This is a story about demon drink...

I have placed a ludicrous amount of pressure on myself, having decided that I'm going to create a great reputation for myself by being a major player in a massive important project, for a big organisation. I've been attempting to be all things to all men, and be in all places at one time. I have been attempting to be manyfold times more productive than anybody else, in order to demonstrate beyond all reasonable doubt that I've been a major contributor and driving force behind the success of the project. I've staked my name and reputation on a successful delivery.

How do I sleep at night?

Vodka.

I bought a bottle of vodka on Monday and now it's all gone. I never drink spirits. Except I have done this week. A whole bottle.

I know this is a bad sign.

This is how alcoholism starts.

Alcohol is a terrible coping mechanism. I was very drunk last night, except somehow I wasn't. I carried on drinking even though I wasn't getting any more drunk. I woke up and I was worryingly OK.

I should have been throwing up.

I wasn't.

It's not the drinking that's so much of the worry, it's the getting used to it. When I can neck a bottle of vodka over the course of 3 evenings, and still turn up to work and be productive, then I'm on a collision-course with disaster. Not the kind of disaster where I turn up for work in a dishevelled intoxicated state - that would never happen - but the kind of disaster where I end up dying of liver failure in my 50s, having been an alcoholic for more than a decade.

I think spirits are a step too far. Spirits spell disaster. The hard stuff is dangerous.

It's been shocking, the effect of strong alcoholic drinks - I've not found a limit where I start to feel unwell, and the hangovers are too unbearable, which is very dangerous. I also have failed to find any point where I think "I've had enough" or "I'm adequately drunk". Strange, that I would never reach a point where intoxication becomes unpleasant; aversive. That's worrying.

So. No more spirits. No more vodka. I need to stop that particular stupid idea immediately.

I do have an enormous amount of stress, which is reaching its peak. The deadline is almost here. The end is nigh.

I'm not sure how my colleagues in other teams are coping. I'm not sure how people who have a lot of responsibility, professional pride and reputation at stake, are coping right now. One colleague who's worked at the same organisations that I have - notably JPMorgan and HSBC - alluded to having a similar hard-drinking predilection. Alcoholism is ubiquitous in the Square Mile. Alcoholism is notorious in banking. I've lost numerous friends and colleagues to alcoholism, from that world. It was practically a rite of passage to end up in The Priory, all paid for by JPMorgan or whoever, in order to dry out and then come back to work.

It's ridiculously demanding work, delivering huge IT projects for gigantic organisations. The alcohol goes hand-in-hand with the project work, because otherwise people's blood pressure would be too high and the stress would be unbearable. Work hard, play hard. It's all good fun, until somebody dies 10 or 15 years later from alcohol-related illness.

I've been patting myself on the back, but nobody's really officially recognised my contribution, as yet. Why should they? So many people are working hard. So many people are involved. So many people are stressed and under pressure. Why should anybody single me out as special, in particular?

I veer between feeling confident and pleased with the project I've been involved in, and feeling that there's something really fundamentally wrong which is going to ruin things. Some nights I go to sleep content, and wake up excited to improve things. Some nights I can hardly sleep with worrying about an unresolved problem, and I wake up with anxiety, not knowing whether I'll resolve the problems satisfactorily.

Taking the edge off every night, self-medicating for my insomnia and anxiety, I have been drinking far too much. I drank bucketloads over the weekend. This week has been ridiculous for alcohol consumption. It's terrible.

This whole period is terrible for my health. The pressure is relentless. The workload is relentless. The demands I place upon myself to perform and excel are huge; I'm so determined to achieve something great, to prove to myself that I'm still a talented and capable engineer, who can deliver huge projects on time with high quality.

I keep telling myself that I need to keep pushing myself, just a little longer. The finish line is in sight. Not long now.

Tags: #work #career #alcohol

This is a story about flashbacks...

I have made a habit of writing my thoughts on September 11th, with a view to how the world has changed since 2001, and how my memories of that day affect my present worldview.

In 2015 I went to the Southampton Boat Show with a friend. That was a good day.

I think I'm planning on attempting to remember good memories.

Tags: #friends #sailing #yacht

This is a story about faking it until you make it...

Being at zero - break even - is perhaps the worst possible position to be in. I've put in two years of continuous hard work and I've got nothing to show for it, but it's been incredibly difficult to reach this point. In fact, I'm not even at break-even, but on paper it looks as though I might possibly reach that break-even point, provided that I continue to bust my balls for the next two months and I don't get sick.

Of course, there might be other obstacles; bolts from the blue. I feel certain that somebody is going to take a dump on me. In my experience, there's always somebody who wants to take a dump on me.

Given that there's only one way I can travel in the event of a somebody taking a dump on me, there's only one place I can end up, and that's back in the nightmare which I've suffered through, while desperately trying to get back on my feet.

I have gritted my teeth and worked through the adversity and the uphill struggle of coming back from being discharged from hospital after nearly dying, only to be sacked and evicted and nearly go bankrupt. I had psychologically prepared myself for the stress and the anxiety and the exhaustion. I had anticipated the likely setbacks. What I cannot deal with is having to re-live the f**king nightmare.

If I get sent to jail, do not collect £200, do not pass Go, then I will tip the board on the floor and refuse to carry on playing, because this stupid game has gone on too long. I've been too close to 'winning' for far too long and the suspense is literally killing me. I have suspended all self-care and concerns about my health. I have suspended all my needs. I have suspended everything. I just work. I work and I work and I work. I work all the f**king time and I'm not prepared to have that hard work not pay off.

This isn't a game to me. The threat of homelessness, bankruptcy and career ruin hang over me, threatening. My health is not reliable; cannot be taken for granted. The consequences of somebody taking a dump on me are severe. I fear it.

Even if I bust my balls for the next two months, all that happens is that I reach zero; break-even. I'll be able to pay my tax bills. I'll be able to clear my debts. That's it. That's all I'll have achieved. That's my lot: zero.

I'm not prepared to suffer any setbacks. I've worked too hard for too long to suffer any longer.

I don't have the luxury of thinking about what would be best for my health. I don't have the luxury of thinking about what would be less of a risk to my life. I don't have the luxury of thinking what would be more pleasant and bearable. I don't have the luxury of thinking about what would be more enjoyable or rewarding. I don't have the luxury of thinking about anything except the rocky road which leads to zero.

It's not fun. It's thoroughly awful. The constant threat of someone taking a dump on me, wrecking my efforts, leaving me bankrupt, homeless and ruining my career... it's a heavy burden to bear, on top of working hard doing something which is purely to keep the money rolling in. Other people do jobs that they enjoy. I do the job that's the only one that'll pay the bills and allow me to reach zero.

Reaching zero is not that great.

Think about it.

Would you be pleased with yourself if years of dedicated hard work amounted in nothing? Zero. Zip. Nada.

Would you be pleased if you made tough choices, to live and work in unpleasant circumstances, living out of a suitcase in places where you don't have any friends and family, only to achieve seemingly nothing? Would you be pleased to achieve nothing, having spent years doing work which was incompatible with your health and somewhat intolerable?

There is of course some potential in reaching zero, because at least from that point there's an opportunity to build something, but not if somebody takes a dump on you and your opportunity is taken away. There's no opportunity if somebody takes a dump on you and wrecks your hard work. Hence the fear. Hence why I'm scared.

I'm not even close. There's still at least 2 months hard work just to reach zero. Even when I reach zero, I still have to find another contract, potentially move house... there's a lot more stress on the horizon. However, my concerns are more rooted in the present: I'm scared that somebody is going to take a dump on me and deny me the opportunity to even reach zero. It would be so easy to f**k up my fragile life. It would be so easy to destroy me. Tempting, huh?

Most of my waking hours are plagued by fears of somebody taking a dump on me. The anxiety is awful, not knowing when somebody's going to take a dump on me, but feeling certain that they will. The dread keeps me awake at night and distracts me. I can't concentrate. I can't relax. From the moment I wake until the moment I finally pass out into fitful sleep, in the small hours of the morning, a dreadful fear and anxiety and worry follows me around, making my existence miserable and stressful and thoroughly unpleasant.

I crave a tiny crumb of security, yet instead I have the threat of ruin wielded against me; the threat of somebody taking a dump on me is ever-present.

Tags: #anxiety

This is a story about receiving advice...

Just a little over a year ago I made a new friend via the Internet. We bonded over our mutual desire to kill ourselves and made what can only be described as a suicide pact. We are close, speaking on a more regular basis than I do with anybody else. I value their advice.

My friend had been advising me to find a therapist, given the apparent futility of my efforts to break the cycle and begin to live a more stable, happy and contented life. My childhood trauma, bitterness, resentment, insecurity and lack of self-esteem are all plainly on public display, every single day that I write. It must be frustrating for those who follow my story for any period of time, and who attempt to support me, to see me repeatedly struggling with similar themes, and apparently making no progress. There is a well-meaning desire to want to help me, or for me to help myself.

There aren't a great number of people who can offer me advice that I will listen to, given that most people haven't experienced the extreme events, which have left me almost dead, destitute, homeless; threatened to end my life so many times. I only tend to trust the advice of those who have suffered; those who are afflicted and who understand suffering. Most people think that yoga, kale, jogging and mindfulness are the cure-all solutions to any problems, because they have never experienced truly awful things, and they never will.

I should listen to my friends. I do listen to my friends.

Advice often comes as a shock to me. It might not be my immediate instinct to accept what people say without question, but I always mull things over at length. I'm always prepared to consider the possibility that I might be wrong, and more often than I care to admit, I do end up accepting that I was wrong about something.

My friend criticised my public aggressive rant, concerned that it was not a good look.

I agree.

However, I have always prided myself on not being a person who thinks only of superficial appearances. It would have been disingenuous of me to hide away a bunch of things that I was thinking and feeling. It wouldn't have been true to myself or my mission to expose myself - make myself vulnerable - to hide my thoughts and feelings, and instead to present a fake version of myself. That has never been my style.

A work colleague reads my blog quite regularly, and they even took the time to comment on my "aggressive rant" which further made me think that my friend has a point. Seen in the context of acting unprofessionally, I most certainly worried about my image, and how my behaviour was "not a good look". If I was making an idiot of myself on LinkedIn or in the office, then I would be mortified. I am very familiar with the pressure to wear the corporate mask and to pretend to be the consumate professional - the bland corporate drone - at all times. This blog is the complete antithesis of the relentless coercive pressure to present a fake image of bland obedient corporate unblemished perfection, and the antithesis of everything you'd ever say in the office, write on your CV or otherwise share with your colleagues.

If I was all about image then I wouldn't have started this blog at all, sharing the very most unflattering things about myself.

My friend has a point: my rants are most definitely read by a couple of colleagues at the organisation where I'm currently working, and what they've read very much undermines the image that I've worked hard to cultivate. They must think I'm some kind of monster; a dangerous unstable lunatic.

I found there was too much effort involved - too much paranoia - in maintaining the bland grey perfect unblemished corporate drone image, and worrying that the mask might slip. I found that it was making me unwell, the pressure to maintain the perfect image.

My friend's advice is sound, and I am definitely thinking that I've probably gone too far. I have spent the day thinking about whether to censor myself; to delete what I wrote. I have spent the day thinking about whether I was too harsh; unfair and excessively biased.

It's a little surreal: advice given from one member of a suicide pact to another. For me, being suicidal means that I'm beyond caring what people think about me; I have transcended dignity and accepted that I place a higher value on ending the suffering than my image. I agree with my friend about the "not a good look" thing, but when I am well and truly ready to die, I don't care how it looks or what people think about it; I don't care about a world which contains nothing but misery, anxiety, stress, depression and pain.

My friend is probably right, in that there's a slim chance - a negligible chance - that I could pull through this f**king nightmare and decide that I can extract some enjoyment out of life, and I would regret things that I've said; I would feel differently about my image, but it would be too late to take back my words. My friend is right, that for those who see themselves as likely to carry on living, they have to think about things like their image and their reputation. I've been writing this blog for years saying the same unflattering things about myself, and presenting myself in an unflattering light, and it's shocking how infrequently I feel as though I made a mistake in making myself look like a "complete psycho" (to use my friend's words).

In my experience, the people who have "Done [Me] Wrong" carry on their lives with clean consciences, without a care in the world about the damage they've done. Yes, my rants are "not a good look" but they are part of the psychological make-up of a person who was bullied every day from the age of 3 or 4 years old until about 16. Every. Single. Day.

Some powerless people, abused for many years, will snap and commit violent acts. Some powerless bullying victims will fantasise about getting revenge. What I do is I write honestly and candidly. Does it mean that I forgive and forget and live a happy and contented life? No. That was never the point.

Why should we forgive and forget? It's drummed into us that we'll be happier if we forgive and forget, but who's beating that into us? I call BS on the idea that we should forgive and forget. Why aren't the victims of bullying and abuse entitled to an apology, instead of being expected to suck it up? Why aren't the victims of bullying and abuse entitled to write and talk as much as they want about the years and years of suffering they endured at the hands of the bullies and the abusers?

Perhaps I might mature one day and see that I was foolish to hold onto so much bitterness and resentment, and to spend time and energy yelling into the great wide world, with my words never reaching the people who wronged me. It seems like incredible folly to expend so much effort, writing words which will never be read by the perpetrators of bullying and abuse, because they run away and put their fingers in their ears, determined to never feel a twinge of guilt for the trauma they inflicted. Why get so worked up and rub salt in the wound? Why not let the scars heal?

I'm undecided. While my life is still intolerable and I'm on the brink of bankruptcy and homelessness, plagued with suicidal thoughts, then I will continue to write about my suffering. I see no reason to ever stop writing about the awful things which cause me such great distress, while my life is in danger. Why would I ever shut up and pretend like everything is OK?

As you can tell, I'm conflicted. I value my friend's opinion, but I also have to live my life my way. It's me who has to figure out a way to get through the day. I am mulling over my friend's advice, and I think about all the people who spend a moment to share their thoughts with me.

Of course I feel out of order and that my behaviour is not how I would like it to be. Wouldn't we all want to be Mr Nice if we had the choice? Wouldn't we all want to be some Jesus-like figure who forgives everybody? Wouldn't we all want to be that one cool dude who lets everything wash over them with cool calm serene composure and dignity? Wouldn't we all want to wear a permanent smile, even when somebody is taking a dump on us?

I want to be Mr Nice but I don't feel able to be right now, because real life; because real danger; because real trauma, abuse, bullying, baggage, distress, anxiety, suffering and all the other things which plague me.

I wondered how many friends I'm going to have left if I make it through this f**king nightmare and reach a point where I have some financial, housing, social, relationship and career stability. Then I realised that the thought was a non-sequitur. If I don't make it through then I have no use for friends, because I'll be dead. My friends are the people who can understand the gravity of the situation. In that regard, I can't really understand why anybody would invest in a friendship with me, given that I make no secret of my relentless suicidal thoughts - I really don't hold out much hope that I'm going to pull through and reach the point where things improve.

In conclusion, I feel some regret and remorse that I might have spoken too harshly about people who undoubtedly wronged me - those are just facts - but who could perhaps be excused, forgiven and forgotten, without a public outburst displaying just how upsetting and distressing things have been, but also how much bitterness and resentment I was carrying. Not a good look, for sure. Not a dignified response. Not what Mr Nice would do.

I am not Mr Nice. I'm just some suicidal guy trying to get back on my feet.

Tags: #friends #suicide

This is a story about being laid bare...

My Facebook friends are a mish-mash of former colleagues who have become friends, former colleagues, old friends, acquaintances, close friends, my accountant, random people who I friend requested, random people who friend requested me, and some people I've had business dealings with. In short, many of my Facebook friends are not friends at all, and some of them are quite powerful and influential, and it would be a bad idea to make a fool of myself in front of them.

Facebook is a place where I've let various crises play themselves out, with little to no filtering. It's been fairly apparent to anybody who's friends with me on Facebook that I've had a major life crisis, which has not been handled with elegance, dignity and poise. It's fairly apparent on Facebook that I've completely lost my mind, at times. It's been fairly apparent on Facebook that I've been through some dreadful adversity and horrible events.

There's a feature on Facebook which shows you "memories" of things that happened "on [the anniversary of] this day". This feature never fails to remind me of just how utterly insane I've been in the past, during various crises. There are moments from 2015 and 2017 which are particularly cringeworthy, although remarkably I was working during a lot of that time. I look back and I think "sheesh! My mental health was in a really bad state".

I keep worrying that my perceptions are all warped and that I'm actually just as mad as ever, but I'm unable to see it in myself. I keep worrying that I'm repeating the same old pattern - the same episodes of mental illness - and I'm not really recovering at all. I do have very good evidence, in the form of those Facebook memories, that my state of mind is completely different, and I'm much more sane, healthy, in-control and generally sorted out... but I worry that I've lost perspective and I'm unable to perceive my own madness correctly.

If I'm having a moment of sanity, I wonder if it's only temporary and I'm about to be plunged into insanity at any moment. Sure, I can spot some of the same problems: the propensity to do crazy things, spending massive amounts of money and zooming around the world in airplanes, plus the ever-present thoughts of suicide. I can see that I'm inflicted with the same mental illness I've had all my life - bipolar disorder - but I don't know whether it's going to become unmanageable, or whether I've got it back under control. I had my bipolar under control for the vast majority of my life, so it seems feasible that I'm managing my illness, like I always managed to do, but I do worry that life will get the better of me and I'll be unable to cope.

I regularly examine past behaviour, and although I understand what I was thinking at the time, I think differently today and I would act differently. I can't justify my past behaviour and I'm very embarrassed, full of regret and remorse, but I know that in the midst of a fully-blown mental health crisis, a person doesn't make the same well-informed, well-considered and carefully pre-planned correct choices. This is not to defend my past actions or excuse them... merely to explain them, although it pains me that it was the same me - physically speaking - who said or did things, it doesn't seem like it was me at all. I know things made sense to me at the time, and I can understand the illogical thinking which led to my behaviour, but I can also see the strange flaws, just as we might imagine a recovered paranoid schizophrenic might come to realise that the voices they heard were not real.

I live a strange existence, where I'm hoping to break out of the perpetual nightmare of recent years, and to re-enter civilised society. I commute to the office, I feed my cat, I hang out with my girlfriend, I go on holiday - my life seems very normal, but I live with the knowledge that things went very badly wrong during a series of dreadful crises, and I struggle to reconcile that with the ordinary, pedestrian, plodding, calm, normal, humdrum, workaday, boring, predictable, civilised and obedient lives lived by most people, and especially the people in my middle-class peer group; my colleagues etc. There is no way I can talk casually about the more lurid and colourful aspects of my past in the office, for example - these are things which are simply not talked about, because my sheltered colleagues would be afraid of who I am - or rather who I 'was' - if they really knew the stuff I've been through, even though they have spent an extraordinary amount of time in my company and they know who I am.

That 'was' aspect suggests I'm some kind of reformed man, which of course I am not. I'm the same person I've always been. My circumstances dictate everything, and life is very different when it's nonstop crisis. My circumstances have improved, so commensurately my life has improved, and my life looks very much like anybody else's, although some of my relatively past is very different.

I'm in danger of getting defensive, so I'm going to stop now. I've shared enough.

Tags: #privacy #socialmedia #bipolar

This is a story about rôle models...

I was very lost in 2015, without any purpose or identity beyond some things which were destroying me, my self esteem, my legacy, my reputation. I was sinking; doomed. I was trying and failing to regain any control over my chaotic and unmanageable life, and to gather enough dignity to carry on living.

A technologist friend has always helped me to discover things in life which have become integral to my future. He taught me to be a programmer and he got me interested in writing, as well as a heap of other things, like political views, which I now consider to be very much a part of my identity.

My friend has written and published online for countless years, and I have read and I have imitated. He was a prolific blog contributor, touching many lives worldwide. He has lived and breathed social media and embodied his online persona. I have imitated.

My parents chose to intoxicate themselves with drugs and alcohol, and were only concerned with their own selfishness, which mainly revolved around social isolation, lest their neglectful lazy shameful behaviour be publicly exposed. Luckily, I had excellent friends and their parents were inspirational people. I saw in other people's families, the way that things should be and I saw in my peers some ideas about what I could be. Friends have shaped who I am and given me the inspiration to pursue my profession in technology, and my passion for online communities, combined with my love of writing.

To say that I love writing is perhaps wrong. I've written a couple of novels, one of which I'm quite proud with, but I don't write fiction as regularly as I'd like. Perhaps if I was a more natural writer I would always be writing little short stories, or exploring my imagination in other ways, but instead I write these "non-story" stories, every single day if I can.

I cringe a little to think of my friend's judgement regarding the wrong-headed thinking, or mistakes of the past. If ever there's somebody I would be ashamed of disappointing, it would be my old friend. If there are certain standards of behaviour I hold myself to, it's not because of any standards from my parents - alcoholic druggies - but instead it's because of a worldview developed in the company of my friends and their families, whose opinions I seem to have taken to heart.

When I think about, for example, my friend's parents' view on hitting children, then I am upset that my parents were such barbaric ignoramuses, when their peer group was able to comport themselves the right way. If my friends' parents were able to be productive members of society, sociable and not drunk drug addicts; able to raise children without hitting them; able to raise children with kindness and generosity, indulging their children's talents and encouraging them to reach their full potential... then why not mine? I do not know, but I do know that my parents were abysmal failures, while many of my friends' parents are awesome role models, and some of their children too.

"They did the best they knew" is absolute horse sh1t when you have your peers to connect with; you can hold yourself to the standard of those around you, as a minimum. If you're the only antisocial drunk druggie losers who don't have a job, then you sort yourself out and start behaving responsibly, you don't force your child to leave school again and again, and drag them away from their friends, isolating them. That's f**king barbaric awful inexcusably sh1t behaviour.

I meant to write yesterday and I'm sad that I didn't. I meant write merely to thank my friend for inspiring me to write, but also to acknowledge my friend's role in giving me a career, and in inspiring me to think about many things. I meant to write only to speak of the positive, but I seem to have strayed into the territory of the negative.

My friend never writes vicious tirades like this, and I know that my ingratitude I show towards my parents could be particularly improper at the particular time, given a traumatic family situation in his life, which is nobody's fault but rotten bad luck.

I wish I could be more positive, but this blog serves as a kind of safety pressure-release valve, which has functioned extremely effectively in enabling me to regain some self esteem, control, dignity and other important things - such as a sense of purpose - when my life has otherwise crumbled around me.

Tags: #friends #parents #writing #socialmedia

This is a story about inconsistency...

I often forget that I have a mood disorder - bipolar - because I'm pretty functional and unimpaired, but clearly I'm not neurotypical. Depression seems to my 'usual' day to day mood, or perhaps it just feels like that because depression seems to last interminably long and can't go away soon enough, but hypomanic episodes are all too infrequent and very welcome.

My hypomania has, as usual, produced some useful results, in that I've been able to make fantastic progress at work on the project I've been involved with.

I was feeling disheartened about how much mess had been made and how the 'purity' had been lost of the wonderful system that I had a major hand in shaping, leaving things less-than-perfect. Then, I spent ages hacking away trying to make things better and tidying everything up, and I'm happy again; I feel like I can be really proud of my work.

Why anyone should expect me to feel consistent about things is dubious, given my mood disorder. Of course I'm going to say "I hate my job" on one day and "I love my job" on another. I wonder if the same can be said for my feelings towards life. I definitely have suicidal thoughts on a very regular basis, but it really wasn't very long ago that I had the holiday of a lifetime, which really was amazing, and I have some great things in my life like my girlfriend and my kitten, plus some great friends and a generally pretty enviable lifestyle... although of course I'm working hard and taking some pretty grim jobs in order to pay for that lifestyle.

I can decide whether I love or loathe creating software. When I wrote some iPhone apps, I never ever wanted to touch the code ever again once they were released. I was not at all proud of my code and it was quite arduous making those apps. In fact, I really got to scratch the coding itch that summer, writing code for 16 to 18 hours a day.

I think creating software can be a mood rollercoaster. Sometimes it's difficult and sometimes it's easy. When it's difficult, it can be really difficult and it can feel like a problem is impossible, but anyone who's a good software engineer will persevere and overcome horrible technical obstacles. When you solve a really hard problem, it's a major triumph, but it's emotionally taxing to have that range of mood fluctuation as an integral part of your day job. Many software developers will retreat into their comfort zone, only doing things in ways that they're familiar with; refusing to work with unfamiliar technologies, where they'll suffer the misery of technical obstacles all over again.

I'm not sure whether I love or loathe overcoming technical challenges. I love it when I succeed but I hate it when I feel like I'm not succeeding; that I've finally met my match with a particularly nasty problem.

In the organisation where I currently work, it seemed like the system I was working on was incomprehensibly huge and that the problems were so deeply embedded in the very fabric of what'd been built, that I could do little more than nurse the thing along and make very minor improvements. However, I started to become more bold and ambitious about making changes, until eventually one day I decided to rewrite it all. Everything works like I thought it would, and things are incomparably better than they were when I joined, but maybe I'm biased. I do have hard numbers to back my claims that things are better... things that were taking days take a matter of minutes now.

I always worry that I'm repeating past mistakes, where I've become full of myself and convinced that I'm a major driving force in delivering a major project for a massive organisation. Perhaps I am a major driving force, but things have not always ended well for me when I've allowed my hypomania to run riot. I need to learn those lessons of the past and not allow myself to become excessively tired, where my hypomania turns into outright mania and I start acting strangely.

Hopefully the reality I perceive is not too different from how other people see things. Hopefully I'm not suffering too badly with delusions of grandeur. There seems to be plenty of evidence that I'm doing a good job and I'm well respected, and that my contribution is valued. There seems to be plenty of corroborating evidence to support my claim that I've made a major contribution to the project and can feel proud about that.

I'm really hoping I get to stick around and see things through to completion. There's fairly significant stuff going on in October, and I really want to be part of that, seeing the stuff I've worked hard on getting used in anger. Sure, I'm over-invested and taking things too personally, but I also want to have been part of something to feel really proud about.

Tags: #career #work #computing

This is a story about antisocial behaviour...

What's the shortest journey between two points? If you know where you need to get to and you know the fastest route to get there, would you make that journey? What if the shortest path was also a very painful one?

A year ago I was living in a hotel close to the office. A year ago I was incredibly isolated - single, in a city where I had just one friend, estranged from family and living a pretty dysfunctional life except for my job.

Who cares... I was functional, wasn't I?

I certainly turned up in the office every day looking presentable and I did useful work, but I'm not sure I really was very functional. It's true that I was earning money, paying my bills and I was on a journey towards financial security. I was reliable; dependable; trusted. What else is there in life other than getting up in the morning, putting on some smart clothes and going to the office? What else is there in life other than earning money? I was certainly earning money. I was certainly working.

What do you suppose happens after a major event, like a near-death experience? What do you suppose happens after a major medical emergency which was life-or-death? What do you suppose happens after a lengthy hospitalisation?

Most people would like to imagine that there'd be plenty of time for rest and recuperation after a major illness that nearly killed a person, but I'm afraid the demands of life can't be paused. Unless you want to emerge from your near-death experience and be immediately hurled into bankruptcy, destitution and have life-changing black marks against your name which preclude you from ever renting a property, getting a car loan, getting a mortgage, getting any kind of credit agreement etc. etc. and indeed getting most jobs, which insist on credit checks and suchlike, then there's not a moment to spare, ever.

For sure, I'm a capitalist's wet dream in terms of how meekly I comply with capitalism's coercion and act in the way that's expected of me, selling my labour cheaply and otherwise allowing myself to be shafted by the system. Instead of doing what I absolutely need to do, which is to spend time getting better, instead I have thrown myself straight back into the workplace.

A close friend - my guardian angel - has similar mental health problems as me: depression and anxiety. She has been able to do voluntary work and quit jobs which were toxic for her mental health, and to engage with her local community. She's swallowed her pride and has accepted that she must live with her parents and spend her precious savings supporting herself, for the sake of her mental health.

For me, I've had to choose between the self-esteem destroying effects of living as somebody's charity case, or the toxic world of work. I decided that the latter option is marginally better, given that it at least offers a route towards freedom, although it's a very risky game.

Living under somebody else's roof takes the pressure off in terms of burning money on rent and bills, but there's an emotional toll for anyone who's been raised to be a considerate guest - there is considerable guilt about time spent sleeping and otherwise "treating the place like a hotel". There is a great deal of pressure to be seen to be doing whatever it is that your host thinks you should be doing. There is a great deal of pressure to please your host, which leaves remarkably little time and energy to rest and recuperate.

Working when you are too unwell to work is risky because you must present a corporate mask to your colleagues, pretending that everything is A-OK when really it's not at all. Work is the very last place on Earth that you should be, but you're in the office carrying on like you're fine and dandy. It's horrible to force yourself - day after day - into a situation and environment which is totally toxic to your mental health and is intolerable, but it's somehow possible to present a veneer of cool calm professionalism, such that your colleagues have no idea that you're on the brink of having a nervous breakdown at any moment. It's high risk, high reward - if you can wear the mask and pretend like everything's OK for long enough, your situation will improve, but it's incredibly draining and prevents you from becoming healthy and happy again, because it's so demanding.

One year later, I have my own roof over my head and a girlfriend. I still don't have any local friends to speak of, but I have ingratiated myself with my neighbours and my colleagues are sociable; one of my colleagues has even started to talk to me socially as a friend, outside the office, having found my blog.

I have the dignity and self-esteem that I wanted, in that I am paying my own way and not dependent on anybody, but it's been ridiculously exhausting and risky to take this path. So often I wonder if I should have cut my losses and given up, allowing myself to be screwed over by the system; destroyed by those who seek to exclude and marginalise vulnerable members of society.

I was struggling to find anything to watch which captivated my attention last night, so I spoke to a friend. That's unusual for me. I live a very isolated existence. I almost never speak to any of my friends on the phone, except for two very loyal friends, one of whom often phones me while I'm at the office. I must make fewer than one phone-call per week, on average.

Overall, my situation is improving, but it's pretty intolerable. I've chosen the fastest route from A to B, but it's an exceptionally intolerable and unpleasant journey, even though I know it's the most direct. I know that this suffering is only temporary and that I will reap some rewards at the end, if I can stick it out, but I do want to quit all the time.

Through this very difficult period while I've been blogging - the past 4 years - I've made some really awesome friends who are very loyal and who have gone to exceptional lengths to help me, including my guardian angel, who's visited me in hospital far too many times. Although my behaviour looks broadly the same, there are undeniable improvements to my situation. My bloody-minded bitter determination to succeed with exactly the same strategy which I've always employed, seems to be paying off, finally. It surprised and gladdened me that during a moment of loneliness I suddenly remembered that I had a whole heap of very dear friends who were available to chat to.

Weirdly, I don't feel lonely, even though I have spent the vast majority of the past 4 or 5 years enduring an incredible amount of social isolation.

Tags: #friends

This is a story about daily chores...

I spend most of my leisure time stopping my kitten from destroying everything that's made of paper and cardboard, wrecking my house plants, attempting to go up the chimney, getting her paws in the soot and ash of my fireplace, peeing on clothes, chewing cables, licking plates and dropping her toy mouse into drinks. It certainly keeps me busy.

My other daily chore, aside from scooping poops out of the 4 litter trays around the house and washing cat-pee soaked clothing and bedding, is my writing. I'm going to attempt to resume writing every day.

The past couple of days I've written far too much.

I needed to write to let friends around the world know that I'm OK. I wanted to also mention the people who've popped up in my website analytics who appear to be work colleagues from a couple of different locations and organisations in the UK, and also my girlfriend's mum, in case they pop back for a repeat visit... wouldn't want to disappoint. I also simply wanted to resume writing on a daily basis.

The good thing about writing lots is that it makes me a moving target: very hard to shoot down.

I'm not going to write much today because I need to get better at writing less. I need to deliver short and sweet little blog posts, not the miserable long essays which exhaust my readers. Even I feel quite embarrassed about the self-indulgence of writing 4,000 words moaning about anxiety and depression, and generally complaining about my lot in life.

Tomorrow I might share some holiday photos, but I'm just trying to settle back into my routine. I thought I would allow a little of the pent-up stuff that was rattling around inside my brain to flow out of me, releasing some pressure and allowing me to consider my situation with a bit more perspective.

I wasn't dreading writing. I was a bit sad that I'd had a three-week gap, but I didn't feel like abandoning the project, although I was quite stressed and anxious that I'd left it too long and I'd struggle to get back into it. I was dreading going back to work, but that's for reasons which I've already gone into at length.

My good intentions have gone to waste regarding resumption of healthy living. I had planned on dieting and being teetotal since returning from holiday, but that hasn't really happened yet.

I don't think I'm going to be able to achieve everything I wanted to achieve within the ambitious timescales I wanted to, but I do feel somewhat rested and that I've had the benefit of a break. I feel like I have more energy and I'm in a much better situation than I was a couple of months ago.

My contract at work might get extended for a couple of months, which brings in much needed cash. Home life is pretty settled and secure - I have a nice house and I love my kitten. My relationship is going well. There's nothing on fire or threatening to cause major problems at the moment. I have the opportunity to enjoy a period of some stable, secure, routine simple living, without too much stress. I can do my writing every day after work. I have my daily routines and systems, and that's the way I like things, in order to manage stress levels down to the point of being tolerable.

I've written more than intended, as usual, but I'm below my maximum word count, which I have been very poor at respecting the past couple of days. I hope I can consistently keep my word count below my maximum, and hone the skill of writing short and sweet little blog posts every day. It takes discipline though.

Tags: #writing

This is a story about influence...

One of the great benefits of operating my own homebrew website is that I get to see the visitor analytics in all the glorious detail. I can't be certain, but I have evidence that I can count some work colleagues, my girlfriend's mother and other important people as readers, who have never mentioned that they are readers, but I see the evidence all the same.

A colleague from another part of the country was kind enough to tell me that they'd been reading my blog. That was a first. I've had plenty of evidence of colleagues visiting in the past, but they've never explicitly told me that they've read any of my blog.

I sometimes feel a little bit paranoid and vulnerable, having the contents of my messy mind and messed-up life so publicly on display, but I assume that anybody who's going to take the time to read is going to hopefully empathise with my situation and see that I'm mad, not bad.

I write about this scrutiny quite often. Often times I am angry about the invasive nature of security vetting, background checks and suchlike, given my lengthy career and achievements, which I feel should be enough to free me from the tyranny of gatekeepers. Often I implore the lurkers to imagine me at my very worst; to judge me based on their prejudice. Often I wail with agony about those who are seeking to dig dirt; to find reasons to reject me.

Conversely, I'm acutely aware that anybody can access this repository of innermost thoughts and feelings at any time. I'm relatively well-informed about who's reading, thanks to my website's detailed analytics. I can see who's reading, when and for how long, and I can make educated guesses about the impression they might form.

It might seem sensible to present another side of myself, given how important it is to be a bland corporate drone or ideal boyfriend material, in the eyes of colleagues and my girlfriend's mother. It might seem sensible to write under a pseudonym. it might seem sensible to present a sanitised mask; to present only my greatest achievements and to trumpet my successes and finest attributes.

I found it was rather toxic to my mental health to live so much of my life worrying about my professional reputation; worrying about my corporate image; worrying about how presentable I was as a fake person. I found it exhausting keeping my CV spotless and otherwise maintaining a perfect career. I found it exhausting, worrying about gaps in my employment history and whether the organisations I worked for were prestigious enough to be impressive. I found it exhausting making sure that my job titles and projects were grand and magnificent, to maintain the perfect corporate image.

If I really was worried about becoming unemployable and losing my income, then surely I would tear down this website and its associated social media accounts and set about expunging anything unflattering from the digital realm, wouldn't I? If I was a credible professional person, surely I would have a bland corporate identity: faceless except for the unblemished stream of non-stop corporate accolades and achievements, presented in dry bullet points, clothed in a grey suit and completely lacking in any personality or personal identity.

I find it exhausting and toxic to my mental health.

I find it intolerable that the corporate world wants to steal so much of my valuable time, but also my identity, and to insist that I conform to an unrealistic, unhealthy and impossible conception of what the 'ideal' corporate drone would look and act like.

My reaction has been to create an "anti-CV". This homebrew website is everything that colleagues, prospective employers, girlfriends' mothers and others, would never normally see, hear or read about a person. Here is everything that you'd love to know but would never usually be able to find out. Here's all the dirt that gatekeepers wish to dig, presented clearly and concisely.

My thoughts are a little jumbled and confused. I don't know who's friend and who is foe. I don't know when I'm being judged harshly and unfairly, due to prejudice, and when my readers are feeling empathy, sympathy and generally taking an interest in my wellbeing.

I know that some colleagues and others read because they're interested in who I am as a person, and perhaps they even care about me and would like to see me succeed. I know that hardly any of my readers are looking to cause me harm. In fact, most readers are concerned about my welfare and they use my words with kindness: worrying about me and thinking about ways in which they could help me.

My behaviour is a little erratic. I do struggle with dreadful suicidal thoughts, depression and anxiety, which threatens to do me great harm, but yet I do not know quite what I'm doing: is this a cry for help, a form of therapy, a coping mechanism, self-sabotage, a folly, foolish stupidity? What consequences are there for acting in contravention of the expected behaviour of a corporate drone? What consequences are there for not complying with social norms; suffering in silence?

I feel happier when I'm writing vast amounts every day, because I feel that I'm a moving target; I feel like the energy and the productivity wards off anybody who might think me stupid, idle and easy to pigeon-hole. I feel like writing wards off anybody who might seek to sum me up with a simple sentence, thinking that they've understood me. I want to be complicated. I want to be interesting. I want to be eccentric. I want to be hard to understand. I don't understand me, so why the hell should you come here and think you've got all the answers?

As usual, I've written more than I intended. Nobody wants to read more than about 700 words, and even then, my thinking is disjointed and hard-to-follow. I've reverted to a stream-of-consciousness comfort zone, where the words pour out, but there's no clear thread of thought and I'm not saying anything except a hotchpotch of jumbled thoughts and feelings without any clear conclusions or intersting insights.

Perhaps there's a human interest angle, but I'd like to return to the time when I wrote think-pieces which explored ideas, as opposed to diary-esque brain dumps, written in a desperate attempt to neutralise overwhelming negative thoughts and feelings which threaten to consume me.

Another thing which occurs to me is how little my mind is occupied. My job is very easy and my working day is pretty boring. My evenings are often spent in social isolation. In fact, most of my life is socially isolated. I have no local friends. My job is not very sociable. There are few social occasions in my life. I am estranged from my family.

I wonder if I'm lonely, but I don't think that I am.

I can remember being lonely in the past, but I don't feel those feelings at the moment.

My brain is very busy.

My brain is intensely noisy.

My brain will continuously present things to be anxious and depressed about, unless it is occupied with something taxing to think about.

Writing is an ideal occupation.

However, my writing is somewhat scrutinised. My girlfriend will read this. My friends will read this. My work colleagues will read this. My sister might read this. Strangers will read this.

Strange.

In some ways I'm incredibly isolated and I mostly inhabit my own mind, alone. In some ways I'm socially disconnected; removed from the normal social interactions that most people have with their friends, family, kids, colleagues and suchlike. I spend vast amounts of time in my own company and/or lost in thought. I can spend a whole day in a trancelike state, thinking.

In other ways I'm not isolated at all. At least I have a mechanism for connecting me with people, even if it's rather atypical. I don't mind that there are work colleagues and my girlfriend's mum, who read my rambling thoughts without acknowledging that they are there, reading in the comfort of their office. I don't mind that I don't really know precisely when I'm communicating, and who precisely I'm communicating with. I don't really mind that I don't get the feedback of knowing how my words are being received. I don't really mind that I'm transmitting - broadcasting - and I don't know how far my words are travelling or where they're landing.

Of course I worry that the more I write, the more I expose myself as a fool. If I write enough, I'm sure to expose my sheer idiocy. I'm hardly considering my words precious and choosing them with extreme care, given the prolific nature of my writing. Those who've read vast amounts of what I've written have said how repetitive I am. Should I have expected any other result, given my approach?

So, the rather unsatisfying conclusion is that there is no conclusion. I find it useful to write regularly, in the interests of allowing my creativity, productivity and identity to have some room to breathe, given the restrictive nature of the bland corporate world in which I inhabit. I find it useful to maintain a digital identity, lest I become paranoid about anything less-than-perfect emerging in other areas: at least my humanity is contained all neatly in one place here, where I can keep an eye on those who come to poke around. I find it fascinating that anybody would bother to try to find me, and would bother to read about me, especially given the vast tracts of drivel that I've written, such as this one.

Tags: #writing #socialmedia #privacy