We all need to be heard for a little while.

Pyxis

Also, Code, you know that feeling of frustration when the computer just won't do what you want it to?

Well, be afraid! Be very afraid! :rotfl:

Waves_and_Smiles

Morning all!

That was me yesterday, Sue! I was the carbon copy of your son. Today I opened my eyes, looked at the window and there was a man outside holding a piece of guttering! Argh! So I waited until he went away and ran for the living room, I am now under a blanket! There is so much work being done that it feels like they are building a new block of flats around me! These aren't even improvements, this is just to get things up to the standard required by the insurance so the building must have been in quite a state. They did sell quite cheaply (although it sounds it lot), 1.2 million for 3 blocks containing 5 flats each near the city centre. Plus this is the south east which is usually super-expensive. I wonder if the windows will be replaced today?

Oh, and Cynthia cyst and Cyril cyst seem to have got together and had a baby which has now appeared on my lower arm. Perhaps I am going to turn into one big water cyst? It needs a name...

Waves_and_Smiles

Now I have creeping psychosis. Lovely. A woman fell over in the street outside yesterday, she was fine and carried on walking. I started to think about the woman and somehow weaved a story for her, where she went home and told her OH that she has fallen but he didn't care and told her she was making a fuss over nothing. He had a drink problem and I saw her bathe her knees in the bathroom while she considered how long she could stay with him. Her son was already being looked after by her sister because it wasn't safe to have him at home, although there had been no violence to him he had witnessed her being hit by her OH. The woman cried as she bathed her knees at the helplessness of the situation, how she couldn't walk away because she didn't have the strength, didn't think that she deserved any better. She had a low paid job, she had never really had an education due to her own fathers drinking, she had to leave school as soon as she could work to support the family. Her mother had ran to save herself years beforehand and they had no contact. She knew she was repeating patterns from her own childhood and trying to put things right, although terrifying it was safety to her, it was what she has always lived. To her this was normal life.

I feel what the woman felt, the helplessness, the desperation and the self-loathing. I see her clearly in my mind trying to manage day to day life, desperately missing her son but without the strength to reunite them and thinking that he is a better away from her because she has nothing good to offer him.

None of this is real, it is a story my mind made up. But it feels real, I feel every emotion the woman would feel and I cry for her and can't stop thinking about her suffering. It is going round in my mind constantly, I want to help.

I have taken an emergency anti-psychotic dose, I can't afford to disappear into another world right now with builders everywhere. This is happening because of my anxiety at the building work, I just retreat into my own mind and make up worlds when this one gets hard to manage. It is also frustrating, very, very frustrating and a bit scary how easy and natural it is for me to do this. Sometimes I worry that I will never get back to the real world.

Solarjunkie

I feel for her too, WaS, with her sore knees and feeling a bit foolish going down in the street when she had been effectively walking upright since she was a small child.
Fortunately, she was on her way to work, a small shop she runs with her OH. He immediately sat her down and made her a cup of tea, telling her to put her feet up for half an hour as the shop was quiet. Thoughtfully, he gave her the spare pair of tights she keeps there in case of mishap, as hers were laddered. So, after a nice sit down with a cuppa, OH's reassuring words and kind gestures, she went back to the counter in her new tights and he greeted her with a smile. Later on, they stopped for takeaway on the way home so she didn't need to cook.

Just as plausible as yours! Try imagining her emotions, the comfort & pleasure of having a good man who cares about her & looks out for her. What does the shop sell?

(I am suffering with a bad knee from a fall about a month ago, OH has been wonderful, each day we find out whose knees are better to decide who does any kneeling jobs!)

BTW, If you could direct your amazing scene building and story telling skills the way you want them to go, you could outsell JK Rowling. I won't give up the day job!:rotfl:

codemonkey

WaS, whatever else you do, you must write. That's a wonderful level of storytelling and you are a born writer. I think perhaps you are just an eccentric genuis who will make enough from writing wonderful books to buy a house in the countryside with a llama and penguins.

Promise me, that when you feel strong enough, you will write a book.

Waves_and_Smiles

That is very true, Solar your story is as equally as valid. Perhaps I should watch the story play out in my mind and try to give her a happy ending. I much prefer your story!

I have been able to construct stories like this the whole of my life code, even as a child. I don't consciously write them, I see the story in my mind as a film and watch it play out, I don't think of plots or personalities, I just sit back and watch and I don't know what's coming next. There is no plan at all, it just happens. My teachers thought it was wonderful when I was a child but were still slightly concerned because I would believe the stories and again cry for the people, or become excited for them, and live their emotions. My mind was born this way, it doesn't seem to be the result of trauma because it has always been there. I would often be taken out of classrooms by teachers bawling my eyes out because I had suddenly watched a story play out in my mind and was deeply affected by it.

It does scare me because it so real to me, often when the real world fades out the stories take it's place and I fear that one day I will won't be able to get back out of them. Psychiatrists say it is definitely psychosis but a type that I was born with but have also said use it to write books and try to see it as something of a gift (the jury is out on that).

It is rarely fun for me though, because they often sad stories and I feel every characters emotions. It feels completely real. Having said that, I can't stop it happening so perhaps I should write and at least use it to entertain others! I suppose it is good and bad really, good if I can learn to use it!

codemonkey

Not so much entertaining others as letting the characters out. Releasing them into the wild

I made a huge leap and asked my brother for help. I don't like to ask for help and my brother and I do not get on at all but I asked. He said no, so I am back to hating him.

Waves_and_Smiles

Aw, well done for asking, though code! That can't have been easy. Be proud of yourself for that.

Yes, perhaps these characters need to be free to tell their stories. One day I really will make the effort to write. I am a little nervous of the whole getting sucked into it thing, though. It is similar with drama, I absolutely loved acting and have A level's in Drama and Theatre Studies, I considered pursuing it for a career. My psychotherapist said a very firm no because there was too much risk of me losing myself. I only found out 2 years ago that I was diagnosed with psychosis at the age of 15, long before the Schizophrenia diagnosis. They didn't give me anti-psychotics back then, just antidepressants which I had taken since I was 11 and therapy 3 times a week to try to combat it without alarming me by telling me that anything was wrong.

At one stage my Education Welfare officer stated her opinion was that myself and my mother should be "within closed walls" which my form tutor told me (she shouldn't have!) and I hated the woman because she wanted to lock me away. When I realised that I been diagnosed with psychosis, clinical depression and BPD before I was 16 I understood a little more of why she recommended that. My psychotherapist blocked it and increased my therapy time to 3 times a week instead and said she thought she could hold me together, which she did.

In a play it was always incredibly easy for me to live another person's back story and believe that it was happening to me, it didn't feel like acting, I WAS that person and knew exactly how they would react. I had no problem being on stage either because it didn't feel like me on a stage, I was living the characters life, not performing.

I'm weird. And I am rambling terribly because my brain has turned to mush with thoughts and memories flying everywhere due to too many builders. Ignore me.

lostinrates

Not keeping up and still' on holiday' but just wanted to say those struggling with hunger on fast days on five two....there are lots of options that are really filling.

For those not adverse to buying ready made food check out fresh soup. A whole pot of many soups ( far too much to be considered stingy or not filling,) is under cal allowance. Chicken soups often included....hearty fare.

Its arguably better for metabolism not to not eat in am....though I usually don't either. When I am I might have a dry fried egg on crumpet at either end of the day, and be well under calorie allowance ( 70 egg and crumpets vary...You can get them for 80) you can have green salad in the evening.

Infact, you can have a monstrous green salad and add calories with other veg and have a pretty huge meal, having had a boiled egg break fast.

Pyxis

You're not weird, WaS, you just take things a bit further than most, but then that is the stuff of genius, isn't it, to take things further than most!

With regard to your lady with the sore knee.........her husband got involved in a drunken brawl and ended up committing GBH on someone and was sent to prison for three years. This was her release. After the shock of being on her own, she started to love being on her own, and found the courage to start a little evening class to improve her prospects and her education. A year later, she had some qualifications, had found a job that stretched her brain, paid more money and had better prospects. She moved from the house she'd had with her husband and found a little place she could share with her son, who was now back with her. She started divorce proceedings, and was happier than she had been for a very, very long time.



Yes, Lostinrates! It's a-mazing how much cabbage you can eat and still be way under the limit! Green leafy veg have very few calories so you can usually eat loads, a whole bowlful! A few drops of green pepper sauce helps to jazz it up a bit , plus lots of ground black pepper.
Nice to see you here, as well!