Mslexia Advert

STOP PRESS - My book - the original memoir - is going to be featured in the next issue of Mslexia magazine!  Only because I have paid for an advert, but still...

A couple of years ago, when I was invited up to Newcastle Uni to talk to staff and students there about Surviving Schizophrenia, the Public Engagement Officer there told me that she had called Mslexia (who are based in Newcastle) and tried to get them to cover the event and feature the book in their magazine. They told her that this would not be possible and she was quite indignant on my behalf.  

I understood though.  I told her that although Mslexia is only a small, women-only literary magazine, it is REALLY prestigious.  Top authors are featured in Mslexia, not first-time, self-published ones.  I would never have expected such an honour.  Anyhow, I was confident that my book would get the recognition it deserved as and when the time was right.  I knew I had written something that mattered.  Newcastle University was just the first step, I believed. 

Two years on from Newcastle (or is it three?) I am still waiting for the world to sit up and notice my book.  I have been really lucky in lots of ways - I have loads of wonderful reviews on Amazon.  Other authors have read my book and loved it.  Raymond Briggs praised my writing, for goodness sake!  That should be enough for ever, for anyone, and in many ways it is for me.

And yet.  I have to admit it, I still yearn for a wider readership.  There is still something in me that feels I have missed out.  And not just that, but that more people could benefit from reading this book.  There is so much injustice, still, in the mental health system and so much potential in so many people who are labelled, wrongly, with brain disorders.  I have found my way through but I am still held back by the label of schizophrenia, and I know that people are still being diagnosed with this spurious condition.  I know of several recent cases personally, and I don't go out of my way to look for them!

Perhaps I need to acknowledge that my memoir is just one more book in a sea of others - sometimes, when I read a really brilliant book, I think I must be delusional to think mine is any good, any use at all.  (Recently, I was blown away by Barbara Kingsolver's The Bean Trees, an incredible read).  Sometimes I think, okay, move on, write something else, something better, keep working.  And I do that, although not always as regularly or in as a disciplined way as I could, maybe because inside me some sulky child is still waiting to be noticed for that memoir. 

So, I have placed an advert in Mslexia, hoping that more people will read my first book, Surviving Schizophrenia, that perhaps an agent will notice it, see the Amazon reviews, sit up and pay attention.  I might be flogging a dead horse, but the same instinct that told me to write the book tells me that it still has potential, that something good will happen in relation to it, perhaps soon.

The sequel, Surfacing, is more about recovery and mostly about how the label itself stands as a barrier to that recovery.  I still wish it was better written, as in more entertaining - I could have done with an editor there and perhaps I should have paid for one.  But mental health often seems like a serious business - the system as it stands is not doing an awful lot to help people in severe emotional distress and lives are, literally, at stake. It's hard to be funny about that. 

Ah well.  I need to go now.  I am working on an entry for the Bridport First Novel Prize.  Maybe this will be the break I have been looking for... if I can get my entry in by the end of this month.  Which is actually really soon...Right, definitely going now! 


   

Should the Mental Health of our Children be an Election Issue?

Below is the article on child mental health which I wrote for the Huff Post.  I haven't got around to putting it up on there yet, for various reasons (not least, apathy) and because it is linked in with the election I thought I might as well publish it here meanwhile - although here I am largely preaching to the converted.  Anyway, I didn't want it to go to waste.

Yesterday's blog post seemed to be a bit open-ended, waffling.  I knew what I wanted to say but I didn't want to be too precise - ie I didn't want to name the persons and situations that have recently upset me.  After I published the blog post, I clicked on Rossa Forbes' blog, Holistic Recovery from Schizophrenia, and to my delight I found several new posts on there that I hadn't realised existed.  Rossa had migrated from Blogger to Wordpress, and her new posts had not updated on my sidebar. It was a very welcome surprise to find them - anybody who has not read Rossa's blog recently really should. 

Anyway, here's the article:

Should the Mental Health of our Children be an Election Issue?

Child mental health seems to have become a bit of a buzz topic in the build-up to the general election.  ‘Vote for us and we’ll see that this is improved,’ all the main parties promise.  Is it appropriate though, to use child mental health as a bargaining chip?  Apart from anything else, how are these promises to be fulfilled?  When a new Government is formed, will there be enough counsellors and therapists in place to provide a better service?  If not, however much funding is allocated, things won’t change in a hurry.  Also, mental ill-health is notoriously difficult to treat.  I am not sure that pouring more money into the current system can ever really help, because psychiatry, which is based on a medical model, does not address the problem of what is wrong, of why the person, or the child, feels unable to cope.   

Parenting is hard and there is nothing worse than seeing your child suffer.   I think we, as parents, need to concentrate on preventing emotional distress, on bringing up our children to make them feel safe and to foster resilience in them.  I think it would be helpful to address the issue of why so many young people currently have mental health problems.  I honestly don’t think there was so much of it around when I was young – although personally I did have quite major difficulties.  Perhaps mental health issues were just not as visible then or maybe I didn’t notice the suffering of others because I was so wrapped up in my own troubles.  But self-harm, for instance, was certainly not as prevalent.   

It seems that society is much more child orientated these days.  When I was young, children seemed to be incidental to the lives of the adults around them, now they are central to their existence and this should be a good thing.  However, wanting the best for our kids and being concerned about their future lives means that often we can inadvertently put pressure on them.  Kids are very sensitive to the burden of parental expectations and as a parent it can be hard to find a balance. 

There are excellent grammar schools in our area and because my husband and I believe that a good education will give them more choices in life, we have helped our children to gain places in these institutions.  They have never struggled with their studies, perhaps because they are lucky, possibly also because we have brought them up to believe that they are capable.  And we don’t pressurise our kids at all – on the contrary, we assure them that even if they failed all their exams, things would still work out fine. 

I hold myself up as an example of someone who despite having a good degree has never held a professional job.  I am very happy to be a stay at home Mum (and now a writer too) but I am well aware that this would not work for everybody.  I do think, though that we should teach our kids that we have choices in life and always be positive and upbeat about the path we choose to follow.  Vicky Pryce (Chris Hume’s ex-wife) is a role model for working mothers.  ‘Don’t look back’, she said in a recent interview in The Times, ‘Don’t start feeling guilty, or you’re sunk’. 

I think all of us, as adults, should do our best to be good role models to our kids.  For a start, we could stop pursuing materialistic goals, show that we value ourselves for who we are, not for what we possess.  Yes, we all need to earn a living and there is pleasure to be had in a career and in the rewards it brings, but we need to find that elusive balance between work and leisure.  We need to value our relationships, to be kind to ourselves and to others.  We need to show our children that life is not a competition but a journey, a precious gift that can be and should be enjoyed.  Then our kids will grow to be strong, capable and resilient.  My hope is that as time goes on the current mental health system will require far less investment of public funds, not increasingly more.    

 

New Huff Post blog and other stuff

I have just written a piece for the Huff Post about child mental health and about how, instead of pouring more money into the current, very imperfect, mental health system (as all the main political parties are promising to do if we should vote for them in the coming Election) we might be better to focus on preventing the manifestation of emotional distress in our kids, for example by teaching them resilience. 

The piece should be up in the next day or two, and when it is I will link to it on here.  I wrote it more than a week ago and Paul (my rock of support and number one Fan) has been pestering me to upload it to the Huff, but I have been hesitant because I find it hard to keep telling people how I think things should be done.  I am only an expert in my own mental health, I keep saying apologetically. 

But I have been thinking about that and I have come to the conclusion that nobody, regardless of how many qualifications they hold, can really claim to be more that an expert in their own mental condition.  And having had three psychotic breakdowns in my youth and spent many of the subsequent years puzzling over the hows and whys of these manifestations of emotional distress means that I do understand more about these issues than a lot of people. 

I have been feeling quite isolated recently.  I have experienced quite a few stressful events in recent months and although I am dealing with them it has not always been easy.  I have suffered a crisis of confidence, and what I have learned from that is that I need to be stronger.  There have always been people in my life who misunderstood me and who criticized me, and because of the books I have written and the stance I hold on mental health (basically, that medication is not the answer to alleviating human distress) there seem to be increasing numbers of these people as I grow older.  I have always been over-sensitive to the opinions of others, always suffered from low self-esteem and always wanted people to like me, so I do not often stand up for myself - rather, I tend to stay quiet in the face of opposition, or to give in to it. 

However - I am getting older.  Life is too short to waste on people who don't care about me, who have only their own interests at heart.  I also need to be a role model to my kids.  I want to show them an example of strength, I need them to learn that they should always put themselves first, never let themselves be bullied or cowed by others. 

So I am not going to opt out of the debate on mental health.  I will continue to write fiction, but I will also continue my mental health writing, because I know that I have helped a lot of people already and that I will continue to help more. 

'It's never too late to become the person you were meant to be,' I read somewhere the other day.  I may be long in the tooth, but I am going to give it a try.   

Foray into Fiction

Hi.  A reminder and link to my free books, as promised:

First, Topp Girl.  It's a kids' book, I wrote it under a pen name because it's such a different genre from my other books.  It got a couple of good reviews, which was encouraging, so I revised it and doubled the length.  But very few people were buying this book (or downloading it when it's free) because nobody knew it was there.  So I decided to start by blogging about it here, rather than setting up a whole new blog, Twitter account etc.  I might do that, under my pen name, once I have written a couple more in the series.

So, here's the link

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Topp-Girl-Diary-Ellie-ebook/dp/B00JX3INBS/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1425121763&sr=1-1&keywords=Topp+Girl

Please pass the word if you can!

The other book which is free all weekend is Surfacing, my second memoir.  You can find that easily by searching Louise Gillett on Amazon.  Sorry, I know that's not a link, but it's Saturday and I should be with the family not on the computer and that's quicker than linking because I am a bit of an amateur on my iPad, which is where I am now...

Anyway, have a great weekend, everyone!

New Eyes

Well, it's now almost 24 hours since my laser eye surgery. 

How do I feel?  I feel like the Bionic Woman.

I mean, none of it was fun.  The clinic was running about two hours late, so Paul and I sat around waiting for most of the day in a room full of other nervous people.  (Paul wasn't having the procedure, he was there to support me).  Luckily I had brought sandwiches with us because I always like to be sure of where my next meal is coming from.

We had arrived at the clinic just before eleven and I finally got called into surgery at about two o'clock.  I panicked halfway through the op and nearly didn't let them do my second eye.  Thank goodness I managed to psyche my way through it, because I didn't realise at that point that they hadn't even lasered my left eye, only cut the flap in preparation.  So I would have been left worse than when I had come in.  Anyway, I did it, and by about quarter to three it was all over and we were on our way home.  (The actual procedure took less than a minute on each eye).

It's a long story.  My eyes have not settled down totally and the glare from the computer is not entirely comfortable, so I am not going to write about all of it now.  But suffice it to say that I am really pleased I had it done.  It is going to change my life - it has already - in the biggest and best way.  Hurrah!

But there is a reason why they ask prospective patients whether they suffer from, or have ever suffered from, anxiety and tell you that you are not a suitable candidate for laser eye surgery if you do.  (I lied).  Having a panic attack in the middle of eye laser surgery was probably one of the worst things I have experienced (although not the worst, and it was worth it).  I would really not recommend having the surgery done if you are of a nervous disposition.  Or, if you decide to push ahead like I did, get a Valium from the doctor to take on the morning of the procedure.  Yes, it is me saying that, and yes, I am totally anti-medication (anti unnecessary medication, that is).

I am going to write more about this in a few days, probably in the Huffington Post, and I'll link to it here.  I am definitely going to become a laser eye bore (in fact I might have become one already).  It is all just so mind-boggling and enormous and amazing that it's hard to stay quiet about it. 

I am not out of the woods yet.  I guess part of my current elation is just due to relief that nothing awful happened during or just after the surgery.  I had a check up today and everything is going very smoothly but I will have to keep putting drops in my eyes and sleep with shields on them for another six days. 

For the first time since I remember, I can see clearly, naturally.  I don't think I realised how much my poor eyesight bothered me.  I had got used to contact lenses and glasses and I knew I was lucky to be able to see at all.  But now that my vision is - I have to say it - almost perfect - I feel fantastic!   

New Blog on Huffington Post today

Here's a link to my blog post on 'How to Recover from a Nervous Breakdown' in the UK Huffington Post today:

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/louise-gillett/recovering-from-a-nervous-breakdown_b_6742854.html


And the other thing is - I am having laser eye surgery - tomorrow!

I can hardly believe it, but in 24 hours from now I should have no further need for contact lenses or glasses.  I have been wearing my contacts for thirty years!  Yes, I am THAT old....

I have thought about having this done for a long time.  The main reasons I have not gone ahead before now are cowardice and cost.

But as for the cost - I am having the surgery with the help of interest-free credit, it's not a huge expense (about ten per cent of what it would have cost when I was young) and it's spread out over eighteen months.  Factoring in the cost of lenses and glasses the surgery will have paid for itself in about five years.

As for the cowardice - well, sometimes I feel the need to face my fears.  I think the result will be worth it.

I will post on here about the surgery after it's done.  Keep your fingers crossed for me!

Free Books all Weekend!

I just wanted to say, to anyone who is interested, that my new book, Surfacing, is free on Amazon all weekend.  I'll link to it on here first thing on Saturday morning - and, as usual, please pass the word if you know anyone who might be interested.

There is a reason why the title of this blog post is 'Free Books' and not 'Free Book'.  I have recently published a children's book, under a new pen name.  The reason for the pen name is that the book is such a different genre from my mental health ones.

But then it occurred to me that I was going to have trouble publicising the new book, unless I set up a new blog, Twitter account and so on.  Which I might do in due course.  Meanwhile, though, I thought I would tell you guys about it - again, do pass the word if you know anyone who might be interested.  It's also free all weekend, in the USA and the UK.  It's called Topp Girl, by Jenny Bell.  I'll create a proper link to that too on Saturday and also put the word out on Twitter etc.  Please review it if you can (read it first!) - all feedback would be very welcome as I am new to fiction and still learning what works and what does not. 

I have also just submitted a new blog post to HuffPost UK and I'll link to that too as soon as it's live.

More soon!