Lies, Cliff Richard and Numbers.

I told the best lie yesterday (I try to tell at least one lie a day, it's good for creativity and writing). A friend of mine came over to see if I was manic, I was putting my Christmas tree up and listening to Cliff Richard sing seasonal ballads, it's April. I tried to give him some money from a wad load of cash I had stuffed in an envelope. When he asked where I got it, I turned all serious, and silenced Cliff, and told him that nine years ago, I witnessed a man do something. Something terrible. Instead of going to the Police - which by the way I've felt nothing but guilt about but have got hooked on the money - I tracked him down and blackmailed him. Not so much about going to the Police but to his wife as that would be game over. My bribe was set at a grand a month, until I decide to stop. My friend looked mortified. He couldn't look me in the eye. He said that he's rather not know what I witnessed but I could see he was curious, so I told him. I saw him pick his nose and flick it at the back of his wife's head. Then turned Cliff back up and started to dance.

Had a piece published a couple of days ago in the Huffington Post. It's had nearly 200 likes already which is fab because I thought it was crap. I went to a press event hosted by Alastair Campbell about the portrayal of mental health in the media and - as Sarah Jessica Parker always say - "and that got me thinking..."

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/kerry-hudson/mental-health-criminality_b_2974281.html

I dream of sleeping

I haven’t posted for a while, been so distracted, and I forget stuff as soon as I think it.

Six and a half hour spending sprees, but on the plus side, no pets.

Nights out, most nights, I can’t remember remembering.

Very little sleep.. even on promethazine and zopiclone combined.

Feeling so high - as in measurement, not morphine - someone tried to mug me the other night and I spat a big fat swear word in his face.

So scatty I keep forgetting my lithium.

Brain so fast haven’t been able to work, it can’t keep up.

But this isn’t mania, mania was last November, mania was putting my address on facebook and inviting anyone to come over and help themselves to anything in my house, mania was throwing the remaining anything off the balcony.

All I want to do is sleep for more than four hours a night. When your mind is on overdrive but your body is exhausted all you can do is lie there and buzz. Sometimes my alarm goes off right next to me but I don’t notice for ages. I had to set my alarm to a Chas n Dave song thinking it would annoy the hell out of me and break me out of the charged up pulse but no.

On a slightly more interesting note, I’m exhibiting at “Creative Journeys” Hackney Museum Gallery for three months, it covers the history of mental health in the East End of London. See photo’s above plus a LOT of knitting.

I love you.

Creative Journeys - an exhibition

Should you wandering around Hackney Central one day, check out our exhibition in the gallery. It runs until May 25th (2013) and artwork is on sale. 

Should you be inspired by my work, I'm running a series of workshops in the museum. Just ask at the front desk.. "What the bloody hell is all that about then?"

SSP x

Interview with Media Mind UK

The lovely girls from Media Mind UK came down to my exhibition I share with Core Arts at the London Hackney Museum for another two months (thats a lot of plugs for half a sentence!) and here's what we got up to..

http://www.themediamind.co.uk/2013/03/10/interview-kerry-hudson/

Internet Dating And Mental Health

Just how honest are we on internet dating profiles? We like people to see our best bits, our qualities, the things we are proud of, so we leave out the flaws, the weaknesses, the things we wish we didn’t have. We upload our best picture, the one that say’s attractive, sexy, happy, not the mid blinking, pre make up or post bottle of plonk.

But fast forward the potential relationship three years - which is when we approach the notorious three year itch and if we don’t make the right decision we have to wait for the seven year itch, it’s a bit like being sentenced then waiting for parole - and by then we are all attuned to the traits we left out of our original profile. So why not just get it out of the way in the beginning? No way!

Being totally honest in our profiles can go in one of two directions. You either get no replies, perhaps the odd one or two after pub closing hours, or you attract someone who admires you for your honesty AND your flaws. Bingo. You may as start choosing the fabric and start table planning.

I thought about doing this experiment, for about ten minutes, but did I really want to greet my potential soulmate with my most personal personality defects, which for me is my mental health? Oh no. People are still scared of mental health, but even though stats are rising, awareness is on the up, and all of us know someone who knows someone with a severe and enduring mental illness, we would apparently live with an ex convict then someone like me. A whopping 75% of us don’t let on about our condition for a whole year, often allowing behavioural symptoms such as a manic episode to do the talking for us.

So, my profile begins.. female, thirties, Aquarius, journalist and textiles artist living in London zone 2, with a professional (that means photoshopped) pic of my good side (good start, grabs his attention). Into reading, walking, swimming, ski-ing (like it), dining, dancing, partying (so far, so good), likes interesting science facts, random humour that makes me laugh uncontrollably (she’s a keeper)... and stalking people off the Crime channel. My friends see me as manic, an insomniac, of which I’m prone to delusions from a parallel world. I can’t make decisions unless when dating then I make bad ones. I keep up to sixteen rodents and have a weird obsession with Noel Edmunds (logs out). Oh, and I’ve only been ski-ing once, I was rubbish, and the only thing I “read” is Take a Break. Really, lets just stick to our qualities.

Last year I joined Guardian Soulmates which was my first ever internet dating experience. I did the fabulous sounding profile and clicked the upload button, and by the end of play the following day my inbox was shockingly chocka with messages, likes and favourites and I made it onto the front page (whoo hoo!). But it was very overwhelming, my previous relationship had left me feeling worthless, and I felt like a fraud because I hadn’t declared my mental illness, so I didn’t allow myself to reply to any of these potential soul mates. Six months of not replying later, still guiltily peeping out from the front page, I deactivated my account. I kicked myself for being ashamed of something I have no control over.

What’s even worse are job applications because we HAVE to tick a box stating whether we have a mental health condition or not. If we declare it, hmm.. they’re not supposed to deselect us but they do. If we don’t, and become unwell, they can a) not pay us sick leave or b) dismiss us for fraud. Epilepsy, diabetes or hard of hearing are other examples of “hidden” disabilities but without that awkward stigma which is mental health.

There is one dating site which caters for people with mental health issues looking for love or even friendship and its called No Longer Lonely. It was set up by a guy called Sam with mental health issues of his own who told me..
“I get regular testimonials from users attesting to how their lives have improved because of this site. Fact is that we’ve spawned at least forty marriages. I think there is a profound comfort getting to know someone for romantic intention when the idea of disclosure is taken off the table. We speak a common language of experience.

I’m all for people with a mental health diagnosis getting together with a similar partner, however, the cross-over of symptoms can be hard work and need deeper attention and indeed support. Mood disorders and personality disorders can be a toxic combination if unattended, although anxiety disorders tend to be more straight forward to understand, but cross partnerships in general can be difficult because not only do we have our own condition to control, we then have a whole new batch of symptoms to understand and nurture. Match partnerships, ie bipolar to bipolar tend to work better because both partners share the same awareness, experience and empathy.

Friends who think they are helping when they say “You need to be with someone normal” do not tend to understand that whilst their support has not gone unappreciated, we often feel that our condition is highlighted in comparison with someone without one, like having a spotlight shining down on us.

I’m done with the whole internet dating thing, it wasn’t for me. Perfect if your fridge is empty and you’re skint because you could fashion a short notice dinner date (if it goes well you get breakfast too) but I think I’ll do better hanging around outside manic depression support groups and depot clinics!

To read this in the Huffington Post, go to http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/kerry-hudson/internet-dating-profiles-_b_2776853.html

Realistic New Year Resolutions

My new years resolution this year was to start smoking and so far it’s going very well.

Admittedly I hated it to start with, namely the head rush, and had to pour cans of coke down my neck to combat the taste, but in order to give up a guilty pleasure I needed another guilty pleasure and a second new years resolution is to give up the booze since my folks - monitoring my lubricated antics over the festive period - have threatened me with rehab.

I’ve heard, read, experienced that people with bipolar love to drink, snort, shop, gamble, ‘hold hands’ because the quick fix attached is similar to our natural buzzers and we often prefer to self medicate than listen to our doctors.

Another thing we ‘forget’ is that drinking on top of our meds stops them working properly. THIS is my reason to quit, even if just for a few months (or minutes) because 2012 has seen two psychiatric admissions, a break up and a bingo habit and I need to see some positive changes in 2013 or I will simply leave Walford (yes, I believe ‘Stenders is real, give me something to cling onto).

Other new years resolutions include..

- See more of people - I actually have more conversations with my pet guinea pigs than people. As a writer I need to be more nosey, find out what's going on in other peoples lives, swear to secrecy and then change names.

- Practice the drums more - I’m getting crap on the drum kit. How am I to be the nagging thirty something drummer with her Take A Break magazine and Ovaltine on the floor tom in a band with teenage comb overs unless I practice?

- De Clutter - My flat is starting to look like something from a Channel Four documentary on hoarding. Because I make installation art I often hang around skips and scrap projects like flies and drag useless materials back to my flat with the promise of bringing it to life.

As humans we are more likely to list the things we must change and forget the things that worked for us in 2012, like.. er.. changing lightbulbs or remote control batteries. Other things I learnt last year to take with me into 2013 is..

- You can’t fix other people - I spent the last five years trying to eliminate someone else’s baggage, instead I just added to my own. The only people you can fix are yourselves, and you need to swallow a bit more than pills and self help books to do this. CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) and CAT (Cognitive Analytical Therapy) are great tools.

- Go against the grain - not only is this a fabulous method for cutting fabric to make cushion cover binding, it also works when you’re so low you can’t face the outside world so you FACE THE OUTSIDE WORLD. Fresh air and change of scenery works on both the mental and physical being.

- Don’t ask you don’t get - Although we’ve been hearing this since the age of five some of us (me included) still think good fortune will come to us if we sit and wait quietly. Last year I wrote for some of my favourite magazines and supplements because I asked to. I also had a three month solo exhibition - since art school - of my textiles art because I asked to. If anyone had of said no I would’ve been exactly where I was anyway.

Whatever you decide to do or not to do in the coming year, have a marvellous new one!

To read this in the Huffington Post.. http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/kerry-hudson/realistic-new-years-resolutions_b_2401729.html?just_reloaded=1

Hypomanic Episode and Drinking Shaving Foam

‘Hypomanic episode’ may sound like a TV documentary about biochemistry but it’s something I go through about once or twice a year, usually triggered by stress (that can also be ‘fun’ stress), prolonged periods of insomnia (this is what usually gets me) and forgetting medication even just for a couple of days. 

I don’t usually know I’m hypomanic until its over, or I’m taken to hospital and it’s explained to me. The things I obsess over, usually the welfare of animals, are at the time ‘normal thought patterns’ and delusions or commonly to me the presence of people around me from edwardian hookers to a big budget film crew, are part of my daily make-up.

I recently had a hypomanic episode, accompanied by mixed episode (horrid.. manic, depressed and anxious all at the same time, exhausting) brought on by five consecutive days of little or no sleep. I even tried to drink myself to sleep but that fueled my mania. I stalked people, obsessed over cats, put my full address on the internet and invited people to come round and help themselves to stuff, even threw stuff off of my balcony, being spurred on by people with me on my balcony (there were no people on my balcony). As if that wasn’t bad enough a previously planned date turned up, and not only was I emptying the contents of my house out of the window, wide eyed, tears speeding down my cheeks, but Fatal Attraction was on the TV. What a catch.

The following day my good friend Sheena came over - she had judged my mood swings by the crap I was putting on facebook - and she took me to hospital. As if five days of no sleep, mixed episoding and a domino rally of incident after incident isn’t enough, a doctor will see you, ask you questions, take notes, then you wait, and then another doctor will see you, ask you questions, take notes, and then you wait, and then. if admitted, another doctor will see you, ask you questions, takes notes...

On the ward I slept constantly. I woke to eat, take pills, then went back to bed again. I was watched every fifteen minutes. They took away my belt, shoe laces, even my business cards(?). I did the sleep thing for about five days before I started talking, taking part in group activities, therapy, seeing visitors etc.. it was going very well until I got attacked by a psychotic woman (patient, not staff) who left her teeth indents in my arm, and I panicked, not because of the attack, but because I realised for the first time that I was on a psych ward for psyched up women and I was one of those.

The following day I went to see the Turner Prize and forgot to go back. I woke the following morning in a Crack den with messages on my phone from the ward, the police, my friends..

A week later I was discharged - it was a bit of a Sarah Connor moment from Terminator 2 where I said everything I thought they wanted to hear - and I went back home, so long as someone stayed with me (Sheena).

A few days later, I was back in hospital, this time following swallowing a box of soluble cocodamol (it was like drinking shaving foam) with brandy. The following day all I could talk about to the doctors, to my visitors was about cats (the animals not the musical) and cried constantly, and, I lay in a bed for two days with only a clock on the wall right in from of me, were they trying to make me more insane??

Because what goes up, must come down, really down. The more up, the more down. Hypomania, suicidal.

I still have Sheena staying with me, I owe her big time. And I’m banned from booze as my worried parents have been threatened me with rehab and I don’t want to go because you can’t drink in there. 

Happy new year!