020610

I wrote this in 2010. I can tell from the handwriting and absence of apostrophes that I was suffering from a psychotic episode when I wrote it. Seventeen and psychotic and scared.

Nothing has changed, which makes me sad. But I also feel a strange sense of something-resembling-pride that I’m still alive.

If I’d left in June 2010 I wouldn’t have fallen in love or worked my dream job or met so many interesting people – I wouldn’t have met my niece or nephew, my last 2 amazing boyfriends, or my brother’s wonderful girlfriend. I wouldn’t have finished school or 6th form, or studied at and graduated from university. I wouldn’t have seen Bob Dylan three times, stood an inch away from a Picasso or been to Arsenal v Tottenham. I wouldn’t have been there for my dad in his last months and I wouldn’t have held his hand as he slipped away.

All these books would have gone unread, all these places left unvisited, all these lessons left unlearned, all these stories left unwritten and unpublished.

I don’t know. I don’t think I feel proud, actually. That’s the wrong word. I feel amazed at my nerve and impressed by my resilience. But I also think it’s silly that I’ve put myself through all these years of pain when I didn’t have to.

8 years later, still begging for help, still getting none whatsoever. Still saying through tears and screams, “I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I don’t want to do this, I can’t do this anymore, I really can’t do this, I can’t fucking do this, I can’t.” Yet still doing it. God knows how or why, but still doing it. Crazy.