Tag: mental health

Eight Stories in an Evening

I asked friends to give me a word each so I could build a story from three. It just seemed like a good idea because wine and I’m not saying these wee tales are any good but they made me feel good writing them and that was lovely, thank you. Written in six hours or so, so go easy.

 

SLUG SUGAR SWEAT

They called it a slug, you know, that round that goes in the gun or whatever. I called it a bullet and they all sniggered, sniggered at how I held it, how the sweat poured down my face as I aimed the cursed thing.

One thing’s for damned sure – ain’t no one gonna be callin’ me sugar no more.

 

Continue reading “Eight Stories in an Evening” →

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Words from a writer too stubborn to fail

…would make for a great epitaph, no?

Anyway, and stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but a few years ago, when I’d moved back to the UK, I started sending out copies of my second book to literary agents (it was smaller, so cheaper to post) with nothing to signify who it was from or why but for “Please HELP me!” scrawled with a black Sharpie on the stark white of the cover.

My website was printed small by the barcode on the back at right angles to the jacket text and such was my naive, unfucked brain still fresh back in the fire that I felt anyone reading this GENIUS would want to seek him out and anyone WORTHY of representing him would be both able and willing, nay delighted to work their way through these cunning yet intriguing layers of mystery. Continue reading “Words from a writer too stubborn to fail” →

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SNRI discontinuation laugh riot

...all your brain are belong to us sprach die möwen. "My brain hurt like a warehouse," sang Bowie.

Depression is the single most expensive disorder faced by Western societies and antidepressants are among the best selling drugs; yet modern antidepressants are no more effective than the first generation and electroconvulsive shock treatment remains the most effective treatment for turning that frown upside-down. *

Pinocchio! So this is where I find you! How do you ever expect to be a real boy? Look at yourself. Smoking! Playing pool!

– Jiminy Cricket

Sex during SNRI discontinuation is like the first time – if you lost your virginity concussed, held up against an electric fence in a rainstorm. During the relationships, flings and longer first dates of the last six years I’d gotten used to the numb pounding of dutiful copulation; I knew I should have been enjoying it more, and sometimes a girl would go the extra mile, but more often than not sex was there just to remind me what a worthless bloated addict I’d become. Continue reading “SNRI discontinuation laugh riot” →

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Adventures in hatred or: Crossing pigs with spinach, pushing the poop and living in the Tribulation

Brandishing a hair-trigger revolver with only one round chambered, the toddler keeps spinning the cylinder, dancing and screaming it wants less, LESS, NOW!
Brandishing a hair-trigger revolver with only one round chambered, the toddler keeps spinning the cylinder, dancing and screaming it wants less, LESS, NOW!

A friend of mine asked how come I was getting so mindfucked with theology while working on a script advocating gay marriage. He said it was purely a civil rights issue and mentioned something about my godless heart burning in hell but I was too busy thinking about gay honeymoons to respond properly.

But now I hope to convince him, and you, that it is impossible to defend the persecution of homosexuality – which is exactly what you are doing by denying gay folk equal rights – without explaining WHY two sets of the same genitals can’t rub up against each other. Continue reading “Adventures in hatred or: Crossing pigs with spinach, pushing the poop and living in the Tribulation” →

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Stealing fire from the gods to beat the winter blues and big pharma: A happy review of a SAD box

Strapped down and receiving a good healthy dose of less SAD
Strapped down and receiving a good healthy dose of less SAD

It takes eight seconds for light from the sun to reach our rock; although if you live in Britain you might question that figure. In fact you might snort: “Ha! Eight months more like!” and grin inanely like a child expecting validation before realising that even if it did take eight months we’d just be getting our sunshine a bit later. Like receiving our Christmas cards in September.

Although saying that – and assuming we’re not reducing the speed of light itself – it’d be a hell of a lot colder here as at current speed/distance light would travel from the Sun to Pluto and back 430 times in eight months which is using the figure for the farthest distance the two bodies get from each other as Pluto has an eccentric orbit which means that sometimes it’s closer than Neptune but by then I’d realise I was staring off into the middle distance whilst eating the skin next to my fingernails and the distance between my date’s body and the barman’s would be rapidly decreasing. Continue reading “Stealing fire from the gods to beat the winter blues and big pharma: A happy review of a SAD box” →

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Safe. Secure. Reasonable. Informed: Coming off Sertraline

DISCLAIMER: The following post took place over the course of several days of teeth gnashing. Its contents are intended for my own amusement only. Any medical advice adhered to that results in your own suicide and/or the murders of your loved ones in the most bloodthirsty and inhumane way conceivable is neither my responsibility nor anyone else’s, you fiend.

Bruce Wayne had other rather more exotic coping mechanisms than psychotherapy.
Bruce Wayne had other rather more exotic coping mechanisms than psychotropic medication. He also had Vicki Vale and the Batcave.

If you get treated like a patient, you’re apt to act like one.

– Frances Farmer

So I made up my mind and will not be going back to Teesside, nor will I complete the year. From here on in, this guff comes straight from the heart.

I’m going to mention mental health now but I promise I will touch upon it as briefly as I’m able; then we can get back to talking zoo animals, gig reviews and reasons why the white man will be the death of us all. Continue reading “Safe. Secure. Reasonable. Informed: Coming off Sertraline” →

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