Sociable

I GOT TO THE POINT not long ago where I realized I was socializing with nobody at all. And just about everyone I had socialized with over the preceeding years had been a drug addict. No wonder my life seemed empty. I have started to rectify that by hanging out with 2 people who are not using drugs every day. I do drink with one of the people but neither of us has any veins left and I don't think either of us really feels anything off heroin from smoking it so there's little point doing it.

Today I have just got back from my old friend Pinks's house. She has a new place. It is a supported housing mental health hostel with a nurse staying in at all times. The nurse was a nice Mauritian lady who told us about her travels as we watched a documentary about a botched attempt to smuggle $50 million worth of A-grade Double UO Globe white heroin into Australia from the North Korean Pong Su ship on CBS Reality. I did smoke some heroin today but felt nothing from it. I am only touching it an average of once a week now. Really there's no point doing it so it's all psychological. I'm supposed to be moving to a place like Pinky's, which is nice and clean and quiet. But nothing at all has become of it. Just like I've had no follow up from the local mental health clinics since diagnosis, despite having changed my GP to one in the same borough I live in (supposedly making things straightforward re which borough is meant to be treating me). Pinky has the same diagnosis as me: schizoaffective disorder, except mine is the bipolar type; hers is the depressive type, as far as I know.

My broken fingers are feeling less "orthopedic" and my hand feels less like someone else's. I had a follow up appointment at the fracture clinic which I was glad I went to as I was starting to regret having turned down surgery on my hand. The second doctor felt that surgery wasn't necessary anyhow. He forwarded me to physiotherapy. The physiotherapist asked me at some length about my background and said that stuff (the heroin) will kill you. I even told him my nut nut diagnosis and he said "do you use the word bipolar because you feel people will be more prejudiced against schizophrenia?" and I said yes because originally I'd told him I was just bipolar. He said his mother was schizophrenic so he knew the issues.

I have to do hand exercises every day and flatten my bent fingers out. I've got a foam doggie ball to squash and I try and flatten my hand out against my thigh. I can type a lot easier now. The only way of typing I know is the all-fingered version ~ touch typing. Switching back to the 2-fingered method where you look at the keys was really difficult which is why I didn't do too much blogging just after the accident.

I'm feeling less depressed than when I wrote the last post. I still feel that without the medication I'd be having an "episode", which is depressing to think. I know that a lot of my unhappiness is down to where I am in life and just who I am. My friend's girlfriend, who I have known distantly for about ten years said I have changed a lot recently. I seem more confident than I ever was years ago and that's true. A few years ago I lost almost all of what little confidence I had and reduced to a shambling wreck of a human being, a walking shadow where a person had once been. I had almost totally given up on life and was just looking forward to dying. I don't see any amazing reasons to live my life now. Everything I would like to do is out of reach. I'd like to go to the bottom of the Mariana Trench. I'd like to publish my magazine and books. All these things feel like distant dreams. I heard of an expedition to the bottom of Challenger Deep, which is over 35,000 ft down, that was taking paying passengers for a mere £250,000 each and I'd definitely go if I had the money. I'd really like a pet angler fish, too.

My one interest in life, apart from coming off methadone, is deep ocean trenches plus life under the sea in general. I have a book on the world's oceans that I flick through after Jerry Springer and before I go to sleep every night.

I hope you all had a pleasant weekend. The weather here is nearly 18C that's over 65F. Very hot for February. I've taken my Benny hat off and everything.


Illustrated: me first thing in the morning