Halloween

By admin on October 31, 2011

ECT is rarely mentioned without One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest being referred to. For many of us that movie perhaps the only contact we’ve ever had with the mental health system. McMurphy’s story is a memorable one of an archetypal struggle of an individual against the establishment – it taps into a shared fear of being unable to exercise self-determination. Not having control.

The image of shock therapy was reportedly changed by the movie, ‘tarnished’ this report says. There is no denying that ECT, or shock therapy, is frightening. Having an electric current flood your brain is frightening, even those of us who haven’t seen the movie might imagine the treatment barbaric.

The song is the title track from Shock Treatment, the sequel to the The Rock Horror Picture Show. My brother gave it to me as a single years ago, in a time when I didn’t realise ECT was offered as a therapy for depression. The clip highlights a problem with the portrayal of ECT in that it is invariably depicted as an involuntary treatment. Note the caged person in the clip and recall the callous institution shown in One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest.

Thanks to the movies, we know ECT as something one is subjected to and it is shown as more brutal than I believe it might be. Still I can’t say I would undergo this treatment, I am most likely to opt for talk therapy over physical treatments – if the choice is mine to make. I very firmly believe ECT should not be administered on anybody being held as an involuntary patient.

Tonight is Halloween that’s why I am reflecting on scary things.

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Movie: The Father of My Children

By admin on August 22, 2010

The French movie The Father of my Children follows a narrative anchored around a suicide. The film presents an authentic portrayal of family left to deal with an unexpected loss. There are tears, disbelief and regrets, the ubiquitous why questions are asked. Watching, I was grateful too for a story of loss scripted without dollops of unnecessary sentimentality.

I also appreciated the way the screening showed some aspects of grief, providing an empathetic depiction of times when emotions spiral. The on-screen portrayal of grief aligned well with my own experience, the disbelief, the numbed acceptance, wanting to put the world on hold but not pressing the pause button. Authentic.

Almost resolutely and despite overwhelming grief the world keeps turning, we continue.

What will be will be, and what is, is…even at the movies.

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Departures

By admin on January 11, 2010

Remiss of me to write about movies with themes around death and loss without mentioning last year’s affecting Japanese film, Departures.

Departures is about the transition between life and death, and about the resultant loss and inevitable grief. The film is presented in a quietly captivating way, with great reverence for the dead.

This is a gentle and very moving movie that honours the dead and with respect and ritual.

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At the movies

By admin on January 10, 2010

I can’t imagine why someone who is grieving would want to watch movies about grieving and grief behaviour. I did, there’s no why. I have written about watching Truly Madly Deeply over and over. I watched it, and found it consoling.

I saw a couple of movies last year that depicted life after a death in the family. I appreciated that what might have looked like odd behaviour on the big screen reminded me of what normal can be like.

I recommend (and have reviewed):
• Genova – the character studies are intelligent, multi-layered portraits of grieving.
• Quiet Chaos – is a subdued but sure-footed meditation on grieving as lives and priorities are reassessed.

As with Truly Madly Deeply, it’s deeply gratifying to see a difficult theme faithfully handled without unnecessary tragic overtones or a weepy soundtrack.

I have to mention Ghost as well, mostly becasue of my supermarket episode. . Ghost is more weepy and Hollywood in style than the other films, just so you know.

Four Weddings and Funeral, fast forward through the weddings just to hear the reading of W. H. Auden’s moving poem:

Funeral Blues

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

The clocks stop.

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Keep it together

By admin on January 3, 2010

Grieving is a lonely place, it’s impossible to share, you must live there alone.

There’s a tension between the internal, and self imposed, solitary confinement and the real or imagined external judges scrutinising every move while you’re trying to function, look after oneself, in public.

Facing up to the challenge I felt a pressure to “keep it together, keep it together…”. It became my mantra, told to me by my friend Lena who borrowed it from Hollywood.

In the 1999 film, Bowfinger, a desperate movie producer tries to make a cheap film without paying for a big name lead actor. The producer decides to shoot the film secretly around a famous actor filming him in public places. The actor has no idea what is happening as other characters play out a sci-fi script around him. The actor can’t discern what is happening and becomes convinced that he is being visited by aliens, or cracking up, he admonishes himself to “keep it together, keep it together…”.

I tried so hard to keep it together at all times. I had some extraordinary lapses (i.e. collapses) in the first few months,mostly while working in overseas cities. It didn’t count if unobserved by a local audience.

While, ostensibly, keeping it together I cried, in the office, in the street, in the supermarket, at the park, in the airport, on planes, into my coffee, soup, salad, sandwich, and pillow. I kept it together while unashamedly crying. Tears were part of my soggy version of keeping it together.

Maybe I would do it differently now, let myself fall apart more. I wonder what that might have looked like. I wonder if my version of keeping it together looked like falling apart. I couldn’t say…however it was, was how it was.

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My heart loves life

By admin on December 24, 2009

I as write about my past and present, you can see that I am not over it. That’s to say I am not over the loss of Mottsu.

There is so much sadness in the world, too much sadness. I think that’s why I write about my sadness. I love to wear tears and carry love for the possibility of a different world.

There is a Woody Allen film, Melinda and Melinda. The movie explores the dichotomy between comedy and tragedy, two sides to every story. Tragedy confronts and comedy is our escape. I watched Melinda and Melinda on a plane, a flight between somewhere and somewhere. The detail of the flight is gone, but there are a couple of lines I remember.

A man speaking to Melinda says, “What do you want?”
Melinda thinks for a moment before replying “l want to want to live.”
He brushes off her words saying, “Everybody wants to live.”

I want to want to live, the sentiment touches my heart. Many would agree, that everyone wants to live (per se) and I know living is not so simple. Most of the time I live without making a conscious decision to do so. Days dawn, I wake and rise, I live. Wanting to want to live is more than the day-to-day, it’s what I’ve sought. I can now say hand on heart, I do want to live.

Life is beautiful. Behind the sadness, or not withstanding the sadness, I want to live.

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Depression is as normal as freckles

By admin on October 5, 2009

Blogging is a mystery

I live too much in my head. I wonder too much about what to blog. As I try to catch thoughts and ideas amid the flurry in my head, I hear a whispering voice, a voice from a movie soundtrack, “If you build it he will come….”

If I write it who will come? Who indeed?
….and anyway does that matter? I want to write about the darkness of depression, the distress of losing someone to suicide. My incomprehension of it all and the importance of breathing. Dark matters that matter, and ones we don’t talk about often enough.

When Mottsu died – pause – that sounds accidental and his death was planned and deliberate – callously so – and I’ll stick with ‘died’ for now there was barely a person who had glimpsed his depression. There was nobody who had anticipated his despair. Everyone asked “why?” asked it of me and asked it out loud – as if I might have known, or could have explained.

Many of his friends and colleagues were guilt ridden that he hadn’t confided in them, hadn’t mentioned anything….no revelation until it was too late.

That’s how it is, I don’t believe we talk about our dark thoughts often enough or freely enough. I don’t know why, maybe there is no why.

If I write it and nobody comes…. I don’t know, what then…

Depression is not the only cause of suicide, I’ll write it anyway…
It is bleak and black. I will write it anyway.

He/you/she/they/we may not come. I’ll write it anyway.
No thunder claps, no whispering voices, no choirs of angels and no readers.

Many of my friends live with depression. They manage with medication, meditation, and therapy. I only know that because they were generous enough to share their own experiences in the wake of Mottsu leaving.

There is a chance that if people are more readily able to talk about their depression, then someone might turn to you and you’ll need to be prepared to make the conversation safe. These are my recommendations:
1. Check your face and shut your mouth, if it gapes. Adjust your eyebrows down to a standard resting position. Adopt an interested, not a concerned or worried, expression.

2. Assume they are credible – so no expressions of incredulity – no “OMG”, no “REALLY?” or similar. Offer no judgments, only support. This is about them and how they are feeling not you and your reaction – no matter how astounded you are.

3. Don’t do anything you’re not asked to do except listen and empathise. No platitudes, they’re not defined as ‘trite and banal’ for nothing. No over cheerful helpful predictions ‘this too will pass’ type comments – this includes ‘the darkest hour is just before dawn’ (or is that a platitude?) and similar. Ask if there is anything you should/could do apart from listening and being available to listen. There is probably nothing more valuable you can do than listen, and only do what is asked. Understand you can’t fix this for them, no matter how desperately you wish it were otherwise.

Depression is a normal and expected state, as normal as freckles.

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Unhaunted

By admin on September 30, 2009

A friend’s Birthday and he’s not here to celebrate. I am thinking of birthdays, and how some ‘die young and stay pretty…’ (thanks Blondie). I can’t imagine Mottsu any older, can’t picture him. Birthdays pass and ageing is held in abeyance.

I, on other hand, am becoming increasingly obsessed with not showing signs of progress by time. Lotions and potions are essential to morning and evening rituals so I can ‘…deteriorate in my own time’ (thanks again Blondie). Today that makes me feel superficial or at best frivolous, on the Birthday of a friend I miss.

Can’t picture him? No, I never have, I’ve struggled to conjure Mottsu and failed. I’ve not seen him since he drove away. A friend who works for the Coroner was able to identify the body, so not even after he was found floating did I see him.

Three or four people reported sightings of Mottsu in the interlude following his death, unexpected glimpses, whereas I didn’t even dream him. Gone. I kept his things for a sense of him, inhaled his clothes for the faintest suggestion of him – gasping for connection. I know that’s a cliche, and I sought his scent with more determination than an airport sniffer-dog. I took big drags of wardrobe air, inhaled pillowcases and socks, attempting to abate the sense of abandonment and all the while haunted by regrets of not being haunted.

truly madly deeply

In the early days of mourning I watched Truly Madly Deeply over and over again, envying Nina. She not only sees her dead Jamie, he moves in and drives her mad with his other world antics.

Someone asks Nina what Jamie would say if he could speak to her. She considers and says he would tell her to lock the back door. I start remembering to lock the back door. Most nights anyway.

Jamie says, “Thank you for missing me”
Nina replies, “I have, I do, I did”

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Going solo at the cinema

By admin on September 17, 2009

When Mottsu and I went to the cinema we would hold hands. From the opening titles to the closing credits, we’d hold hands in the dark throughout the movie. Fingers would be squeezed in tense scenes and gently held through the emotional ones.

Holding the hand of someone close to me connects and grounds me. I am reassured by the gentle grip of another. My flustered head stilled and my erratic heartbeat steadied. Holding hands at the movies, it is a great memory. We sat so well together. We were a great couple, I loved us at the movies with hands clasped.

Holding hands is one of my favourite things, it is right up there with preserved lemons and Scotty dogs.

Today I went to the movies alone. It is no big deal. I often go the movies alone. Today when took my seat and looked around I noticed was really alone, there was no one else in the cinema. It was empty but for me. An audience of one. Spooky. The film was a family comedy, which worked in my favour. I could have been really unglued watching suspense or horror. The experience was a little unnerving nonetheless, and the movie a little blah…

To ensure a comfortably populated cinema, check the reviews here:

http://www.filmdude.com.au/

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