Me and Diogenes

I know it should be 'Diogenes and I' and it's upsetting my OCD to just leave that title but leave it I will.

HELLO there, so here we are again then eh?  There's so much to tell including my future death festooned in monkeys, the lobster -v- shrimp costume argument, the having to lose at least half my body weight (she exaggerated) in a year and oh, I dunno, the thing I've picked to talk about today! 

...the rest will follow in due course.

So, yeah - gosh, where do I start.  Hell, I'll just jump right in.  Remember about 18 months ago when I went totally nuts and ended up on meds and seeing a shrink?  I did mention that over here didn't I?  I can't be arsed to look back over my previous posts but it was around the time I went totally mental and turned up at someone's 40th birthday party crying and in my dinner covered pyjamas and no shoes?  Yeah, if you are going to do 'break-down' you have to do it in a totally memorable way.  The thing is, the people at the party were so nice they completely ignored these minor details, welcomed me in and gave me food.  I calmed down a little bit - food always fixes me, but was gently lead to see my doctor the next day.  The upshot was that together with the meds I had to 'see someone'.  Someone who wore Hush Puppies to be precise. 

Back to the present. 

(I pulled myself out of the mire by the way......well, I thought I did.  That, it would seem, remains to be seen!)

So, I'm sitting in my litter strewn car waiting for a heavy rain shower to stop.  A piece of paper had fallen out of my bag and in my boredom I picked it up and after a cursory glance realised it was some notes I'd made at one of the 'Hush Puppy' sessions.  It was weird, I'd pretty much forgotten everything that had been discussed and I think I only attended twice before buying the bald dog and feeling much better.  The piece of paper had stuff written on it which Mr Hush Puppy had told me were his early thoughts about what I'd told him about myself and how I was feeling/behaving and he'd told me to go away and Google this stuff so we could discuss it at our next meeting.  I remember that I couldn't be fucked to do it so cancelled the next sesh  and as you know, Derek the bald dog turned up next.

I'd written one phrase at the bottom of the page.  One phrase which the Hush Puppy guy had said was very significant and I needed to look into it for discussion.

The phrase?

DIOGENESE SYNDROME

I Googled it in the car and told my housemate (The Tidiness Nazi) about it when I got home. 

Me: .....so, what do you think?  That cheeky Hush Puppy wearing bastard INSULTED ME!

Tidiness Nazi:  So he said you are on the foothills of developing some sort of squalor and self neglect syndrome?

Me: YEAH, the cheeky bastard!  Granted I can admit that some of the symptoms listed ring slightly true - the whole apathy, social withdrawal and lack of shame thing.  That's got me ALL over it but the rest can fuck right off!

T.N: It says something about poor reasoning and stupid decision making too doesn't it?

Me:  ....your point being?

T.N:  Oh, I don't know.  Shall we start with the plan to dress up and climb the Himalayas dressed as a fucking lobster despite being a lazy fucker who hates walking or doing pretty much anything?  Then there was your plan to become a worm baron with the largest worm farm in the whole of the UK?

Me:  That was an eco venture!  It's not my fault the worms turned out to be scary.....

T.N: Well, I think that the fella might have had a point.

Me:  ....how rude!


So I called my mate Bison in order to get some proper sympathy and reassurance that I wasn't permanently broken!

Me: .....so what do you think?  I've been properly insulted!

Bison (can barely talk for laughing): Ha ha ha ha ha, you've gone wrong and it's official!  You've got a 'syndrome' named after some ancient Greek bloke who went nuts and lived in a barrel!  You'd LOVE to live in a fucking barrel, go on ADMIT it!

Me (not helping my case): I will admit that after reading that bit I did get lost in thought about how snuggly and cool it would be to sit in a massive fuck off barrel on a big soft cushion with a blanket over me just listening to the conversations of other people in the street without them knowing I was there....

Bison (still laughing!!):  This is hysterical.  Some bloke told you to look into a syndrome he was concerned you had started displaying tendencies towards and you couldn't be arsed, which is one of the symptoms and now you are offended?  HAH HAHA HA HA HA HA HA....you've joked you were going to end up as a crazy old lady

Me:  ....shit. 

Bison: Just remember, I'm supporting you through the medium of laughter (starts laughing again)

So next I spoke to my cousin Bakes who, when I told her about Diogenes, pissed herself laughing too!  What the hell's wrong with 'Team Sketty'?  They're shit man! 

Me:  I should go and punch that bastard in the face for saying that I was turning into a Crazy!

Bakes:  .......(long pause)......isn't that one of the symptoms?

Me:  Shit.....


So there you go, 18 months ago some bloke decided I was on a slippery slope towards turning into the type of person who might walk around town dressed weirdly with a bald dog in a pram collecting newspaper with which I could wrap up and neatly stack my own faeces.  Well guess what Mr Stupid-Hush-Puppy-Know-It-All?  I've applied for the funding through the Cycle to Work scheme to get a bicycle with a basket on the front to put my bald dog in SO THERE!

...and on a totally unrelated note - here's a picture of the lobster (or possibly shrimp) outfit I'm getting:

Half Dead

Well, for the people who know me it's no secret that I've pretty much gone totally wrong.  Some of them even know that I've done some stupid shit to myself in the process.

I'm talking specifically about the eating disorder here.

Now don't think this is going to be one of those (whingey voice) "I've got probbbbblems, I've got an eating disorder, I've had a terrible childhood/wasn't breast fed and now I over compensate by punishing myself with food" crappy blog posts.

Fuck that.

I've screwed myself up with my obsession, see-sawed between thin-ness\being a moose and had a bloody good time doing it.  Of course, no one wants to be fat; it's the leprosy of the modern age, and so I've done some major shit to my body/system and FUCKED it over.  I'd like to say I wouldn't change a thing but clearly finding a way to eat like a bastard/contribute to Third World hunger yet stay thin would be my ultimate goal.

Well, to cut a long and frankly boring story short. My digestion is fucked and I frequently puke when I lie down.  Sexy....

For various reasons, I ended up being taken to Accident and Emergency on Sunday.  It was here that I was given 2 bags of fluids and told that my kidneys were getting a bit pissed off.  I related the story to my cousin 'Bakes' AKA my Sister from another Mother/my fellow 'Crash Test Brummie/the person I'm proud to share took it upon herself to punch a baked potato thus losing a fair chunk of skin and also felt the need to touch one of those electric fly killers which shot her across the room (a few days later she tried it again.  I don't know whether she thought something different would happen but it didn't and she again ended up on the other side of the room.  It's for reasons such as this that we really relate to each other). The conversation kinda went:


ME: ...yeah, and when the doctor told me about that, the Tidness Nazi and I had a proper Hollywood Feel Good moment.

BAKES: Really, what happened?

ME: Well, I was all wired up and with tears in my eyes I said that all this shit had to stop as I was killing myself.  With tears in her eyes she said she had to stop drinking as it was killing her.  We sort of hugged and made a pact that I was going to start eating healthily and she would stop drinking.  We're going to the gym, start swimming, take the dog for long walks and basically stop harming ourselves.  This was the wake up call I needed - that we BOTH needed.

BAKES: Cool - what are you doing now?

ME: ....eating all the Halloween sweets.

BAKES: ...and the Tidiness Nazi?

ME: Down the pub.

BAKES: Excellent. Any way, I was lying around yesterday and my legs started to hurt in a weird way.  I became firmly convinced that I'd got deep vein thrombosis and bits of the clot were breaking off and getting into my system.  I absolutely KNEW I was about to die!

ME: Faaaack, what did you do?

BAKES: Nothing.

(on the other end of the phone I was nodding in silent unity)

ME:  Well, when I ended up back in A&E on Monday they put me on another drip and when the bag was finished  they left it for a bit before attaching another one.  I was just sort of sitting there when I noticed the fluid starting to come down the tube in my arm.

BAKES: Oh yeah?

ME: Yeah, and just before the new lot went through I reckoned I saw an air bubble in the tube.  I was really worried that the bubble was heading quickly towards my blood stream, would travel up to my brain and I'd get basically cured of one thing and killed by a freak air bubble accident.  I was absolutely convinced that I was about to gasp my last and I got a bit upset.

BAKES: Faaaack, what did you do?

ME: Nothing.

(again, I imagine she was just nodding her head in silent unity on the other end of the phone)

What I learned?  It's not just me who has an inner arsehole (see previous entry) pre-warning of imminent death.  Furthermore it's not just me who, despite overwhelming evidence, simply doesn't have the inclination or self preservation skills to act on this potentially pre-cognisant spiritual tip off.  Who can be arsed?

Oh yeah.  When I was potentially gasping my last just prior to my first trip to A&E I could hear a tinkling bell ringing.  I became convinced it was the sound of the heavens opening in readiness to take me away.  When it didn't happen I became paranoid that 'whomever' had a look down at me and decided I wasn't worthy, put their stinking bell away and fucked off.  Cheers Heaven.