There are many ways people slow down and the chronic use of speed is one of them. People slow down when they can’t sleep anymore, one of the first side-effects of chronic use of speed, along with increased irritability, emotional instability, a delusional feeling of invincibility and equally the flat emotional ‘deadness’ of dysphoria, panic attacks and eventually paranoia.

When does medication stop us being ourself? When does it enable us to be more of that self? And which self does it enable us to be; the self we have built to fit a role or position in society that was never 'us' in the first place or does it enable us to be the meta self I would have, could have been had I not had the mood, anxiety and compulsive disorders that the medication was treating?

When I'm creating or swinging or rocking are the only times I really sit still for a long time. But what was I like before I could dare these creative outlets? I lived in my head and whenever I was alone (which was as much as possible), I pawed and cried over my mirror reflection like a nutter, I chattered in constant characterisations from the TV, I tried to get lost in the sound of gravel or a pattern in wallpaper, the shifting patterns of lights, anything to not be present, chaotically present with impulses pulling me into fragments and emotions raging... and why, why is the question?