Laudus Himself

The Bastard Noose Mental Health Ward: Food, Family, Friends My Grandad O'Reilly, apart from being the reason I can never spell my mother’s maiden name, had an important saying: Faith, Family, Friends. It is a good mantra and one I hope to adhere to as closely as I am able. My problem is that I’m an atheist, but I’m just about grown up enough to appreciate how important faith is to a lot of my family. I wanted to replace the F of Faith, and I decided on food. No, I wasn’t going there, get your mind out the gutter. It’s probably pretty obvious if you’ve read the other The Bastard Noose entries that I love food. Eating and cooking (particularly cooking- I’ll happily make food and not eat it) are things I enjoy extremely. Obviously making meals, past lukewarm posh Pot-Noodles, was not an option on the ward. I’ve talked about the ubiquitous cabbage and even toast had to be prepared by someone who wouldn’t try to eat the toaster, or however you kill yourself with a toaster. Recently, a f...

The Bastard Noose Mental Health Ward: Car Alarms My notes say “I was anxious on entry. I wasn't scared, I was suicidal, what were they going to do, kill me?” This is me lying to myself, I was a bit of both anxious and scared. Although I didn’t fear for my life, I feared the unknown. My anxiety was about settling in. It didn't take long to, and now I was more comfortable I was taking a lot more of my environment in. A nurse came into my room and forwardly asked “for a chat” to say they hadn’t checked my sexuality yet. Even in my confused state i t seemed an odd move given no other nurses barged into rooms, apropos of nothing. Is this the norm, hours after all the fucking checks and questioning about minutiae of one's being, to come into people’s rooms to ask them whether they prefer front hole or back hole? It was also his only question and therefore his opener and closer. There was no foreplay, so to speak. Even with my flat feet my sexuality is irrelevant and also the way ...

The Bastard Noose Mental Health Ward A hiatus from The Bastard Noose was due to my feeling good and thus aware I was a self important prick imposing his moaning on you about things in the past. Also after a while I'd totally blasted the whole experience from my mind. Given where we're at, good thing Google didn't delete my memories, eh! I write The Bastard Noose to contemplate and examine but I always hope to have some happy come from it. Looking back at past posts I’m not entirely pleased with many of them and I wonder why I let it slop back and forth in my head only to throw shit out my fingers. Writing up my notes to force on you began to feel pointless. I worry it's a waste of my time (and yours).  But then if you never worry about anything you’re probably a prick. It is perhaps ironic that what I consider to be a relatively upbeat piece has come at the worst time I’ve had since going into hospital. My brain is wrongly wired and sadly my body listens to it. A y...

For other posts from the ED- take your pick I’m rather proud of my ability to find humour in things others are reviled by or at least uncomfortable with; it has certainly helped me throughout my time in hospital and beyond. In all of life’s ups and downs, seeing the funny in something can be the slither of hope. If I can still laugh, I can still live.  With that in mind, I bring you the tales of Barbara and an unnamed gentleman, both of whom I came across in my first twenty four hours in Bay 13. Stories I could twist any which way, but will try to find the funny in. While I hope Barbara (not her real name) and the man I describe are well now, I also hope my lottery ticket wins next week. My troubles felt as if they paled in significance with those of the poor souls who wandered or were escorted through the ED. It made me feel sane, then guilty for being that selfish. Every person has layers, levels, branches. Only it seemed the leaves were falling from many of these poor ...