Renegade

Fifteen months ago I started therapy.

It was hard. Confronting things that I had buried for many years was hard, and it took several sessions to even start to open up.

 

I came out of the other side of this knowing myself a whole lot better. I've spent the last 9 or 10 months processing.

 

The therapist diagnosed me with PTSD.

 

I'll go into the cause of the trauma some other time perhaps, but for now, let's just say that at some point, decades ago, I built a wall around myself. I walled myself off not just from everyone else but also from myself.

 

Therapy did not in itself seem to change anything, but what was I expecting? For the therapist to wave a magic wand? For things to happen overnight? What follows couldn't have occurred without it.

 

Two days ago, something happened. A music reaction video popped up on my youtube page. 

Not anyone I'd ever heard of, but I started watching it and was quickly drawn in by what I was seeing. 

I've spent a lot of the last 48 hours binge watching other reaction and analysis videos of the same song, and one other song that is three songs. A musical triptych. 

 

The reactors and analysers are musicians, cinematographers, youth justice advocates, psychoanalysts, therapists, composers and songwriters, voice and acting coaches... 

 

Each reviewer had their own take, and by looking at these two videos, each with its own applicability to my situation and history, multiple times through the eyes of such various people, I felt something that I'd sometimes glimpsed during therapy fall into place.

 

Here is the first video they were reacting to: 

 

 

 

What struck me so profoundly was the monologue at the end, where Ren described his struggles as a dance, rather than a war to be won. Somehow framing it in this way made things much simpler. 

Watch the videos. Take the time to learn the back story of the artist, and you will perhaps understand why. 

 

The detailed, introspective post I've been struggling to motivate myself to write for the last two months isn't needed, and would anyway be a depressing, turgid affair. 

 

 

This is the second video. 

 

 

 

This one made me realise I'm not as singular as I thought. Of the three characters in the story, the one I relate to is Violet. Someone once described me as "The man with no opinions" 

 

Unlike Violet, I was not sexually abused by my father. 

 

Because of the trauma, I have made many mistakes, and have carried a burden of guilt and self hatred for a long time, but it feels like there is a crack in the wall at last, and a big broad chink of sunlight is coming through.

 

I, like Ren, am finally starting to stand on my own two feet. 

  

Hearts and minds

I planned to start blogging again, but with a different format. One long form post on the first day of each month.

Yesterday though my Dad was rushed into hospital because his heart was only beating 32 times per minute.

I knew what my post today was going to be. I had the topic, the structure, many of the actual words, but my attention has been diverted.

I visited him this evening. He's ok. For now. He will be 86 in October if he makes it that far. He will be fitted with a pacemaker, and could live for a good few years yet perhaps. The old fucker seemed indestructible, and this is only the third time in 85 years that he has spent a night in a hospital.

We plan golf.

Anyway, today was going to be a big long mainly coherent post about... Well something important to me.

It's now tomorrow, and I have missed my self imposed deadline.

So here instead is a seemingly unconnected video that is sort of relevant. The issues I wanted to deal with aren't going away, and a month makes no difference. See you on the 1st of September.

Acronyms

DOB: 1967

CND: 1981

THC: 1982

NUM 1983

PTSD:  1984

LSD: 1995 

M: 2004

ADI:2005 

S: 2020

It's the end of The World as we know it

And I feel fine.

This is my last post here.

Because I've started to include mature content that sometimes pertains to people close to me, I've set up a new blog under a different account.

Thanks for reading.

Bye bye.

Quaking in their boots!

Last time Tottenham Hotspur came to Prenton Park, Tranmere Rovers held them to a 2-2 draw. OK, they fluked a 4-0 win in the replay, but their third goal was a mile offside, and it came at an important psychological moment, right before half time.

But this time round, they don't have Gascoigne.

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And Tranmere are going to win.

Yes, you read it right. I predict a win, for League Two play off hopefuls, Tranmere Rovers, against a team of Premier League internationals.

Every time a defender takes the ball from the toe of Harry Kane, they win. Every time James Norwood forces a save from the Spurs keeper, they win. Every time some trickery on the wing sends a Tranmere winger on a run to the by-line, they win. I'm not sure Lloris would have kept this one out either...

Oh, and the money from a packed ground, and BTSport is a win too :)

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Seriously though, I went to both legs back in 1989. Gascoigne, whatever demons he has, was one hell of a player. Watching him dribbling through the Tranmere midfield, leaving them befuddled in his wake, you couldn't help but feel a kind of awe. I don't remember much else about it, except the atmosphere was brilliant, both home and away. I swore we outsang the Tottenham fans at White Hart Lane. The TV coverage belied my recollection.

driving lessons in North Wirral? learn to drive in Hoylake? driving instructor in Birkenhead?