
It is always a gamble and I sometimes I lose.
This time I came up trumps.
She had actually read my notes, for a start, and knew why I was taking these things.

Her eyes grew with surprise as I told her my tale;
‘I’ve been biting them in half for a month!’
‘There are pill-cutters, you know?’ she smiled with despair,
‘I’ll give you a smaller dose’.

I described my fatigue and my aching head and the sleep that was broken each night.
‘Stay on this dose for a while’ she said.
See if it settles and come back in three weeks.

So on I struggled and gave up the booze, it only makes me cry.
I can’t go out as I’ll only succumb, so it’s been a dull old time.
The friends were back on the case again, ‘vitamins are what you need!’
My pharmacist told me B was the thing mixed with vitamin C.
I bought a brown bottle, they stink to high heaven, and consequently so does my pee.

Perhaps that was it or perhaps it’s just time but the gloom is beginning to clear.
In time it will settle and then I’ll go back and cut my dose again.
I’m tired of it all but I know I’ll succeed, this is the only way through.
I need a break, to walk on a beach and fill my lungs with sweet tasting air.

I might go to Scotland and hide on an island; fill my ears with melodious words.
Just be alone with my thoughts and myself and write it all down in the sand.
Wherever I go, whatever I do I'm just seeking peace in the end.
A moment for me away from my life, then come back and start over again.

A journey of memories and ridiculously big boots

2006-09-30T21:20:00.000+01:00

I bought a ridiculously expensive pair of jeans on Thursday. This morning, as I woke, I decided it was only right that they should be accompanied by a ridiculously expensive pair of boots. Sporting the aforementioned jeans I set off into town heading for the ridiculously big shoe shop. (The shop is not large in itself but the shoes it sells are.)

Transport at the week end is always a quandary. I don’t do the tube on work free days, but taxi fares accumulate and mini cabs never turn up on time. I had been going to cycle, but the inclement weather and soggy tyres put an end to that. So, set to a random iPod soundtrack, I strode off through the park. Approaching the bus stop I passed a bar. A bar where I had delivered some ridiculously bad news to a short fling of mine (the fling was short, not the man), some 6 months ago. He has not been seen since.

I boarded a bus heading to Euston planning to walk from there. As it trundled down Essex Road we passed the Outreach Centre (a ‘care in the community’ kind of place). Six long years ago I had sat in there with my friend as his doctor told him he thought, after 10 years of being well on a bi weekly injection (known as a depot in the trade), he could be trusted to medicate himself with pills. Armed with his capsules my friend set off on a 2 year, unsupervised journey, which was to end in the Old Bailey and 4 years in a secure psychiatric unit.

Along we rode, past the fishmongers which always has a queue spilling out of its door, and through Angel, my old familiar home. We headed down Pentonville Road and up loomed Kings Cross. The hole through which I had emerged from the ground, that smoke filled day in July last year, has been filled with rubble and sealed with concrete. A scar on my life, erased from sight but never from my mind.

The driver dimmed the lights at Euston and off I hopped. I glanced at the gate house bar which is sometimes open (today it was). Months ago I was sent to check whether the padlock was in place. ‘You go’ someone had said ‘you’re the runner’. As I sprinted across the road my heart had skipped a beat, I was overwhelmed with guilt, as I thought of the girl I had only just met. Another passenger from that tube standing on the pavement on her prosthetic legs watching, waiting and perhaps remembering when she could run too.

I strolled past St. Pancras Church, where we had laid flowers at the foot of ‘The Fallen Angel’ on the 6 month anniversary of the bombings. Where I had wept uncontrollably at the first anniversary this summer as the local school choir had sung ‘Make me a channel for your peace’.

I took shelter from the smog filled road and cut through a new development by the Euston tower. I stopped and looked up, with awe, at a giant glowing artwork plastered across the raw end of a building. I wandered over to the plaque we had designed:

Michael Craig-Martin
The Fan
2003
Lightbox

I remembered that gloomy November morning when, shuddering with cold and nerves, I had watched the crane hoist it onto place. Would it fit? Would it stick? Would it work? Had I messed something up? It was still there today, vibrant with colour, Michael’s fan for all to see, with me (who had played a part in its creation) standing below it and taking it in with pride.

Great Portland Street was next, past the pub where we had all congregated, that summer evening, after the anniversary memorial service in Regents Park. Determined to get hammered but too emotionally drained to drink. We all flopped home early and slept for a week.

By now I was getting warm, my jacket was too heavy and I needed a drink. I bought some water from a newsagent and tried to squeeze it in my bag. My bag was too small to hold it and I needed to go to the loo. Jacket flung over my shoulder, hand bag bursting open I concentrated on the medley playing in my ears. 2Pac, Johnny Cash, Eminem, The Carpenters, Jimmy Cliff, Air, Eminem, Nightmares on Wax, Novelle Vague, Neil Diamond, Eminem. My iPod random setting is not random at all. I imagine one of the programmers thought it was funny and installed a little bug. It wanders through my collection, but every few songs, without fail, it returns to Eminem. He is a bit of a hero, I’ve seen 8 Mile 8 times, but sometimes you can have too much of a good thing.

An old red routemaster passed me, decorated with wedding ribbons. ‘Andy and Mandy, just married’ it declared, where the destination should be. I couldn’t help a smile.

I strolled past the hidden mews of this sprawling city and peered into havens of peace where people live protected from the hustle. I rounded a corner, and there I was, the street of the big shoe shops. Women of all shapes and sizes grace this street with excitement and glee. Most are tall, but some are not, all have a comment bond of bearing larger feet that the norm. We laugh and chat and exclaim how we have never had so much choice. Decisions, decisions, we squeal, we are so used to buying the only pair that fits. I tried on nearly every pair in the street, settled on three, close my eyes and paid the bill. I left the shop with the ridiculously expensive boots already on and decided I needed a drink.

I skirted along the back of Oxford Street to avoid the crowds. The rear side of Selfridges loomed and I walked past the reception of their offices. I had been through that door, fired up with adrenolin, more times than I could remember. Each time, coming back to meet someone else to pitch for the job again. A job we lost, even though everyone wanted us to win. Everyone, that is, but the Director of Design, Alannah Weston, whose dad just happens to own the joint.

And then to the bar, a haven from the crowds, the bar where I had my first date with my ex some 4 years ago. An early evening vodka and a call from a documentary researcher. We talked about forgiveness, PTSD and recovery and about how, amongst the chaos of it all, blogging somehow helps.

Bully boyz unite

2006-09-28T13:04:00.000+01:00

If anyone is going to ‘confront muslim bullies’ Dr Reid is the man to do it.

Nick Robinson
'It was once said of Ken Clarke that he was the sort of man who would see a fight starting on the other side of the road and cross it to join in.
John Reid is just such a politician.'

Liberal Dissenter
'he started his political life at Strathclyde University as the Student Communists (yes this was when the British Communists thought that Uncle Joe Stalin was just misunderstood) political enforcer - the political & physical heavy who 'persuaded' recalcitrant party members to toe the line. '

A Big Stick and a Small Carrot
'The thing is, John Reid really does scare me silly. No joke. '

Time Magazine
'John Reid (8 to 1 against), a former Communist turned right-wing Blairite, has long disliked Brown and would relish a grudge match'

Iran Daily
'Defense Secretary John Reid rejected the report’s conclusions, arguing that terrorism was a global problem that the whole international community had to confront.
“One of the lessons of history is that if you run away from this it doesn’t actually get better,“ Reid told the BBC.
“Every child in the playground knows the idea that if you just avoid the bully, the bully will not come for you is refuted by every piece of historical experience,“ he added. '

Dave's Part
'Reid is an unpopular bully boy with a distinctly dodgy past.'

No wonder I'm feeling crazy!

2006-09-28T11:07:00.000+01:00

If only they had told me this when I started to take the bloody things. Although, to be honest, I was so desperate at the time I think I would have taken them anyway. Still, this information is kind of crucial to know up front, don't you think?.....

Withdrawal symptoms for tricyclic antidepressants include:
excessive anxiety, restlessness, hyperactivity, insomnia, disturbing
dreams and nightmares, flu-like symptoms (headache, sweating,
diarrhoea, stomach ache, bowel discomfort, nausea, vomiting,
hot and cold flushes, goosebumps), fast or irregular heart beat,
low blood pressure, and increased libido. Psychiatric effects include
hypomania and mania, apathy, social withdrawal, depressed
mood, panic attacks, aggression, delirium and psychoses.
When describing the symptoms of withdrawal from SSRI
antidepressants, David Healy breaks them down into two groups:
• symptoms ‘unlike anything you have had before’
• symptoms that ‘may lead you or your physician to think that
all you have are features of your original problem’.
The first group include: dizziness (when you turn your head you
feel your brain gets left behind); ‘electric head’ (strange brain
sensations which have been likened to goose bumps in the brain);
electric shock-like sensations, other strange tingling or painful
sensations; nausea, diarrhoea and flatulence; headache; muscle
spasms and tremor; agitated and vivid dreams; agitation; hearing
or seeing things others can’t.

The second group include: mood swings; irritability; confusion;
fatigue, malaise and flu-like symptoms; insomnia or drowsiness;
sweating; feelings of unreality; disturbed temperature sensations;
change in personality.
Many people taking SSRIs, especially paroxetine (Seroxat) and
fluoxetine (Prozac), have reported uncharacteristic feelings of
violence and suicidal thoughts and actions, and these seem to
be particularly associated with changes in dose.
Withdrawal symptoms for Monoamine oxidase inhibitors (MAOIs)
are less well known than for other antidepressants, because they
are less commonly prescribed. There are conflicting reports on
the frequency and severity of withdrawal problems. Reported
symptoms include: anxiety, agitation, paranoia, being unusually
talkative, headaches, low blood pressure when standing, muscle
weakness, shivering and tingling, burning sensations, and mania.
Catatonic states have also been reported.

Misplaced pride

2006-09-27T23:21:00.000+01:00

Superb post by Clare Allan (whose book has been nominated for the Guardian's first novel award) on CiF today and an extraordinarily sensible and intelligent thread of comments for once.

I love the fact that a post about nutters is the first I have seen which the usual 'nutters' haven't responded to!

Bright lights on Sky

2006-09-26T22:19:00.000+01:00

I largely ducked out of the media glare when the report was published last Friday. I can’t take any more time off work, every time I so much as breathe the numbers seven and seven another day mysteriously vanishes from my annual leave. Suddenly I only have 3 days left, so Friday had to be spent at work.

Sky News however, assured me they could interview me live in the morning and still get me to the office on time. So bright and early they picked me up and whisked me to their Millbank studio. As I peered through the door of the largely empty office space a few heads popped up, checked me out and went back to their screens. Who am I after all? I walked into the room and as I looked down (for she is far more diminished in stature than me) I saw Tessa Jowell, flanked by an entourage, walking towards me. She threw me a slightly more frosty smile than her usual caring look of sympathy. No wonder, I was hot on her heels and she knows I am not their greatest fan. But still, she managed a smile and said ‘hello’, I returned the look with a cheery ‘Hi’. Almost instantaneously those heads which had previously ignored me, sprang up from their desks, greeted me warmly, offered me coffee, a seat and a stack of newspapers.

As I wandered over to the seats by the studio door, I noticed an elderly looking man sitting by the window and waiting. He leant over as I approached and welcomed me like an old friend. ‘So what are you here to bang on about then?’ he asked. I stumbled with my words and muttered ‘Oh the 7th July’. It was Tony Benn!

He opened the window, sparked up his pipe and said ‘Ah yes, Tessa Jowell was just here’. ‘Yes’ I replied ‘I saw her as I came in. So what did she have to say for herself?’ ‘Oh God knows’ he said ‘I didn’t listen to a word!’

No. 5 and counting

2006-09-26T22:16:00.000+01:00

Apologies for being a bit late to the party with this one. I have been busy cutting down on my anti D’s and fighting the affects. I wouldn’t say I was winning but I’m fighting a damn hard battle and I ain’t gonna be beat.

So ‘the report’ is out. Report No. 5 in the grand scheme of looking back at what happened on 7th July last year. They have told us what they have learnt, and although, as predicted, it is nothing new it is one small victory for a random group of survivors and bereaved families. Without blowing our own trumpets, this report wouldn’t have happened had we all sat back and shut up as they wished. The ball was kicked off back in March by the London Assembly. They were the first people who had the brainwave that the people who might be able to teach the public more than anyone else about what happened that day and what could be learnt for the future were the people who were there. Not politicians and people in power but the people who had been through it.

They were forward thinking enough to do this publicly. Nervous as we all were, the words and stories flowed and the minor rumblings of a storm were first heard. The Government were quick to act & Tessa Jowell wrote to us the next day. They had no excuses not to do the same although our meetings with them were held in private. Still they met us, we talked, and talked, with dignity, courage and emotion and they couldn’t help but listen. The stories they heard could not be ignored and hence this report was born.

Last Friday Tessa Jowell admitted their failings. Failings she would never have known about had she not listened to the survivors and the bereaved. That in its self is a lesson to be learnt and a small success to be celebrated by everyone who spoke out.

But it is just the beginning and the tip of the iceberg. What was said so eloquently by many last week was that it’s all very well looking at the affects but you cannot keep ignoring the causes. It is a political game that is going on here. The Government would rather be lambasted for refusing an independent inquiry and looking at why this happened than having to admit that its foreign policy is putting its citizens at risk. Earlier today Blair brayed to his party ‘terrorism is not our fault’. For pity’s sake, it is not about fault, it’s about stopping it happening again. I am almost past caring whose fault it is. I am certainly not interested in seeing the reactions of the poor emergency services trawled through over and over and their failings highlighted again and again. If we are playing the schoolyard blame game then it is most definitely, with out a doubt, not their fault either. So leave the people who risked their lives to save us alone, stop talking about blame and lets grow up, pull together and stop stop stop this from happening to anyone in this country again.

Not another bloody report into 7/7

2006-09-19T23:06:00.000+01:00

I don’t tend to talk about 7/7 much any more, apart from with my KCU friends (fellow passengers from the train). Interest is dying, from all but those directly involved, and I cannot say I am surprised. I would probably be the same if I hadn’t stepped onto that fateful train over a year ago.

I can imagine if I mentioned to anyone I know that the government is due to publish its ‘Lessons Learnt’ report this week their response would be largely along the lines of the title of this post, ‘Not another bloody report’. And I agree, wholeheartedly!

‘Haven’t there already been loads published?’ they might ask.

‘Yes’ I would reply ‘but this one is different?’

‘How?’

“Well, it’s about lessons learnt’

‘But weren’t the others?’

‘Well the first one, published by the London Assembly was, kind of, but it had a very narrow remit. It only focused on communications both on the day and afterwards’

‘Ah, so this one’s about everything? Everything related to the bombings?’

‘Well not really, I don’t think it’s going to talk about security failings or the lead up to the bombings’

‘So has anyone looked at that?’

‘Yes, the Prime Minister appointed a group to look into it; The Intelligence and Security Committee. They published a report back in May’

‘So it wasn’t an independent group then?’

‘Not at all’

‘So what was the point of that? They weren’t really going to tell us anything they didn’t want to were they’

‘Exactly’ I would say. (What was the point? I have no idea. To shut us up maybe?)

‘Haven’t there been others?’

‘Yes, there was the Government ‘narrative’’

‘Another one by the Government?”

‘Yup’

‘So what did that one tell us?’

‘What happened on the day and a bit about the lead up’

‘Didn’t we know that already?’

‘Pretty much, yup’

‘So how do you know there’s going to be another one published this week? Do you know when? I know Tessa Jowell’s your great mate now, did she tell you?’

‘Well, no actually, I found out from the press. She told the Telegraph on Sunday that it’s coming out this week. I think it’s going to be Friday, but that’s just come from journalists’

‘How are people supposed to make head or tail of all these different reports? Isn’t it confusing?”

‘It’s totally befuddling. They all contradict each other, it’s a mess’

‘Wouldn’t it be better to have an independent party compile one single document that covers everything?’

‘Eureka! It’s not exactly rocket science is it?!’

‘So is this one going to tell us anything new?’

‘I doubt it’

‘So what’s the point then?’

‘Beats me’

Stephen Fry: The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive

2006-09-19T23:00:00.000+01:00

I am shaking with emotion and exhausted. I have watched too many powerful documentaries over the last year, I thought this would just be another. Stephen Fry tonight was astonishing. I wept, I laughed and I nodded my head, incessantly. When he asked a woman, suffering despairingly from Manic Depression, how she saw the future I said out loud, before she could answer ‘I don’t’. I knew that would be her response. I have been there in the depths of my PTSD. ‘Future’ is not a word you consider. You are lucky if you can contemplate the next 5 minutes.

Admiration does not come close to describing what I feel for that man tonight. He has admitted his weaknesses, his failings and his illness all in the name of helping others. There are very few people in the world with his qualities and I cannot thank him enough. He is successful, he is famous, he is in a position to make programmes like this. Many other sufferers are not so lucky, they are desperate and penniless. A large percentage of the nations homeless suffer from mental health problems. But he has touched upon topics which are usually only whispered about. He has brought it into people’s living rooms and made them listen.

My emotions were split between myself and my friend. My friend was diagnosed as Bipolar for years, but more recently has been told he is Schizophrenic instead. I think that sometimes labels are too simplistic for mental illness. Surely you can have a combination? The description, tonight, of people suffering from delusions of grandeur were all too familiar to me. My friend has told me many times how he has spoken at the United Nations.

But oh how refreshing to see both familiar faces and strangers, spilling their guts and telling the nation the deepest secrets of their mind. Stephen Fry has done an insurmountable service to sufferers of mental health problems tonight. I look forward to part 2.

'We failed victims of 7 July' admits Jowell

2006-09-18T15:57:00.000+01:00

I wonder why she chose The Telegraph as the place to make this admission? I am heartened but not surprised by her comments in the interview published today. I have never been sure whether to trust her during the two meetings I have had with her. The first was with Ms Jowell alone, the second with old bull dog Reid.

She has a slightly mumsey air about her. She looks you directly in the eye, remembers your name and frowns pitifully as she listens intently to your recollections of pain and her department’s failings. She seems like a decent human being and, rarely for a politician, her heart is very much in evidence. She has told us many times how affected she has been by her meetings with us and the stories she has heard, in this for once I believe her. I have often wondered, however, how genuine she is. It is clear why she was the minister charged with coordinating the support for those affected by the bombings last year. She is the right person for the job, a job in which she excels. There is no argument, no defence whilst in discussion with her. She listens intently, nods sympathetically, she apologises fluently and is even brave enough to admit mistakes. All this in stark contrast to her colleague from the Home Office.

This aside she has constantly failed us. Our first communication from her was dated 22 March 2006, it was sent second class and arrived the day after I and other survivors, had given evidence to the London Assembly about the failings of communication both on and since the 7 July. The irony of this timing was not lost on us.

She then wrote again in a letter dated only May 2006. She was writing, she said, on behalf of John Reid (why couldn’t he write himself? Is she his PA?) to let us know that the government would ‘publish an Official Account of the events leading up to 7 July very shortly’. By the time we received this letter the ‘narrative’ had already been made public and the media was buzzing with it.

We first met with her on 16 May. She didn’t answer many questions directly and promised to issue us with meeting notes. She said these would address any issues she had not been able to deal with at the meeting. She sent these notes on 20 July (I would lose my job if I issued records of meetings over 2 months after they took place!) 5 days before we were due to meet with her and John Reid. The notes were scantily written and told us nothing new.

At the meeting on 25 July we bantered with the Home Secretary , he fought back and argued his corner like a Pit Bull. We were, however promised, that they would always notify us is something they knew to be false was published in the press about the bombings, and would also give us warning before they published any documents. Today I read in The Telegraph that the ‘Lessons learnt’ report is to be published next week. I look forward to a letter from Tessa the day after.

It could be you

2006-09-17T20:18:00.000+01:00

This article in the Observer today , highlights a subject which spends most of its life brushed under a dusty carpet, only seeing the light of day on rare occasions like this. There are people who work tirelessly to bring the scandal of the mental health services in this country into the public eye. There are others who do everything they can to break the stigma of mental health and try to make us aware of how common it is. 1 in 4 is a statistic which pops up again and again. 1 in 4 of us, at some time in our lives will suffer from some kind of mental illness. This powerful statistic should, I always think, start to wake people up to the fact that it could be them. But, as always in this world, it is the fear of the unknown which terrifies people most. Victorian asylums with darkened corridors and unkempt nutters is a vision which appears in people's minds, ‘that will never be me’ they think.

I, on the other hand, am fully aware that it could easily be me. Only 2 nights ago I had a dream that I was sectioned. I have had a terrible week. A combination of the 9/11 anniversary and halving my does of anti depressants (for a month now). The reduced dose is beginning to kick in, and I feel like I am losing my mind. My dream was both upsetting and disturbing, but rarely for a dream, it was probably surprisingly accurate. I remember arriving at a grimy hospital, the airlock security doors closing behind me, and being left. I was given no introduction, no explanation, not even a room. I was left to wander, confused and helpless through the corridors of the ward, without even being told when I would eat. I remember thinking that surely I was coming here to get better. How was I going to get better if no-one even spoke to me? I fear that my dream was not too far off the mark. Too many people are locked up, drugged up and forgotten about. Friends, relatives, police and health professionals send people to these places trusting they are doing the right thing. Sometimes they are, sometimes they aren’t.

After many disastrous stays in hospital, my friend has finally found somewhere which has actually treated him . After 4 years of being locked up he spent his first night out, in a supervised hostel on Thursday. He will spend every Thursday there for the next few weeks and on 6 November he will permanently move in. It’s a fantastic step forward for him and I am so proud of how far he has come . On Thursday we went for a drink, ate burger and chips and spectacularly lost (despite my best attempts at cheating) the local pub quiz. I could already sense a new confidence about him, a sense that he was soon to be free. He would not have got here without his current doctor and psychologist, but it has been a rocky road and it is only the luck of the draw.

When he was sectioned and arrested 4 years ago, he was unrecognisable as the man you see today. He had been let down from every corner, each blaming the other. He spent a day in a cell at the police station, haunted and injured. I have never seen a man so vulnerable, and mad. They searched high and low for a hospital bed, but not a single one was to be found. That night he was shipped off to Pentonville Prison, there was no where else with any space. He spent 4 weeks there over Christmas, he was given no treatment, no medication, he was a very sick man in need of urgent help and he was left to deteriorate in prison for a month before a bed became available. It was a disgraceful way to treat a human being, I remember never having felt such despair.

It is time that this stopped, time that more, not less, money was given to the departments to treat these people who are as deserving as cancer sufferers. It is time that we all woke up to the fact that it really could be you. I wouldn’t wish it upon anyone, but the way we live our lives these days, we are all on the edge, all as likely as the next to go at any moment. My money is on Tony Blair being next.

Good for the Syrians...

2006-09-12T22:51:00.000+01:00

....protecting the yanks. Enjoyed watching Condi's squirming message of thanks tonight. The Americans would do well to learn from them. Remember how they stormed into the devastated American embassy in Nairobi and only looked after their own? When your 'enemy' gains the moral high ground you are really on the slippery slope.

Sad and sickened

2006-09-11T16:33:00.000+01:00

There is a sickening feeling of despair with the world in the pit of my stomach today. I am discovering that a natural empathy seems to exist between victims and survivors of terrorist attacks. When I read the papers, watch the news or immerse myself in the plethora of documentaries which have been shown in the run up to this anniversary, there is, this year, a personal connection.

I am angry and sad and I cannot concentrate on a thing, I wasn’t expecting to be so affected by today. I know no-one directly affected in the attacks of 9/11, however my experiences over this past year make me feel as if I do. I may not know the people but I can start to feel their pain. I think it is having an understanding off the suffering which adds to the anger. I cannot begin to imagine what many have been through but I know better than I did a year ago. It is that knowledge which brings tears to my eyes as I listen to and watch the individual stories of courage and pain.

I feel angry at the wasted lives and those lived in terror and mourning around the world. I am sick with the powers that be who thought they knew better than the men on the street. Osama Bin Laden is sitting pretty as the west does his work for him. Meanwhile there is suffering and death around the world on a scale which fills me with shame.

Today it is hitting me hard, the anger, the sorrow and the helplessness to do anything about it. I do not like this world today, I feel scared and sick and I want to run away from it all.

Anniversary mania

2006-09-10T23:44:00.000+01:00

As September has crept upon us, my mind has been on a different anniversary from the one which haunts the rest of the world. I have been keenly aware that it was this month last year when I first broke down after the bombings in July. For me this was the beginning of a journey which is yet to be concluded.

As the balmy summer days wrapped themselves up I thought about marking that day with a post on my blog. I knew it was a milestone to remember and recollecting it in words seemed the only way to honour it.

I wanted to remind myself how far I had come, that my shrink had been right when he told me it would be ‘at least a year’ until I felt like my old self. I didn’t believe him at the time, it seemed incomprehensible that it should take so long. I am still not there, but I have travelled the rocky road and, as someone told me the other day, I have begun to find the joy in life again.

I wanted to recall the night it all began. The night my brain was finally unable to contain the fear. The night I was no longer able to protect my consciousness from the horrors hidden deep inside my head. The night I fell into a fitful sleep and shrank into my mattress as a black cloud of faceless evil surrounded my flat and crept in beneath the ill fitting front door. As it slid towards my sleeping form I recoiled in terror unable to escape its growing mass. There was no escape from this engulfing cloud. As I prepared myself for its final onslaught something came from deep within, there was a way, a chance of survival. The darkening cloud was all too real, but something inside my unconscious head reminded me that I was, in fact, asleep. ‘Wake up’ it told me ‘you have to wake up’, that is the only chance you have. I gathered all the strength I could find and put every last effort into beating this force. I sat bolt upright, my eyes still closed, and hollered with all my might. My eyes shot open as I heard the sound, what was this curdling cry? It was seconds before I realised it was coming from my throat, that I was the one screaming into the night. Where was the evil? Had I killed it with my shout? My whole body was consumed by a shuddering fit and I fought to inhale the surrounding air into my tightening chest. I dragged off the covers and staggered across the room, I had to kill the darkness with light. I found the switch and shakily pushed it in, there was a crack and a flash and the system was blown. For a moment I wondered if it had really been a dream. Darkness had invaded my home and now the fuse was blown. I felt my way along the wall until I came across the ladder. I hauled it across the hall and, shakily, climbed it until my fingers rested on the fuse box. I found the big red switch and as I pushed it down I was enveloped with a warm blanket of light. It was over, I was safe.

Little did I know as I fixed the fuse, that this was just the beginning. The beginning of a voyage where I was to discover the weakness of the human soul and my inability to put mind over matter and beat this bloody thing.

As I pondered that day and mentally prepared this post, I realised I had better find out the date. Last week, as I sat in front my desk, I leafed through my diary of the year that has passed. I counted backwards until I found that day, the date was September 11.

I shook as my eyes fell upon those numbers. How could it be that I had never known? It was natural that the anniversary of 9/11 should have been the trigger to awaken my terror, but not if I hadn’t been aware. I have no recollection at all of the significance of that Sunday. I had friends for lunch which occupied my whole day. Perhaps I had heard a snippet on the radio or caught a headline in the paper. You would have thought that over the next few days the penny would have dropped when I asked myself why. ‘Why has this happened and why now? Oh it’s September 11, of course.’ Perhaps I was too mentally broken to know or care, or perhaps I really didn’t know. Either way tomorrow is going to be tough. The 5 year hype is upon us and as I turn off my lights tomorrow night I will be praying that the darkness doesn’t return.

Not sure I earn more but I'm definitely smarter!

2006-09-08T15:51:00.000+01:00

Tallies rock...check this out!

Humble pie?

2006-09-07T18:40:00.000+01:00

Well, Blair has spoken. Not much has been said, but he has uttered the ’12 month’ words that the ‘rebels’ within his party and the media have been braying for. Whether this will be enough to quell the boiling pot I am not entirely sure. I should think, in reality, that there is more to come.

We heard an apology (of sorts) today, and that is the very least that we deserve for the debacle which has played itself out in front of our eyes. He said he would have preferred to do this in his ‘own way’. I imagine there are very few times during his reign that things have not been carried out as he would please. It is refreshing, at least, to see him pushed into a corner from which he cannot escape. But there is something rather tragic about witnessing this once fine party crumbling before our eyes. I fear it cannot be saved and Brown most certainly is not the man to try. Blair has lied and lied, stood by Bush through his reign of terror and consistently ignored his public and their views. He is managing his swansong about as well as he managed to convince us about the existence of WMD. The dirty washing is being aired in public and that is never a pleasant sight to witness whoever the laundry belongs to. The least he could do for his voters and his party is manage his exit with efficiency and dignity. He has even failed in that. There is no point in that man being in office any more, tomorrow would be too late for him to stand down in my eyes.

As Blair frowned and twitched before us, his comrade across the Atlantic delivered his own painful confession. Secret CIA prisons have indeed existed he admits at last. He obviously thinks the gamble will pay off. Admit he's told a porky (tactically in the lead up to the 5th anniversary of 9/11 when the whole world, myself included, is jittering in their sleep) in order to bring these 14 men back out of the wilderness so he can use them to justify his continuing war on human rights.

Are these two indominatable pals crumbling simultaneously? I have to admit to enjoying watching them squirm upon our screens. Where is their cocky bravado when their power is whipped from beneath their feet and they are forced to publicly admit that they have lied. I would like to see them both held to account for the chaos they have caused with their foreign policies. That, I fear is a pipe dream, so we must cherish these moments of seeing these statesmen humbled. They are few and far between, but they are truly sweet.

'It's up to Tony'...

2006-09-07T14:15:00.000+01:00

...says Brown. Thing is, he doesn't mean a word of that. He wants it to be up to him & he wants Tony to go now. So do we all. Stop insulting the public & trying to hoodwink us with your political games. We know what's going on. Brown wants in & wants Blair out. What is the point of pretending otherwise?

There is change in the air tonight

2006-09-06T23:47:00.000+01:00

I am full of admiration for those MP’s who today sacrificed their jobs for what they believe is right. I wish that many more had taken such a stand when Blair urged them to support him in the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. I hope they are not pawns to the Brown camp, and I am not sure whether ‘B’ with a ‘row’ is any better than ‘B’ with a ‘lair’. But it is undoubtedly time for Blair to go and I hope it is before this month is out.

I haven’t witnessed such a shambolic fiasco amongst a group of, supposedly intelligent, men (there are few women in sight at these days) who are charged with leading this country since Thatcher was ousted by the grey man. It is an embarrassing saga of leaks, whispers and lies. Blair has lost control. He wants to go out on top but it is too late for that and he should scarper before he drags his party into the dust.

My problem, through all of this, is Iraq. They all supported it and each is as guilty as the other so I will not feel joy when I see the next man take the stage. None of them hold the moral high ground any more. Still, Blair must go and the sooner the better, he has too much blood on his hands and I hope he is contemplating that as the sun sets before him.

He cannot fight the ebbing tide. No man, whatever their charisma, is strong enough to beat that. He would do well to gracefully admit his time has come in parliament, even though he has been unable to admit that on the world stage.

I would like to see him forced to admit his many mistakes before he leaves, but that he will never do. It is like a bad relationship, you hang on, destructively hoping that the magic that was there at the start will somehow surface again. In fact it is dead and gone and will never show its face again. Better to cut your losses and get rid of the dead wood before anyone else gets hurt.

I don't subscibe to much that occurs across the pond these days. However they do, at least, understand that there is a limit to the amount of time that you can place such power in the hands of one man before it goes to his head and destroys it.

Blair lost the support of his country when he started sacrificing our young men and thousands of Iraqis for the sake of his own personal goals. Thankfully he is finally, publicly, losing the support of his last crutch, his party. Go now Blair, with a last semblance of dignity, before you are unceremoniously pushed.

Blimey!

2006-08-31T19:53:00.000+01:00

Big thank you to Nosemonkey over at The Sharpener & Rach for nominating me! I feel somewhat out of place amongst such prestigious company.

Cheers guys! hx

One London?

2006-08-30T22:40:00.000+01:00

I spent three magical days playing with the sparkling ocean this week end. When the limitless time eventually ran out I squeezed a stolen moment from the empty tube. I stayed Monday night and rose before the birds to join the motorised sheep on their early morning trawl along the tarmac road which joins the smog to the sea.

As I struggled with my sleeping eyes the blanket that was the sky above shrank to a rag which I plucked from the air and wrapped up safely until I had a moment to find it again. My shimmering heart began to fade as I thought about the city ahead; the miniscule vistas and the tubes of steel burrowing their way through the earth transporting huddled commuters to their soulless desks.

But as the traffic became more dense and the sheep slowed to a crawl I started to peer into the capsules beside me. As I studied the passing faces a feeling of being surrounded by my familiar home started to awake. Much as the proximity of the sea fills me with a glowing warmth there is a sparseness in the uniform whiteness of the people who surround it that drains the depth out of it’s deep blue hue.

The faces I saw as I neared the metropolis filled me with a different kind of comfort. The monochrome was replaced with colour and energy, there was life in their diversity and I remembered what it was that kept drawing me back to my north London flat.

As I was driven along Piccadilly in a black London cab this afternoon a row of blinking banners flashed before my eyes. ‘One London’ they proclaimed in a typographic puzzle of black and red. The message was clear but I recoiled at its meaning. There is nothing ‘One’ about this city of ours and that is why it is so great.

I emerged from the tube this evening and wandered through my local streets along a well trodden route. The ‘Finsbury Bite’ announced it’s speciality in African and Caribbean food, across the road sat the ‘Delight Kebab House’ and firmly planted on the opposite corner was ‘The Happening Bagel Bakery’. They know their place, they understand their market and they carry out their trade side by side.

I do not want to live in a city where we are all ‘One’. I love the differences and the energy which is generated by their juxtapositions. Last week Ruth Kelly launched the Commission on Integration and Cohesion. When I walk through Finsbury Park (a former terrorist heartland) I see nothing but integration and cohesion as people mingle in the dusk.

Of course there are problems, but they are not new. We all have a natural distrust of what we don’t know. This city is divided by north and south as is this island we live on. The world is divided by east and west, rich and poor, black and white, catholic and protestant, dark brown and light brown, African and Caribbean, Muslim and Jewish, male and female; the divisions are exponential in their scale. They have always been there and they always will be. A banner is not going to obliterate the divides.

Fancy graphics and lip service commissions are not going to change our perception of each other. There is much to be done to achieve Kelly’s remit of ironing out the tensions created by our differences. That the tensions are there we cannot deny, but they are not the only reason for the extremism which is growing in this society. We are skimming the surface if we let ourselves believe that. The roots are deeper and far more complex than the Government want to admit.

If we are truly going to beat terrorism and extremism then we need to find the core. To do that we are going to have to dig deeper than any Government has done before. To get there we need to look at every ingredient of the foaming cocktail before us. Integration and cohesion are the herbs in the pot, the real meat is to be found with education and foreign policy.

We do not want this London of ours to be ‘One’ we are only asking that it is a place we can live without fear of young men blowing themselves up beside us.

Ditching the dastardly anti-D’s

2006-08-18T16:43:00.000+01:00

I have been taking anti depressants (Citalopram to be precise) since October last year. Following the bombings I carried on as normal for a couple of months, then finally fell apart in September. I was off work for 2 months and it was during this time that I eventually realised that help was required. It is a natural human instinct to resist help, to feel it is an admission of weakness and to, consequently, try to battle on alone. This was my scenario to a tee.

Fortunately, and somewhat fortuitously, an old university friend, who now lives in Malaysia, was in London at the time. We met for a drink and I happened to mention my lack of success in getting any psychological help from the NHS. The psychiatrist that my GP had referred me to told me I not suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). She could tell this, she said, because PTSD tends to seriously disrupt your life. Apparently the fact that I had already been off work for a month and still did not feel able to return, was not disruptive enough to qualify. She said I was just anxious, and needed to practice deep breathing. Despite having no previous experience in this field I had a gnawing feeling that she was wrong.

My bosses were putting pressure on me to seek private help (whilst not offering to pay) but I was resisting strongly. I was worried that a private psychiatrist would dive in and start to analyse my entire life. “Why are you 38 and single?’ ‘What’s your relationship with your mother like?’ and so forth. I felt that it was, clearly, in their best interests to make you feel as messed up as possible so that you would continue to make appointments whilst lining their pockets. The NHS, I rationalised, had endless waiting lists and the pressure to get you sorted and out the door would ensure they only concentrated in the job in hand. This was my somewhat cynical and misguided train of thought at the time.

During her years at school in the UK some friends of her parent’s had acted as guardians to my Malaysian friend, they had all studied together at medical school. Mike had visited her whilst we were at University in Edinburgh and taken the two of us out to dinner. That evening of opulence shines out like a jewel amongst those sometimes freezing, sometimes starving, always drinking, student days. We picked our lobsters live from a tank and I tasted, for the first time, the sickly pleasure of sweetened wine with home- made pudding.

Some days after meeting my friend, she sent an email saying she hoped I didn’t mind but she had mentioned my situation to Mike. He had told her he knew just the man for the job, I really should talk to him she said. Later I called him and we fondly remembered that evening 20 (yikes!) years ago. He was calm, matter of fact and stood no nonsense. ‘You won’t get better on your own’ he told me. ‘With professional help, however, you will most definitely recover, but you do need to get some help, and an old friend of mine just happens to be the best in the business’. ‘I call him tomorrow’ he said ‘and make you an appointment’. And that was that, no questions, no choice, I was going.

It was the best chain of events which could have occurred under the circumstances, and Mike was right, I don’t think I would have made it here on my own. He was well briefed this shrink of mine, ‘I’m not going to ask you about your mother’ was his opening line, immediately I relaxed and settled into the space. He quickly diagnosed me with medium to severe PTSD, he still says it will be another 2 years before I am rid of it. After a couple of appointments he brought up the dreaded anti- D’s. I was wary but desperate. I honestly didn’t think I was capable of getting myself out of that darkened tunnel alone. My worry was that they would hinder my recovery. I thought they would numb my emotions in such a way that they would just be putting off the inevitable pain. Once I came off them, I thought, the terror and the fear would come flooding back.

My shrink assured me that this was not how they worked. The anti depressants may well numb my emotions, however my brain would continue to process the traumatic experience; eventually filing it into my memory along with other, less traumatic memories. This can be a long and painful process and the anti-D’s will just make it easier he told me.

They took, I think, about 3 months to kick in. I was hoping to be bouncing off the walls after a couple off weeks with a permanent grin plastered across my face. The affect, however, was extraordinarily subtle, and sometimes I wonder if they have done anything at all. I have certainly improved and am feeling inconceivably better. I have had no perceivable side affects. No nausea, vomiting, headaches, or tremors. My sleeping patterns were not great, but that could be put down to the trauma rather than the pills. I underwent a drastic down turn during the first few weeks of taking them. Days and nights of ‘what on earth is the point of my life? What have I achieved? Nothing!’ Again, that could have been my natural mood before the chemicals had started their work. I don’t believe my emotions have been particularly numbed, I have laughed myself to tears and cried myself there too.

Now I feel the time has come to see how I fare without them. It is a liberating whilst frightening prospect. I may plummet back into those blackened depths, or continue to skip between the days of my life. I am terrified of disappearing back underground, whilst at the same time desperate to live without them. I will not feel as if I have truly recovered until I am back to my medication free self.

I am now biting my 20mg pills in half every morning. I intend to do this for a month then throw in a few quarters along the way. I will let you know how it goes.

We are losing this 'war on terror'

2006-08-14T22:06:00.000+01:00

The terror threat has, today, been reduced from ‘critical’ to severe. We are however to remember, says John Reid that the ‘change in the threat level does not mean that the threat has gone away’. Over these last few days of high alert the strength of the language used to describe the threat has increased faster than the threat itself. ‘Critical’ was replaced by ‘unprecedented’. This rapidly escalated to ‘unimaginable’. When still the public still failed to panic they threw in ‘apocalyptic’ for good measure.

I have been strangely unaffected by this scaremongering rhetoric. I thought, perhaps, that it was due to coming so close to the carnage caused on 7th July last year. I have experience the so called ‘apocalypse’ and have lived through months of terror in the aftermath. I KNOW that the threat has not gone away, and I know that it was there long before the raids on Wednesday night. What I was not clear about, last week, was whether others felt the same. It seems, to my relief, that they do. Friends have questioned the scale of the reaction. ‘Why’ asked one last week ‘haven’t they evacuated the airport?’ ‘Thousands of people’, she said ‘stranded at Heathrow. If I was a terrorist who knew they couldn’t get their bomb through security, I would just go and detonate it in the check-in hall’ She had a point. My brother’s first question to me when I saw him this week end was ‘do you think it’s real then?’. And all my mother was busy fretting about was the thought of her laptop getting damaged in the hold next time she traveled to the States.

I am desperately disappointed by the willingness of the mainstream media to pick up and run with this political over reaction. I am even more disappointed by the lack of caution in condemning the suspects. For that is what they are, at this stage, mere suspects. From a country who prides themselves on the right to a fair trial, the release of these men’s names, addresses, and even photographs, into the public realm is utterly unjustifiable. None have yet been charged. I am not arguing their innocence, and I hope, for the future of community relations in this country, and for the nations safety, that they have got the right men. But as yet we do not know and some members of the press should know better than to jump upon this conveniently placed bandwagon.

We are playing into the terrorists hand with this overblown scaremongering. They are seeking to divide and conquer and we are doing their job for them. The leaders of the Muslim community have written an open letter urging the Government to reassess their foreign policy. In response they are told that they are encouraging us to ‘give in’ to the terrorists. Not at all, I say. The Government, with their mantra of fear and panic, are dealing the trump card to Osama and his cronies. We are dividing ourselves, and it is going to be an endless rift to heal.

The thinking is sensible, but only if the circumstances are right. Of course we shouldn’t be cowered into changing our policies abroad by the threat of terror and murder. But this argument will only hold onto the slippery ground beneath if our foreign policy is right. If we were bringing freedom, democracy and a better way of life to the people of Iraq, if we were extinguishing the power of the Taliban and giving the citizens of Afghanistan control of their own land, if we were helping the fledgling Lebanese government to control its insurgency whilst negotiating with the Israelis to help them to do the same peacefully, then and only then could we stand our ground. But what we are doing, and supporting, is wrong. We are using the threat of terrorism as an excuse to carry on with this senseless destruction. The government are right, we should not change our foreign policy because of the threat of terrorism on our doorstep. We should change it because it is wrong. We are, in fact, sticking to our crazy guns because of the terrorists, and that is how they are winning this fight which is not a war.

When will Blair and Bush wake up to the reality that their might cannot win a phony war? You cannot fight an idea (credit to Rachel for that one, but I can’t put it better than her). Surely we should have learnt that by now. Iraq has become a monster which we cannot control, Afghanistan is going the same way, and the Israelis have failed in every possible stated mission in Lebanon. The Palestinians seem almost forgotten as they are slaughtered by their neighbours and their plight is at the very core of this catastrophe which has escalated beyond anyone’s control.

The only people winning at the moment are the terrorists and that makes me sick to the core.

High alert

2006-08-10T10:50:00.000+01:00

This morning's news will have put everyone on 'high alert' and not least the potential terrorists. Any news about terrorism, whether at home or abroad, always brings back emotions relating to 7th July for me.

As I listened to my radio through my duvet and my slumber (nursing a sore head from Bumblebee's leaving party!) it all sounded somewhat unreal. We know that the threat of terror is increasing, and we all know why, although the government refuses to admit it. That the terrorists are not targeting flights between London and France, for instance, must be some sort of a clue. It comforts me that plots are being foiled. After the de Menzes shooting and the Forest Gate fiasco they need to do something right.

There is a little alarm bell ringing inside my foggy head, though, and the fact that they 'need to do something right' might be at the root of it. Why is this particular raid such a big deal. There were the 'fertiliser bombers' who are currently on trial in the Old Bailey. They were, allegedly, targeting a London nightclub. I don't remember quite such overbearing drama about this arrest in the media, or increased security in west end clubs. Apparently the suspected plot was not planned for today. Better safe than sorry, I know, but why such phenomenally heightened security measures at airports today? They didn't just bust these guys last night out of the blue. I am certain they knew just as much yesterday as they do today. In order to arrest 21 people, a serious operation must have been in place for many months. I am not sure I understand why arresting them last night makes the chances of an attack so much higher today than it was yesterday.

John Reid has recently undertaken to announce when the security status in this country is increased, for our own safety, he says (or their own protection from criticism we may wonder?). I sense a whiff of 'the politics of fear' creeping in here. Things could not be worse in the middle east, international support for the stance of the UK & US on the conflict in Lebanon is at an all time low. Forest Gate has created ravines between the Muslim community and the rest of the population. What better diversion than a 'we told you so' plot suddenly emerging. 'Stop giving us a hard time and be afraid, be very afraid' seems to be the message coming through today. And why now?

Call me a cynic if you must (but god forbid ‘a conspiracy theorist). There is something fishy in the air today, if I am not mistaken there is more politics and spin at the heart of this story than public safety. I will, however, be delighted to be proven wrong.

Peace amidst the pain

2006-08-09T18:01:00.000+01:00

Even when you think you're over it and moving on with a spring in your step, something can dull your spirits and bring you back down again. The news today that Damilola's killers have finally been convicted must be an unbearable relief to his family who have waited and suffered with such dignity. I pray it has brought them a small amount of peace amidst their pain.

I have written about Damilola before (here and here) as it is a story close to my heart. The news today will not bring him back but is, at least, the end of a journey. A time to reflect and look forward. It has opened the pain in my heart again and brought tears into my salty eyes. The senseless waste of a beautiful beaming boy. The two brothers only 12 and 13 at the time. What has happened in their lives, how are we letting children grow up with such hate and violence in their souls?

I hope you can now rest in peace Damilola.

Flowery tent – check

2006-08-04T00:51:00.000+01:00

Dancing shoes – check
Suncream – check
Kagoul – check
Big Chill – here I come!

UPDATE:

a taste...until my brain can engage enough to find the words to describe it.....

What is going on?

2006-08-03T17:57:00.001+01:00

It seems clear to me, a mere girl on the street, that things in the Middle East are not all they seem. It may appear, on the surface, that Israel are fighting against Hezbollah (and killing hundreds of innocent Lebanese in the process). On closer examination, it becomes apparent that although the fighters themselves originate from their host countries the weapons do not. Israeli people may be fighting Lebanese extremists, but it is American weapons which are trying to outdo their Iranian supplied counterparts.

What I am struggling to comprehend is what exactly this tells us. Are the US encouraging Israel to antagonize Hezbollah in the hope that Iran steps in and bingo they have an excuse to invade the bigger fish? Or do they truly believe that randomly firing missiles into Lebanon & killing hundreds of children will convince Hezbollah to pack up their weapons and go?

It is blatantly clear that Israel’s actions are never going to achieve their stated aim. So why are they doing it? Either they are stupid or they are lying about their motive.

The IRA were not persuaded to disarm by retaliatory violence. Ultimately they lost their homeland support and looked increasingly isolated. Israel’s actions appear to be doing exactly the opposite, they are in fact ramping up support for the extremists. So WHY are they causing this unforgivable death and destruction?

UPDATE:

A taste of Cowes

2006-08-01T22:15:00.000+01:00

Last week end I went sailing in Cowes (see below pic) for the infamous regatta. It’s not really my scene, mingling with the yachties, but the Isle of Wight is somewhere I spent a large amount of my childhood. It is not, however, the people I go for, it is the freedom of taking to the water and throwing yourself at the mercy of the wind and salty sea.

Cowes is an experience which has to be seen to be believed; thousands of sails of all shapes and sizes glistening amongst the waves. The streets of this, normally sleepy town, are filled with sailing types and tourists. There is an atmosphere of carnival with stilted performers walking the winding streets and towering above the stag parties who sport French knickers on the backs of their T shirts.

Once on the water the atmosphere changes, the joviality is swallowed up by fiercely competitive natures. Some manifest their tension with silence, others with cursing which bounces off the surface of the ocean for all to hear. The boats start at 15 minute intervals, segmented by their shapes and sizes, known as ‘classes’ in the trade. From the jumble, a gaggle of identical boats gradually emerges in front of the Royal Yacht Squadron. As they traverse to and fro across the imaginary line, they are timing the distances, working out where they need to be when the 5 minute gun goes off. You start on the move, the faster the better, you have to time it to the second, as if you are over you have to go back.

They start into the wind which means zig zagging and swearing. Your right of way is defined by the angle of the wind relative to your direction of travel. If you have the advantage when a collision is imminent you holler at your opponent to ensure he understands that he has no choice but to scarper. If he doesn’t, you must avoid him, raise a red flag in protest and sit in a sweaty committee room for the rest of the afternoon debating the incident as if in a court of law. It is a serious business this competitive sailing.

I have always thought of myself as more of a cruiser, a fair weather sailor, travelling from port to port in sunny climes and savouring the local liquor on arrival. This week end, however, I found my competitive edge again. I revelled in the proximity of the other boats, the choppy water sluicing down my neck & the frenetic flapping of sails as we rapidly tacked to avoid (or not – but that’s another story involving an overnight pit stop and a change of mast!) an oncoming boat.

I tore myself away on Sunday night, leaving my dad and my brothers to fight for the honour of the family name. I sit at my desk and avidly check the results. I gaze at the daily photographs and I can smell the sea, hear the screams and feel that joyous rush of adrenaline through my veins. Today they won and I feel as if I have too.

Britblog roundup & Chicken nugget

2006-07-30T22:42:00.000+01:00

Thanks Tim & Justin!

ps...apologies all for the disappearance of my blogroll...i accidentally deleted it whilst putting together 'my favourites' list...it will be reinstated soon.

Sailing today!

2006-07-30T17:35:00.000+01:00

Meeting the Home boy

2006-07-27T21:25:00.000+01:00

Well, the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State met with us, survivors from the bombed Piccadilly line tube, on Tuesday evening.

Dr Reid is a politician, I suspect, harbouring a severe case of short man syndrome. I can picture him, as a youth, battling with his comrades in a bulldog like manner. Doggedly fighting until the end, stubbornly refusing to be beaten or shamed.

He has not changed much. Whether it is job, his age, or he has been unchanged since birth, I do not know. But I can say with certainly that one thing he adores is the sound of his own voice. That man can talk.

He purposely, I imagine, seemed to miss the point by a whisker; launching himself instead into wordy responses whilst ambling through topics he felt safe discussing. ‘Discussing’ is perhaps too balanced a term, it was more of a monologue which frustrated ‘survivors’ eventually felt brave enough to challenge.

There was the hint of a patronising tone, which emerged from time to time. Something which fired me up and made me more determined than ever that we should match him at his game. For a game is what it was, and what it has been from the start.

The Government do not want a public enquiry, or indeed an independent one. They will meet with us and the families of those that died, but it is lip service at its very worst.

He delivered the Government line, although it has been edited behind the scenes. They are running out of excuses fast. The last 2 remaining were money and resources. Lack of money is not an argument that would stand against a newborn child. So they are left with their last round of ammunition which they are spending fast. ‘Resources’ it is, the reasoning behind the ‘no’. With Bloody Sunday (7 years and £20 million) cited repeatedly as a glowing example. ‘Surely’ I queried ‘it is your job to do it better?’. How is ‘this is a bad idea because last time it went wrong’ a credible reason not to forge ahead and do what’s right?

I told him that I felt the Government had been on the back foot since the moment those boys blew themselves up. They had been reactive instead of proactive. All we had heard was them telling us the reasons they weren’t going to have a public enquiry, where were the positive steps they were taking? ‘Surely’ I asked ‘ the single aim of every person in this room, is to do our damdest to stop this from happening again, and make sure we learn everything we possibly can from this experience so that next time we do it better?’. Sincere nodding all round to this. We should be working together, every single one of us, to uproot the seeds of this hatred, instead of playing political games. ‘This Government’ I said ‘ has been nothing but negative and defensive whenever this subject is raised’. A pause, a purple face followed by his retort ‘I am NOT being defensive!’ spluttered Dr Reid. Point proven I think.

Then how, I wondered, can a public enquiry be wrong? ‘I don’t care’, I told him, ‘if the enquiry brings up nothing more than we already know, I don’t care if it means you can turn around and say; you see, we were right’’. But there is no excuse to leave a single stone unturned and this will only be done by an independent party.

‘Resources’, he muttered from behind, his now familiar glow. ‘Muslims…Arabic speakers…ethnic minorities…takes a long time to train… it’s not lack of money it’s lack of trained manpower’. He said that MI5 had more important things to do like preventing further attacks. ‘Some questions’ he said ‘just don’t have answers’. MI5 has grown from 1,000 staff to 2,500 and is still expanding. At any one time, he said, there are tens of major terrorist investigations underway.

We have a lawyer in our midst and she was quick to interject. ‘Ten?’ she said’ at any one time?’ ‘In that case, could you tell me how many were involved in the case of the four bombers on 7th July’. He squirmed and avoided and would not answer the question. The point, she was powerfully making, is that it couldn’t have been more than about 20. An inquiry would not be carried out by MI5 itself, the clue there is in the word ‘independent’. Hence as many people as required could be gainfully employed in seeking the facts and that would not hamper the fight against terrorism. They would be lawyers, most probably, not members of the security services. Only 20 would be called upon to give evidence which would not, I suggest, hamper their productivity whilst it was happening. So, it seems to me, that resources has been quashed as an excuse too, so what is it now?

The question of the influence of Iraq came up and was, again, dismissed. 4 terrorist attacks have been prevented in this country in the last 15 months, he told us. I asked him how many had been uncovered prior to 7th July. I was hoping for it to be less and that giving me an opening to ask him why he thought that was. He was one step ahead though (that is why he is Home Secretary and I am not) and didn’t answer. Instead he told us that the first al Qaeda plot to be foiled in this country was in 2000 in Birmingham. He kept doing that, throwing in facts that we were bound to not know thus tripping us up on our way. In his opinion the first war in Iraq had a greater radicalising affect than this one. ‘Jermaine Lindsay, at the time was 4’, someone helpfully pointed out ‘I doubt he was radicalised by it at that age, do you?’

On the subject of the errors he has admitted in the narrative ‘we never said it was comprehensive’ he said. Oh well that’s ok then, silly me. They fully intend to communicate any further errors to us and will do their best to inform us when stories appearing in the press are untrue.

They are compiling a ‘lessons learnt’ report which will cover issues from before the attacks to concerns raised in their meetings with us. This is a ‘dialogue’ they said which they intend to continue. When pushed the Home Secretary would not commit to meeting us again, Tessa Jowell, however, did.

So another day, another meeting, who knows what was achieved; but at the end of the day, the most important thing is that I AM FEELING BETTER!

Oh John Reid John Reid......

2006-07-26T00:19:00.000+01:00

...why did the blood keep rushing to your face?!...did we get you angry or was it just the hot flushes creeping up on you in that air conditioned room?

My does he love the sound of his own voice....he tried to stop us getting a word in edgeways but I'm afraid we were rude enough to interrupt.

It was infuriating, frustrating & exasperating meeting the Home Secretary tonight. But I have to admit it was bloody good fun!

More later,my bed is calling.

A strange, and unnerving, coincidence

2006-07-23T19:14:00.000+01:00

A year ago today I met a man at a party. We talked and laughed and flirted all night whilst his disgruntled girlfriend looked on. We childishly argued about who was the tallest, went into the kitchen to measure each other and all of a sudden he kissed me.

I was so taken with him that when I left I scrunched up a piece of paper with my phone number scrawled on and slipped it to him as I shook his hand goodbye. He called me the next day.

The girlfriend is no more and during these last few months he has been a friend and more, and sometimes less, but never, unfortunately, a boyfriend. He has helped me through my darkest days and people who meet us think we are a couple. (His birthday is on the 7th of July.)

I have begun to accept our strange relationship for what it is and have given up hoping that he may eventually find ‘commitment’ in his heart. So last week I went on a date.

It was an internet date, something I have not done for a very long time. But, with the anniversary (of the bombings) behind me, I decided it was time to start afresh and, at least, give it a go.

We had a few drinks, the conversation flowed and led to a dinner of Argentinean steak. It all seemed to be going swimmingly until he started quizzing me, in uncomfortable depth, about my past relationships. When he was finished I felt it was only polite to reciprocate. Quickly a common theme developed, it seemed that all his ex’s were ‘incredibly beautiful’. I must add at this point that he was hardly a picture postcard but seemed keen to get across his apparent talent of snaring feline goddesses. Eventually I couldn’t help but comment and he smiled smugly. ‘I have to be honest’ he said, ‘but given the choice I always favour beauty over brains’. It seems that, by his strict criteria, I wasn’t attractive enough, or perhaps I am too brainy. I have to say I have had a few Adonis’s myself, in my time, but would never insult a smiling pot bellied man with this information.( His birthday, too, is on the 7th of July.)

Words of wisdom

2006-07-23T15:20:00.000+01:00

I had a GOOD day at work this week. Yes, I nearly fell off my chair too.

I had a meeting with an artist, we are working on a rather unique and challenging project together. I went to his studio by bus (not tube – oh joy!) and found him working in oasis of calm hiding behind a drive through McDonalds and a Texaco garage.

He is in his sixties, tall, with a crop of striking, thick, white hair. His calm and casual manner belies a quiet confidence. I have worked with him before and he is so unassuming that it is easy to forget the enormity of his success until you wander through Tate Modern and spot his work singing out from the walls with a joyful clarity.

We chatted, swopped ideas and gossiped about the array of individuals involved in this project. ‘I have found’ he said’ that it is always the most forceful of speakers who find themselves listened to in this world. They can be ignorant, stupid, and even liars, but if they speak with unfaltering confidence people will listen. Groups of people struggling, to make decisions will fall on these characters with relief and awe. He seems to know what he’s talking about’ let’s do it’.

How many situations does that ring true for? I found myself thinking of our desperate leader and smiled.

I started telling him about something the client had told me he had agreed to do. ‘Did I?” he laughed. ‘Oh I guess I probably did, as Picasso said ‘the easiest way of saying ‘no’ is to say ‘yes’’!

Good news at last!

2006-07-14T23:30:00.000+01:00

I heard joy in the voice of someone I love tonight and it dried my sodden spirits like the roasting sun.

(I have nearly finished reading ‘The Corrections’ by Jonathan Franzen and it has dawned on me that I have not the faintest inkling of how to put together words)

This particular story started 3 years, 7 months and 3 days ago with a phone call from the police. I had only been in my job for 2 months when my mobile rang that morning. I knew they were going round to section him the night before, this wasn’t the first time and I never slept when it happened. I always feared the worst, but this was beyond my darkest imaginings. ‘We’ve got someone here you know’ he said ‘can you guess who?’. Well that set me off on the wrong foot for a start. How many sectionable friends, who were likely to have had their front door smashed down by the police that night, did he think I knew? My first thought was for my friend, what had happened to him, what had they done? It didn’t enter my head for an instant that this gentle, caring, loving, but very sick, man might have done something to them.

‘Is he ok?’ I asked in a panic. ‘He’s fine’ he replied (he was lying).

’ Why is he there? What has he done? Has he got a solicitor?’

‘I can’t tell you that I’m afraid’ (why not?!)’ There’s a duty solicitor here, don’t worry’.

Well this was all new to me but it didn’t sound right at all. He can’t tell me? A duty solicitor? No, I need to get on the case. Years before he had been sectioned and I had met his solicitor. I couldn’t find his name in my head. I started, frantically searching the internet ‘mental health lawyers’ and such forth. I couldn’t call his mum, couldn’t break the news until I knew the facts. Finally a familiar name appeared and I picked up the phone. It was still early and he had just arrived in the office. I gave him the sketchy facts I knew and already I sensed trouble ahead. ‘What’s wrong?’ I asked. ‘It’s probably a coincidence’ he said ‘but I heard a story on the radio as I drove in this morning, something about a mental health patient attacking a policeman, It’s probably not him though’. The moment he uttered those words I knew it was. His life is over I thought.

Immediately I evacuated my desk and rushed across London to the police station. I called his family, the solicitor was already there. We all sat and waited. I will not and cannot describe those painful hours, but I have made myself remember them today. Eventually they let me see him. It was like an illusion. My darling friend broken and babbling. Pacing around a cell in a torn white paper suit with stitches in his shaven head and bruises across his beautiful face. I held him tight and tried to let him feel the comfort of human warmth. But he was in another world, the shock and the trauma of what had happened the night before had taken him away from me.

To tell the tale since those beginnings would take a book, and a pretty miserable one at that. Suffice to say that after a short stay in prison, a few, incomprehensible, appearances in court he was transferred to a secure psychiatric hospital and diagnosed with schizophrenia. I promised him, that day at the police station, that I would not desert him, and I have kept to my word. He feels he has been a burden, but it has been a pleasure to support him through his years of solitude. It doesn’t take much to be a voice from the outside world every day, to give him a home to visit when he was eventually allowed leave. For the little it took from me, the help and security it gave to him was exponential.

I don’t know how he has got through his lonely days. But there has never been a word of complaint, a moment of self pity, or a feeling of despair. He has knuckled down and, as only he is able, got on with the job. He has been a role model in that ward of his. When I visit I am struck by his quiet assurance amongst the drugged up existences surrounding him. He writes the most startling poetry and is doing a journalism course in which he excelling. His memory is beyond the sanest of imaginations.

Today, his exemplary attitude and patient perseverance has finally been rewarded. At his tribunal the judge told him that nothing in any of the reports that he had read was affecting his decision. He was granting him a discharge based solely on the way my friend had handled himself during the hearing. He had proved himself beyond any shadow of a doubt as an intelligent, articulate and compassionate human being. That is the man I know and love. Finally someone has found a way through the prejudice of madness and seen him for the man that he is, my friend, free at last.

Thank you

2006-07-10T13:25:00.000+01:00

Thank you one and all for all your kind messages of support. I have not had the strenth or time to reply to you all yet but I just wanted to say how much it means to me and how much it helps.

Thank you also to all of you who stood up for me on the Comment is Free blog. I have learnt to ignore the trolls and imagine them as 14 year old boys wondering what to do with their willies & finding power in front of a keyboard. I was actually glad of the abuse as it encouraged so many people to come forward and be positive and that was the point of the piece.

Now I am off to eat lobster in the rain!

x

Forewarned was not forearmed

2006-07-10T13:15:00.000+01:00

I am holed up on the drizzly south coast of England. Wiped out and emotional, completely unable to face going back to London. I have taken the day off work because my body is telling me to stop. I have been running on adrenaline for weeks, just as I did directly after the bombings. I am going to learn from my mistakes, even if the government are not, and I am taking it easy today.

I really was hoping that forewarned was forearmed. I knew the anniversary was going to be tough but I thought this knowledge would help me get through the day. I wrote on here and on the Guardian site, the day before, how I wanted it to be a day of hope and celebration. I am afraid to say I failed miserably in that task.

I went to meet my fellow passengers in Tavistock Square for the 2 minutes silence. I chose to take the tube. I wanted to go through the tunnel that day and watch for where the wires running along the wall of the tunnel turn red. This marks the spot where the bomb exploded, the red wires are new and stand out from the grime.The carriage was empty apart from a woman who sat opposite me with 2 young children. They seemed oblivious to the significance of the date and the journey they were taking, as we passed through the tunnel they laughed and joked and it felt like a good way to remember.

I came out at Russell Square and the hope started to fade. As I walked through the tunnels and waited for the lift I thought about those who had taken this journey a year ago. The injured, the wounded, the dying and the dead. I came out of the lift to find a station full of police. In a daze I wandered through and came across the mound of flowers which had gathered that morning. I stood and stared and was overwhelmed by the senseless loss of human life. A police officer came up and comforted me. I have no idea how she knew me 'you're Holly', she said 'you're one of the survivors, are you ok?'. Again human kindness and sensitivity prevailed, again I had been helped by a stranger.

I found the others in Tavistock Square, someone had bought balloons. 26 white, helium filled, balloons, one for each of the people who didn't make it out of that tube a year ago. We held them through the silence. As I looked at the spot where the bus had been blown up, I started to shudder with pain. As the tears flowed I could feel the wakening of a new emotion, one which had never visited me before. I looked at the empty street and listened to the silent grief....and finally I thought 'you fucking bastards'.

In that moment the anger and the hatred emerged. Anger which had been previously directed solely at the government. I looked down that street and I hated those 4 men with all my heart.

Afterwards I went to a beautiful, multi faith, service in St Pancras church. I hadn't meant to go, I am not religious and I had felt uncomfortable about grieving for the dead, for people that I didn't know. But these new feelings that were welling up inside me told me that it was the right place to go. I wept throughout that service and this time I was crying for the dead and bereaved. The St Mary & St Pancras School Choir tipped us all over the edge. The innocence of their voices resounded through the church and there wasn't a dry eye in the house. As they sang their way through 'Lord of all hopefulness' a nearby church warder passed over a box of tissues and said to me 'take a handful'. As the piano hit the opening chords of 'Make me a channel for your peace' even the most hardened of hearts in the church had crumbled.

I emerged drained, exhausted and starving. I went back to the hotel bar which had been our base for the day and ordered a blue cheese and bacon burger with chips. Energy and comfort, it was perfect!

Then it was time for the evening memorial in Regent's Park. It was a beautiful setting, the rain held off, and we sat in the midst of blooming greenery. When we arrived there was an air of mingling and chatting. So many people involved in those dreadful events have met each other at some stage over the last year. There was hugging and kissing as we all embraced familiar faces who had shared this journey with us. Again, I managed to feel hope and strength, seeing and feeling all these wonderful bonds of closeness which have formed in the face of terror.

Then the service began. As The London Community Gospel Choir opened with 'Something Inside So Strong' I felt rather numb and detached from it all.I thought, perhaps, I had cried enough, there were no more tears left to shed. Then the readings by the family members began. How they did it I do not know. They were so incredibly brave and strong. I listened to Marie Fatayi-Williams reading 'All is Well', followed by Kathryn Glilkson with her own poem 'The Moon'. I began to feel overwhelmed by the waste of it all. Sitting in this tranquil spot, surrounded by over a thousand people who were all still struggling to come to terms with their losses and traumas. It was all so senseless, all so tragic and all such a bloody waste. When Saba Mozakka read 'You can't have departed' as a tribute to her mother I was finally overcome. Friends from the train hugged and comforted me from all sides as I shook uncontrollably and sobbed. I was crying for the dead, the bereaved and the survivors. I was crying for the tragic loss of human life, for the thousands who were suffering as the result of the actions of 4 angry young men and, I am ashamed to say, I was crying for myself.

The anniversary was a difficult day, but I think, for those I shared it with, it was a good day too. I witnessed people who have never let go finally giving in and succumbing to their grief. The outpouring of emotions was immense, but ultimately cathartic and healing. I have found my hatred and my anger at last (for the bombers rather than the government), and it is probably good that it has emerged. I had no idea that it was in there, but as it was, and as we kept saying to each other all day 'better out than in'.

I walked arm in arm with friends from that day to lay our flowers in the floral mosaic. As we all clambered off the podium we gathered in a circle and, weeping, encouraged each other to celebrate the fact that we were the lucky ones that we had 'made it'. As our little circle dispersed, the tears continued to flow, I glanced across at the little gathering of power and exclaimed 'David Cameron is wearing fake tan!' Our tears turned to laughter as we saw his orange face glowing from the mass of dark suited men. 'You are naughty Holly' someone said 'you always make us laugh when we should be crying'.

Tomorrow

2006-07-06T20:41:00.000+01:00

It is finally here, I am almost relieved already. I haven't had a moment but I'll write more soon. Tomorrow's post will be on the Guardian's Comment is Free site.

Tomorrow I will reflect and remember but above all celebrate my life, my learnings and my wonderful fellow passengers. I am proud to know you all.

'It's up to you'

2006-07-04T22:51:00.000+01:00

I am just watching my old friend Tom Bradby reporting on Blair's latest stand. Apparently he can invade Afghanistan (twice?!), topple Saddam under false pretences and leave both countries with failing infrastructures, dwindling resources and suffering citizens, yet the rise of Islamic fundamentalism, fired by his actions, is ‘up to’ the Muslim community to sort out. I am almost speechless.

Where has that man’s understanding of the word ‘responsibility’ vanished to?

’It’s up to you”?!

How is that approach remotely constructive? It’s ‘up to’ all of us and spectacularly HIM. It’s up to me, my neighbour, my family and friends and every person I have ever sat next to on the tube. The rise in strength of the Jihadist’s cause in this country had been fuelled by our foreign policy. We have a fundamental responsibility, each and every one of us, to strive to unite our increasingly polarised society. He cannot wash his hands of this, it is not solely up to them.

How can they do it alone? We need to work together to build bridges, understanding and, most importantly, trust. It needs to be a 200% COMBINED EFFORT. The horrors of 7th July 2005 should never be inflicted upon another innocent person again. Tragically they will be, they occur every day in Iraq, increasingly in Afghanistan, in Israel and Palestine and around the globe.

The only way it can be stopped is to understand why it happened in the first place. What drove four, seemingly integrated, intelligent young men, born and bred in this country to blow themselves up on the tube, nearly a year ago, with the specific intent of randomly killing innocent people. I am honest enough to admit that I don’t know. Tony Blair would do well to do the same. But he, more than I, SHOULD know. And if he doesn’t he should be doing his damdest to work it out. ‘It’s up to you’ does not strike me as a man trying to understand.

I have just watched the best football match I have ever had the privilege of seeing. The spirit and perseverance of both sides was inspirational. Last night I was interviewed with three other Kings Cross United girls to talk about the positive aspects of the last year. That too was inspirational. These two events contributed in bringing me out of the terrifying hell into which I was descending yesterday. Tony Blair has done a damn fine job of quashing my newfound high spirits. I was going to take a break from 7/7 tonight. Watch football, drink wine & try to be my old self for a moment without the interruptions of the world's press. I watched the news and I had to write.

‘It’s up to you’ indeed. How DARE he?

Back we go

2006-07-03T10:15:00.000+01:00

I am back there again. I was hoping that 'forewarned was forearmed’. I knew this week was going to be tough, but I was willing this knowledge to help me control the pain and the fear. It doesn’t seem to be working. My heart is racing, my hands are shaking and I am on the verge of tears. I am back where I was last September.

Yesterday I had my first panic attack for 6 months. I was in Cornwall with friends, staying in a beautiful house perched on the top of a cliff. The trouble is, I have been there before too. The evening after the bombings last year I drove down there with the very same friends. It was a surreal week end but I was glad I had gone. Cornwall holds a special place in my heart, we went on family holidays there throughout my childhood. It seemed like a logical place to be. Surrounded by clean, fresh peaceful air, away from the clogging smoke of terror struck London. We awoke in the morning to a bay filled with basking sharks. It felt like a special gift.

This time I wasn’t so sure. I had to take the tube on Friday morning with the same ‘trolley dolley’ full of luggage that I had carried on the 7th last year. When I emerged from South Kensington station I felt as if another journey had been completed. Cornwall was a different matter though. The views, the smells and even the beauty brought everything back. I was that shell shocked shadow of a person again, it all came flooding in.

I had anticipated this and taken the precious smattering of tranquilisers which I have been hoarding since I was prescribed them last year. Yesterday afternoon I took one. I am not sure if it was the panic attack I was afraid of or the prospect of having one in front of so many people. I didn’t want to cause a scene and spoil everyone’s week end, so I popped a pill and hid myself away with a newspaper for a few hours. For the first time ever I couldn't wait to get home. Back to the safety of my own bed.

Of course it may not have been Cornwall at all, it could well have been the fear of the week ahead. It was probably a combination of both. I know it’s going to be hard, I knew it was going to be tough, but it is still upsetting to find yourself taking such mammoth steps in the wrong direction. At least this time I know what is happening inside my mind and I understand why . I know I have the love and support of so many fellow passengers, strangers a year ago, who are all going through the same emotional mill.

Still, this week cannot be over soon enough.

Unreal days

2006-06-27T18:17:00.000+01:00

I am feeling somewhat detached from life at the moment. I can hardly believe the anniversary of the bombings is upon us, yet at the same time it seems like a lifetime ago. It is summer again and there are new triggers which I had forgotten. Hot, airless tubes are the worst. They take me straight back to that day. Having thought I had conquered my terror on the underground, I had to get off twice the other day. I cannot get into a hot, crowded tube, I just can't do it. I know I am not going backwards in my recovery, I just have new memories to deal with, but it sure feels as if I am.

I am keeping myself too busy. Exactly as I did immediately after the bombings. It is a subconscious need to keep your mind away from thoughts which petrify you. I am out every night and if I don't go away at the week end I fill my garden with friends and throw meat on the BBQ to keep them fed.

And then there's the media. I am doing too much, but I feel I almost have a responsibility to tell my story. I want people to know what we have been through, I want to raise awareness of mental illness. Just because an injury is not visible doesn't mean it is not life threatening. Most of all I want to try and help those still suffering alone. An article I was interviewed for has resulted in 6 new people getting in touch with Kings Cross United. They introduce themselves with that now familiar air of overwhelming relief to have found us. I was quoted in the interview as saying that as I had been on the back of the train (in the carriage furthest from the bomb) I felt unworthy of being traumatised. Others have come forward from my carriage saying that was what inspired them to join, they felt the same. I keep telling myself 'enough, no more media, just look after yourself'. Then something like this happens and it all feels worth it. Another journalist calls and I say 'yes' again.

I am not sure if it is good for me. Perhaps it is. I tell the story over and over, now it has become meaningless. It is just words. The same anecdotes, the same stories, I have spoken them so many times I feel as if I read them in a book. I talk about the fact that I was there but I don't really believe it. I just can't stop. Not only do I feel the need to help other survivors I also want the government to listen. I want them to stop covering their backsides and lying to us. I want them to sort out the situation in Iraq, help rebuild the country instead of killing its citizens. I want to know what was really known about the bombers. I want to understand why those four men did what they did. I want to forge links with the Muslim community and help us to all understand each other better. I want to know the TRUTH, I want the lies to stop. I want the powers that be to learn everything they possibly can from what happened both before, on and after 7th July 2005. I want us all to learn and work together to do our utmost to prevent this from ever happening again. And if this is too tall an order then at least to ensure that next time it happens we do it better. We have to learn, and in order to do this we need to understand. We can only understand if we know the truth and the truth will only be uncovered by an independent enquiry.

The Government are all too busy trying to hold onto their jobs. Increasingly their coherence is crumbling and fingers are being pointed between once loyal friends. This is not an environment in which to uncover the root of this evil, this can only be achieved through clean, fresh eyes and ears and above all by someone with nothing to lose.

So on and on I go, talking and writing, and in between I go out, and drink. On the surface I am coping, possibly deep down I am too, but I have learnt that you can never really know that. I have learnt respect for my mind over these last 12 months. I know it could throw anything at me with out me being the least bit prepared. Let's hope it doesn't. Let's hope all this therapy has helped and I am strong enough to get through the next week and a half. Then I am going to stop. No more journalists, no more photographers, no more strangers invading my life. I will still write, I will still campaign for truth and democracy, but I will need to look after my precious mind as well. It has had a tough year and it needs a break.