Manic Depression

I saw my doctor this morning. He's rather marvellous and has a clever manner by which he tries to keep me on the straight and narrow, which in my case broadly means keeping me medicated, though not up to the eyeballs.

I came off my dual medication back in December (that is to say off both uppers and downers) and was even so presumptuous as to trumpet the fact. Big mistake. I fell rather spectacularly off the mental health wagon in mid March. I won't bore you with the sordid details but suffice to say it was ugly and scared the shit out of the person closest to me. So now I'm back on the drugs (just the Olanzapine - my anti-psychotic of choice - no anti-depressants this time) and the better for it. Fingers crossed.

spare us a thought - we're not making it up

As it happens next week is Mental Health Awareness Week but Radio 2 has been marking that fact this week and so it was that I caught a rather beautiful little segment of the Jeremy Vine Show as I drove home from university today. It is available to listen to at Vine Show for the next month and if you skate around the less than learned debates about what Churchill would make of the EU, and whether first-class travel on trains should be banned (seriously), you should catch the sensitive little interview with a bipolar sufferer called Steve who was sectioned only a few weeks ago. Vine, as a good journalist should, had mastered his topic and Steve was both brave and disarmingly honest about how the condition can utterly fuck with your mind. I hope Steve will get it under control and that he comes to appreciate what Olanzapine can do for you, even if it does make you fat. God bless you Steve, wherever you are.