My little contribution to The Conversation online today

In response to a question in a discussion on meditation and mental illness. Finally The Conversation becomes one for me... hope I haven't pushed to 'boat' too far and shut down the conversation with my middle class/educated claim about research in this field...oh well will know tomorrow if these people get too busy or I have simply accidentally negated their discussion space...

Okay this one specifically to James but also to the other academics discussing this topic. One could say that meditation is simply relaxation but I think the tenor of the discussion is about its efficacy in treatment for mental illness. Thus, as I mentioned before this is not my area of PhD studies (I am doing Creative Writing and writing a novel), it happens to be one of my "hobby horses". Too often people without mental illness study and speak for people with mental illness. And whilst I cannot speak for others, especially not for sufferers of extreme psychoses, I have lived with these patients for several weeks at a time on numerous occasions. Ethics does not allow me to use their experiences for my own research; however I can make general observations and relate the differences to my own experiences.

Relaxation is fantastic.. no matter how one achieves it... through physical activity, immersing oneself in a book, listening to music, or gardening and painting... however, meditation is the active decision to enter (or attempt to enter) a state of calm and relaxation. So why does this work for me as patient?

In my depressive state, my mind is active, constantly spiralling out of control with negative self-talk, reframing my past experiences in the bleakest light, and projecting that feeling forward if I can conceive of forward at all. When in mania it is as the disease name suggests the polar opposite... my self talk is grandiose, expansive and totally unrealistic in the same sense. I do not consciously want to come down from here... the colours are intense, the aromas more so, the sounds so sharp... every bird tweet is a thing of beauty and wonder, even the sound of the wind is magical... why would any rational human (even non-patient) want to say good bye to this? It is enervation at its extremes and we know that inevitably the crash will be horrendous to the hole dug by the "black dog". It is no way to live a 'normal' life... so what can we do?

Learn to establish wellness, and a form of self-awareness that means we mobilise our resources. We need to meditate first (as painting just allows the driven mania to express on the page). We need to learn to quieten our mind... to shut out external aural stimuli and internal self talk before we can enter a state 'normal' people equate with relaxation.

And from what I have been told by other patients with immediately more debilitating conditions such as schizophrenia and allied psychoses, they cannot shut out the noise and voices... they are already outside, not internal self-talk. Sometimes they are even externalised to the extent that 'real' people or personas are screaming the abuse at them... the quietness of the yoga space just allows them an amplified space to be heard.

So why tell you all this. I truly want to be a part of an NMHRC or ARC working with experts in their fields (multi-disciplinary) to research this topic. And why me? With the ethics clearance procedures at the Universities and Medical Institutes, the researchers interview 'subjects' and then present empirical data analysed into a cohesive academic narrative Consistent with disciplinary specificity... what that means in practice and please do not be offended, is that educated middle class people filter the data through a number of social, cultural and semantic lenses first. The voices of the patients become lost or translated and no longer have the immediacy and dare I say it, even emotive/evocative power of ethnographic research data.

I want in. My whole life is committed now to bringing the patients voices into the spotlight, publically and academically. I can only ever speak as me, on behalf of me... but I know my lived experience has validity as data in this space. If any of you or in best scenario... all of you put up a multi Institutional-interdisciplinary grant app in 2012 and beyond... I can be interviewed for this role... and most definitely itching to be so.

From the gloved one... no not that one!

Would you believe I am sitting at home wearing my purple woollen gloves? I have paid the heating bills and no it is not freezing. This is a new one even for me... I am wearing gloves so as to not scratch my face, arms and generally visible skin!

Given that this is a mood and wellness diary, this needs to be recorded. I have been battling off depressive swing for around five days now and have been doing everything I can think of to keep the endorphins flowing... but 'everything' is not working as expected.

I am meditating to the CD from my wonderful hypnotherapist Carolyn, and I am able to fight off the teary moments and panic attacks tightening my heart muscles. They are truly scarey and one has to have had one to understand that if a heart attack is worse pain than this.... please God spare me. I do the breathing into a paper bag when hyperventillating but have been unable to get to yoga (which I so obviously desperately need right now). And as for Art therapy... well let's just say that a trusted person equated it with "basket weaving" the other day. Wham another kick in the guts to devalue my wellness routine... so instead of going I sit at home feeling guilty and crying instead! What I wouldn't give to splash black paint all over a canvas and free up my anger right now! And somewhere where I can forget about making a mess on the carpet... Basket weaving indeed... lead by a trained therapist arts practitioner... how dare this person!

This is not the first (nor will it be the last) time that this person in authority undermines my wellness regimes. She already openly expresses disdain for the work of my psychiatrist... the wonderful Dr John who has kept me alive for over twenty years now (and that of the wonderful Gerald for ten years before him). Again this is gross misconduct to infringe on private medical treatment in this manner. But what to do... I can only attempt to resolve the conflict in the only effective way I know... by writing.

People dismiss Stephen Fry's daily Twitters but I suspect they perform a more important function than self-promotion. To my way of thinking, by twittering or blogging in a public forum we BMDs are able to gather strength from the fact that there is a positive and supportive readership somewhere 'out there' on our side. We must 'make it' to repay their faith that we can. many of these perceived readers may be 'like us' just longing for someone to understand the illness and to prove that we can win... no matter what is thrown our way.

I would also like to explore the idea that the much criticised chaotic and random thoughts illuminated by my writing are in fact valuable insights into how the mind of a BMD person functions. What I am always trying to do is to discover patterns and linkages across all apparently random and disparate threads of experience.

It is my belief that by finding these connections I can make sense of the world and see a better and clearer way ahead. This in turn reassures me that the bad times are only temporary and that they will be over once I discover the greater meaning or clearer path through.

I am currently supposed to be writing about madness and creativity IN AN ACADEMIC WAY... yet what I want to write is this material and in this style and voice. This is my working through ideas surrounding madness and creativity, and indeed generativity.

So why the gloves... I hear you say.

Wel,l the tension and aggression being forced beneath the surface is emerging at night through insomnia and just so that there is no respite from the anxiety in daylight hours, I have developed a (and I can't believe I am typing this word) psychsomatic itch and allergic reaction!

I am sitting gloved to not scratch as I have red whelts all over my arms, neck and scalp. I am smothered head to toe in aloe vera cream, as phenergan merely sedates me temporarily and of course I get zero written for my PhD! Again.

So the current course of action... aloe vera cream, soft old trackies and gloves... no man-made fibres at all!

Now I am testing to see if I can concentrate and write. If I can do this blog I can attempt to find rational thought structures in my writing for my academic work...

Well at least that is what I am praying for today! Here goes.