100%, it was a powerful piece and felt like something you’d read in the Times, @Cheasty you have a talent and when you recover you should look at utilising it.
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Ffs. As if the lad hasn’t enough problems
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all about Mac 
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Ah lads ffs sake 
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The one with the dark blue wrapper. Superior to the Club Milk
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Definitely truth in that. He seemed to be well clued in to what was going on around even during a very traumatic episode.
Fair fuck to him for posting that.
@Cheasty you need to keep fighting buddy. The 80% can get stronger.
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I’m sitting here in a pub in Venice and I genuinely broke down crying reading that. I hope you get sorted Sid.
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Anything to be said for keeping in touch with these lads as a support group? Don’t know if that’s what the experts would advise but it sounds like talking about shared experiences and thoughts seemed to help you while you were in there.
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Freudian
This might sound ridiculous but I think if I had had a couple of cigarettes as I was walking out past GMIT or wherever, I might not have done what I did. I was also blocked up in terms of bodily motions for five days with no urges whatsoever and I wouldn’t get an urge to go until the Sunday (Christmas Day) when I was in the psychiatric unit sharing a room.
As it is I’m after getting punished for informing on myself because either the Guards or the hospital (I’m pretty sure it’s the Guards) have lost my phone on me. I’m sure it’s the Guards because the five or six cigarettes I had on my person also vanished.
While I was in the unit I went back on the fags big time. It’s the sort of place where if you didn’t smoke at all you’d nearly take it up just for something to do.
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What did they give you for Christmas dinner?
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The lad I was sharing the room with sent a text to my phone when he was leaving the first time but given I’ve now had that phone lost on me I won’t have his number. I might be able to get in touch with him by other means. I have another number of another patient alright.
The problems people had in there were widely varying. Drugs, alcohol, depression, financial problems, depression due to being too doped up with meds, depression due to tragedy, psychosis, suicide attempts due to violent partners, suicide attempts due to aggressive neighbours, learning disabilities. One girl who came across as outwardly normal has been in there nine months straight due to an abusive partner.
Some of the faces in there would haunt you because they were haunted. One guy was like Father Stone, he was much worse than that. You could tell which people have a road back and which don’t.
One lad I was very close to in there doesn’t have a road back. Thinking about him makes me cry, because he has a heart of gold, but he has no road back, and will most likely die within a year or two. He’s from a very different background to me, comes from a broken home, lives out the country and has some dodgy mates who take advantage of him and he will 100% fall straight back into his ways once he’s let out because he knows no different and no longer has the capability to know any different. His brain is addled and the most basic social and hygiene norms are lost on him. He routinely says the sort of stuff that would kill a conversation stone dead. And form a selfish point of view I didn’t take his number because I don’t want to be dragged into some of the shit he’s likely involved in in the outside world. I hugged him and cried leaving him, and he cried, and I cried leaving the hospital, because it’s unlikely I’ll ever see him again.
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How your mother doing Cheasty? ,she’s a great woman I’d say. Keep going with the recovery laad best of luck with it
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Aramark’s finest turkey and ham with roast potatoes. The turkey had stuffing inside it. I didn’t have the sprouts and that seems to have been a good decision because a few people said they were hallucinating after them. Though they may have been hallucinating for other reasons besides the sprouts.
Santa made an appearance which was nice of him and each patient received a wrapped present which was a box containing either Lynx or Nivea shower gel and face wash or deodorant. Those who got the deodorant had it confiscated by staff if seen.
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She’s OK though she got the Covid while I was in there so I didn’t see her after last Thursday but it was a mild dose.
One of the consultants I saw in there got the Covid too and now my brother has it but I seem to have escaped so far. There was an unreal amount of coughing in there which reminded me of the “death rattle” I heard going round among the journalists in Qatar but I think most of it was down to lads having their body ravaged by drug and cigarette addiction. One lad in there told me he was on 80 (eighty) a day.
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You’re a fine gentleman Cheasty and although your posts can hit me hard reading them, I do find them great and enjoyable reads as it is a sign you are still motoring and as others have mentioned you have a natural gift at composing a piece of writing. Hoping the year brings you great fortune.
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If there’s one TFK urban legend that can be put to bed by @Cheasty’s stay in hospital, it is that he and @ChairmanDan are one and the same.
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Reading some of that makes me think that there could be a good play in this once you over come it all.
You have a brilliant way of telling even the most harrowing of things.
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That is an idea!
If ever you get the chance to see The Curious Savage go, fabulous play.