h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

It actually took alot of courage for me to go to the Edinburgh meet I did. People I told about it were amazed I managed it.

I have mild OCD but I try to control it, however the more I think about not doing something more I feel the need to. Plus all the other head sh!t I have.

However, I am determined to make the effort this Saturday, even for a couple of free !

Well I for one thought you did really well last time

Excellent, Mort. Well done, you.

I only have mild OCD now. It's most obvious manifestation is that I can't go to bed without checking all the locks and stuff . It used to be much worse, I literally found it hard to even go for a walk because I felt things had to be done a "certain" way. I hated it.

I know that "irrational" stuff like that is very very hard to overcome and impossible to explain to people who don't have to deal with it and I know it must take a lot for you to come to something like a hootoo meet. The good thing is, the more you manage it the weaker the compulsion/fear becomes and the stronger you become.

Aww. I know you noticed it was hard for me, and I appreciated it. We chatted in the girls loo I remember!!

It's a shame as I am really a party animal

Oh, and I'm sure you'll get a couple of free s. I know I usually do.

We certainly did I'm not agoraphobic but from other things I can understand how hard it must be for you, but I think that yeah, the more you face your fears the easier it becomes. Here's to the day you're dragging us all out for a night on the town!

A fiver for Edimbra and 70 quid for Manchester - I suppose I should refrain from commenting here, so I'll shock you all by doing so

I'm probably wrong you know, wumby. I usually am.

Just before I went on the sick from work I had to repeat the bus numbers to myself over and over again, drove me mad.

I am the same with the door locks and the electrical switches, the computer and ashtrays (filthy habbit) but I have a rutine and when I start to doubt myself and feel the urge to 'check' I tell myself I followed my routine and it is ok. That has helped alot.

Is it GN you work at? Probably got my records there

I'm terrible for leaving lights on, and many's the time I've woken up at 3 am to check the light's off in the kitchen. Drives me nuts!

Gartnavel Royal.

Yeah, OCD is f**king impossible to explain to people. Iain Banks once described something like that as "like walking along a road you know is safe and then shutting your eyes" and that the compulsion to keep doing something is like the compulsion to open your eyes - you just *have* to do it and it's impossible to explain to people *why*.

Sorry, I'm letting out years and years of stuff here at 2am on a thread about a bloody hootoo meetup. Ah, well.

Actually after the last meet I remember putting a tray of drinks down and my sleeve rolled up and think EV noticed. After that I thought 'great, they will think I am mad now'!!

In actual fact I am more sane than most of the medics - dum asses.

At least I don't have to go to work tomorrow

That figures!

We actually have one psychiatrist at our hospital who's comically neurotic.

Did you watch Psycho's on Tv a few years back? Set in a Glasgow Psyche hospital, and one of the pysches was on lithium. Hilarious - or not!

Lithium by Nirvana?

I didn't, no. I find the "medicated" patients in the hospital a bit creepy. I keep wondering what they're like when they're not medicated.

It's interesting, actually. We do a lot of copying of patient's case notes and it's given me a real insight into why so many people in the world are screwed up and how it's always the fault of some malicious force in their lives or just plain bad luck. It can be quite difficult sometimes.

I know have additional reasons to hate disciplinarians, bullys, social conformity and sexual repression. They have a lot to answer for.

Kurt Cobain was a depressive and the song "Lithium" was supposedly named after the drug they give depressives. So there you go, Wumby.

Well, ya learn something every day. My initial thought was Librium, but that's usually pissartists (aka ) isn't it?