A Recovery Blog

This blog is about my continuing recovery from severe mental illness and addiction. I celebrate this recovery by continuing to write, by sharing my music and artwork and by exploring Buddhist and 12 Step ideas and concepts. I claim that the yin/yang symbol is representative of all of us because I have found that even in the midst of acute psychosis there is still sense, method and even a kind of balance. We are more resilient than we think. We can cross beyond the edge of the sane world and return to tell the tale. A deeper kind of balance takes hold when we get honest, when we reach out for help, when we tell our stories.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Confession and Reflections

Thank you Karen and Anonymous for your comments.  Much appreciated.  I wanted to say that after I did all that writing yesterday I began having some psychotic symptoms last night.  It's embarrassing to admit it, but admit it I must in order to stay healthy and on track.  It's the same old story for me, I try something creative, do it halfway well and then start falling into the egotism of delusion.  Most people can safely fantasize, but due to the schizophrenia, I cannot.  I get pulled into the vortex of something that threatens to consume me.  So I talked into my taperecorder and then aloud to myself and tried to ground myself and then I got a good night's sleep and am feeling a lot better today.  Reading your comments, especially yours Karen, gave me further ground under my feet.  So if you can, keep the constructive criticism coming.  I'm printing out your comments and keeping them in a folder to review from time to time.  It's such a privilege to get your feedback and to read your insights into what I've written.

The truth is that I am a beginner and have to go through the slow,  careful process of creating a story.  I read in one of my writing books that often beginners are good at either the beginning, the middle or the end of a story, but not all three.  Right now, I think I have a sense for a relatively strong beginning, but whether I can fabricate a middle and end, whether I can complete what I started, only time will tell.  I also need to read a lot more short stories, of which I have many collections, and learn from those with talent and the skill of their craft.  All in all, I'm still very pleased with my early attempts and it feels so good to publish pieces of the work here in this blog.  That's a big step for me and opens the door to me letting other people in my life read my work and hopefully give me constructive criticism.

Anonymous, you asked what the difference is between showing and telling.  I'm not so sure myself.  I think showing includes more description and some dialogue.  I lay it out there okay, but I will have to learn to use these other skills.  I feel as if in my writing that I am making lists to describe the characters and sometimes that's overkill.  The stories I've read from other authors leave more to the imagination and are structured more ingeniously.  So I'll keep plugging away and see what I can learn from other writers, from you who read my pieces and from myself in trial and error.

Karen, I think you make some very perceptive points about "Cold Comfort".  I do need to add physical description and it is unclear the switch between the present and the past.  I don't know yet the answers to your questions.  I'll have to sit and brood about it.  I do know that I'm setting Johnny up to be a hero figure, but is he handsome?  My idea is that at twelve he is short and undeveloped.  His physical appearance changes radically at puberty, so much so that Jamie doesn't recognize him in the street later on.  I also think it is too easy to make him handsome.  It might be more interesting if he had imperfect (but perhaps endearing) features.  Maybe the reason he's drawn to beauty is because he's not striking looking.  On the other hand, Jamie is particularly attractive.  She stands out that way.  Two beautiful characters might be too much.

Anyway, despite the minor setback of my psychosis rearing its ugly head, I feel good.  As they often say in 12 step meetings:  Live and Learn.  Eventually, if I keep up with the writing, I would like to write about what it is like to be psychotic.  That's the ultimate challenge because I have to have insight into my own illness and sometimes I struggle with that.

3 comments:

Antique and good used furniture........ said...

I don't want to be the badfish in the koi pond, but I will get you to A to Z in a very short time..........Boy loves girl, girl doesn't love boy..Boy meets another girl, boy doesn't love girl, and so on and so on. Add a few trees and roads and squirrels, and thats it..........end of story........ the rest is just using your knowledge to make a couple bucks on the next human.....or you could truly help people......Your decision.......Ain't it nice for someone to tell it like it is..LOL

Feminist Voice with Disabilities said...

Kate, I think it would be great if you wrote more about what it is like to have Schizophrenia. And what psychosis feels like. Personally I can't write fiction, but writing about my illness comes more easily. Everybody has a different ability. But I think you could do both. Or write about psychosis in the autobiographical novel. That would be very interesting to readers.

Karen May Sorensen said...

Hi Kate,

sorry you got a little lost. I too respond in uncomfortable ways both during the creative process and afterwords. I become either hyper critical or (less often) elated. They are extremes, and they are dangerous to me feeling grounded. Either reaction is the ego, only the ego could make you compare yourself to others and make you feel lousy or too high and heady. I try hard to think, "I'm doing this for myself" and not bring fame or the crowds of strangers into my mind. Like you, probably because I'm schizophrenic, I can't fantasize safely. Little ones yes, big ones no. I use my husband to sound things off of, you are clever to use your tape recorder because you live alone. But both of us are looking for truth, what is real, and when we are uncomfortably unbalanced by fantasy I think alarm bells go off. At least we have the sensibility to have alarm bells! Any insight into our behavior when it gets extreme is a gift, not all schizophrenics can be self reflective. Good for you for catching yourself. You can be creative and not suffer, but you have to be straight with yourself and know that the creative work is done with as little involvement with the ego as possible. Love of the process is safe. Staying in the now is safe. The more I talk with my therapist, the more I realize that staying anywhere but in the now is perilous. If you get overwhelmed with thoughts concerning your creative work, walk away from it for a little while. You can always return. But thanks for admitting on your blog that you had a strong reaction to sharing your creative writing, there was nothing to be embarrassed by, only courage for revealing how the illness affects you.

All my love,
Karen