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

Hi folks! I'm in a pretty dark place right now. Something went wrong ... just a little thing that went wrong but it ripped open deep wounds. Feeling extremely alone and isolated and *scared*. I'm again experiencing serious alienation ... paranoia too. It's hard to describe to people the fear of a falling completely into insanity. Many people use 'crazy' as if it wasn't something very bad, sometimes even being something positive. But for me, insanity is the worst thing in the world. I've already experienced it ... it is indescribably bad. It's all your nightmares becoming real. It's a pit of despair with no way out. It is screaming at the top of your lungs but it's all locked inside and no-one else can hear. It is being buried alive ... and not being able to get out or even to find relief in eventual death. It is being trapped in a kind of mirror-world ... you're surrounded by strange beings, they're not like you and you're not like them, nothing makes sense to you, you don't know what to do, you can't predict what will be the result of anything you do or say except that it is going to be horror and disaster. You realize something is wrong, you're doing something wrong, something has gone wrong with your interface with reality and with others, but you don't know *what*. You're failing some cosmic test and the punishment is worse than eternal hell. You're letting everyone down. But you don't know what you did wrong. You start questioning, questioning, questioning, and it's like a tornado of fire ripping you to pieces. Your soul goes up in flame and with it the universe, the only universe you've known. Something has gone wrong and now everything's doomed. You've tried, you've ripped your own guts out trying, but it wasn't good enough. And you don't know *why*, since you don't benefit from the torture, and no-one else does either! Or does anyone? What is it all in aid of?

Look - I'm not there yet. I'm sort of all right right now. But I'm too close to that for comfort. I just want folks to sort of understand ... heck I want to understand myself. This is the kind of fear I have to live with every day. I'm still clawing my way out of the abyss and just a small bump can send me falling back in.

Email on its way, buddy. Nil desperandum.

Thanks a lot for the email Dmitri!

Like I said, it's not actually that bad right now. But it's still the fear of going insane ... a little crisis happen and even though I can handle it, there's the fear that a future crisis can come in which I can crack completely. And one thing is ... I am extremely afraid of having to be institutionalized. I love the outdoors so much, I live for being able every now and again to go out and experience the wonders of the living world. And if I have to be put into an institution I'll lose all of that!

Hi Willem - sorry to hear you are so close to the edge. I wish I could do more but what I can say as something to hold on to, is that in a universe which threatens to spin out of control and comprehension ( to the extent than any one of us homo sapiens "comprehends" the universe around us), you bring beauty to the world through your art and your finger tip appreciation of nature and landscape. Douglas' favourite book was " Last Chance to See" and as I have said before, I think that he would have seen your loving contribution to the Guide as one of its crowning glories. Willem, bringing beauty to the world in amidst much of its ugliness is a good way of being in the world. I hope that the fear and the chaos backs off and that you can indeed muster the light to back off from it yourself.

Hi Robbie - thanks! And it is for the sake of what I can contribute that I'm still hanging on. But the fear I have is also the fear of how my illness can destroy all the good I might have done and might have contributed. But I am hanging on, still.

Hang in there buddy. We are holding you up in our prayers. Remember this is not the real reality and God has a better one coming and he knows and loves you unconditionally.

Sending good vibes your way, Willem.

Thanks everyone! I'm doing better today ... will write an update tomorrow.

Hi folks! Going better today ... but I did make it a bit worse over the last two days, having hurt myself in the gym! It might be because I was stressed and distracted. But it wasn't bad and is much better today. The whole deal with stress is it makes many things worse! Once I begin stressing I lose my judgement and sense of perspective. A while ago for instance I had a problem recharging my cellphone ... the plug wouldn't go into the socket. When I reached the point of not knowing what was going wrong, I went into a kind of dissociated state ... I didn't know up from down, but I phoned a friend and she sent someone over to help me out. I'm happy they could help (somehow some soil had managed to get into the cellphone socket) but I felt bad for needing help! It was a simple problem but my mind jumps into this disconnected mode at the slightest prompting ... and this remains a big problem for me, which I don't know how to solve. My psychotic disease is a result of brain chemicals being out of whack, and I keep things all right by using my meds but they work mainly when I manage to keep on an even keel ... things still easily upset this ... and once I'm totally spaced out (and it happens so quickly, too) it won't help to drink a few more pills ... those things work over the long term and also have some rather horrific side effects.

I hear you. Glad it's getting better.

What Dmitri said.