One year ago, I published a piece about bipolar disorder. It had been something I had wanted to do for a long time, and the act of doing so marked a significant point in my life. The piece itself has been useful on a number of fronts. People who know me have either found it or been referred to it, and it has given them something of an insight into my head. Some people I thought I knew well have opened up a little more as a direct result of reading it. It has also introduced me to some new people. But more significantly was the effect it had on me. Up until that point I had been enormously guarded on the subject but, almost instantly, I became much more relaxed both with others and myself.
I’d liken the experience to something like bungee-jumping: while you’re standing at the top crapping yourself with fear, but after the event you’re left both with a sense of achievement and wondering what all the fuss was about.
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I have considerable admiration for anyone who’s ever had that discussion with their parents. If the parents have managed to overcome shock and respond with the usual parental love and support, I admire them too. I like to think that, by the time my own terribly liberal generation is old enough to have children of the “finding one’s sexuality” age, we’ll be so chilled-out, unfazed and approachable about it that it won’t even register as a milestone.
Last year, I found myself in a situation which I believe is as close to this as you can get if, like me, you’re straight. It took place, as convention dictates, around the kitchen table.
It wasn’t premeditated: I had not intended for it to happen, nor staged the moment, nor even planned what I was saying. For the life of me I can’t even remember exactly what I said. I remember realising that I’d just said it, and that I was already part of the brief silence that followed.
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Reasons to be cheerful: The BBC report on the fact that memory loss starts in your twenties. Why does this make me cheerful? Erm, what was the question again?
I don’t take this particularly seriously, as I’ve come to take the BBC’s health coverage with a pinch of salt. At times, it would appear that they just can’t find enough news to fill their health section, so simply recycle some old news of dubious reliability. Their all-time favorite is the groundbreaking story about how alcohol is actually good for you. They like this story so much that they’ve run it again and again and again and again.