Musings of a mad woman   Please read her blogs – I enjoy them for her honesty, I understand her.

Hi there. I have mentioned before I like your blogs. I think I enjoy the freedom you write with and how you express your normal.

I only understand a little about being bipolar as I shared a studio with a lady artist whose work was produced in low times and always in black and white. They were large paintings and showed commitment to her chosen bent. I always had to suspend belief when I looked at her work as trying to say it’s this or it’s that did not work for me. They were abstract really and the beauty I saw in them was me wondering what she was thinking and saw when painting.

I am here because I am trying to find out what normal is for me. I have/is/was/may do again suffer with PTSD and just cannot get my old mind-set back. I am not sure whether I actually want it back either. I enjoyed my life but as I said my normal isn’t no more. I don’t know whether to just drift along and over time return or whether I should say just start again and let go of my ideas of what I thought I was.

I belonged to a kite club and for many years would go out with other people and … yes fly kites. It was a good pastime and I made some good friends who I might not see for a long time but still enjoy their company when we meet.

I enjoyed the fly-ins not only because I enjoyed flying kites but also as no one spoke about what they did for a living. Yes, we would talk casually but no one declared they were a ??? or a ??? we were all equal and help was always offered and accepted openly and keenly. No one judged anyone else based upon a side of person they did not see or know; sterotypical people did not exist.

I accept many people look at me and define me by my job. I don’t like that at all, it’s a very shallow approach, not too dissimilar to how much money  you have or don’t! Over the last few months I have spent many hours thinking about me: It started by working out diversion plans on how to avoid particular people and how to draw conversations with others to a quick close. It then morphed into what qualities do I like and dislike and now is whether to make a conscious attempt to change my external appearance. It seems a crisis of my own making, perhaps a delayed mid-life crisis – I don’t know.

On a humours note, my distain for being defined by your occupation is not a new concern, as when I completed a form for one of my children while at school, I was asked ‘Occupation’ I answered ‘Trainee Astronaut’.

I attended a NPL course many years ago and liked and appreciated its purpose. A key factor for me on this course was to be able to recognise what normal is, find a base marker, so I could recognise and respond to changes in my feelings, and be in control. My efforts now are not to dissimilar to that time.