The Big Black Dog Message Board & Chat Room (TBBD)
Would you like to react to this message? Create an account in a few clicks or log in to continue.

Over the next wee while

+2
ZenMonsta
Paddy
6 posters

Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 9:38 am

I'm going to add stuff I wrote in my battle to get by, a year or so back when things were particularly grim. Most of it is in the form of 'poetry' for want of a better term. No one except my ACC-funded counsellor has read these.

I'm pretty scared about the prospect of sharing my demons like this, but hopefully, there may be something in what I've felt and written, that lets you know you're not alone in feeling the way you do.

You are welcome to add your own writing, thoughts, fears, dreams - whatever you are comfortable with.

I dunno if I'd have made it without being able to turn to a pen and paper as and when I needed to. Often, what I wrote scared me. I've resisted the urge to 'proof read' anything I'll post here - the words you'll read, are the words as my mind threw them out onto the paper.

Pat. pale
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 9:41 am

MIDDLE AGED MADNESS - 26/07/2006

When I was just a boy, I made the decision to live within myself
Friendless and shy, avoiding closeness and instead to seek a solitary way to get by.
Bike rides, long exhaustive walks, fishing, every sport I could get into and books, my
Chosen escape from the madness of violence and booze.
The blows somehow bounced off if, in ones mind, one could step back from it all.
Observing, occasionally pitying, but somehow divorced from my reality. Sure,
It hurt. How could it fail to, thrashed with electric flexes, ducking flying rolling pins, Head pushed into a bath-full of cold water as blows rained down on my naked body?
But it only hurt me and no one saw that. There was no one I allowed to see.
Family? No thanks. A few of them probably think they are ‘OK’ – but they are simply more adept at camouflage and deception than I. I don’t want to know them.
Drunk, violent, resentful, trapped father.
Drunk, violent, resentful, trapped, mother whom in her depravity knew no shame yet
Fed it by the cubic yard load to me.
Ah, but what fun that little boy let himself have. What dreams of escape, of daring do.
Alone in a world fashioned inside his head – a world that once more lurches from its orbit
Out of control because yet again, a bitter crop of despair seeds, so long ago planted in such perfectly tilled ground, have germinated, thrived, and produced
A prize crop of middle aged madness.
Export quality, but.
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 9:42 am

SHOPPING EXPEDITIONS. - 30/07/06

I’ve misplaced my keys, I’m locked inside
A broken diseased mind with no way out
Huge room full of disjointed thoughts
Abandoned.
I can’t keep pretending it isn’t happening
Because life is becoming too rough to handle
With leaden brain and wonky limbs
Unseen terror stalking every isle
Chest seized as if by an iron band
Urine trickling down fearful crotch
Ah, Supermarkets.
Dontcha love em?
Ain’t life grand?
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 9:43 am

THE MISTS OF THE YEARS - 01/08/06

What might it mean, not to be me?
To possess a mind that’s safe to roam free?
To have hope – desires, interest in things
To be focused and clear about all
Manner of ideas. To experience life and
To allow myself to enjoy the fact.
Not to hide myself away, living a vampire life
Afraid of each day, when people expect
So much more than I’m ever able to pay.
A week, just a day – that’s all that I crave
To discover who I might have become
And not what I’ve been.
I must be inside me, burrowed somewhere
Down deep, but that persons a stranger
Forever forbidden to speak.
A product of Fear, Self-loathing and Hate.
Yet I’ve caught vague glimpses of him
wraithlike through the mists of the years
Cowering down, made tiny by fear.
And I cry for him. Ache for him. Mourn him too.
Because I know that he’s died.
What could it have meant not to be me?
Not the person I am, but the little me locked inside?
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 9:45 am

W.T.F.N. - 01/08/06

Why do I write these?
Why do I care?
No one shall read them
That, I don’t dare.
A pen in my hand opens my
Souls tarnished mirror
Like squeezing an abscess as the
Puss of my life spreads its poison
On paper. Torrents of torment
Intertwine tortured memories with
Stillborn dreams such that one learns not to hope
I guess then that words are my way to cope?
W.T.F.N?
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 10:00 am

ONE WISH - 20/12/06

I have cried so many tears of late
Tears of sorrow, shame, self hate
I’ve tried to think back, have I ever been happy
Just the once, on a day filled with promise
When I first held your waxy, new-born self
Oh yes, my girl, I was then the happiest of men
As I made you all those solemn, heart felt promises
To nurture, protect, teach, enjoy. And now
A mere 16 years, 364 days later, every one of them
Has been broken. I’ve hurt you; I’ve left you;
I’ve frightened and scared you,
Failed at everything I’ve needed to do to be a
Real Dad, unlike the one that I had.
The way that I am, the way we’re apart
All it does doll, is rip up my heart – devours it entirely.
Granted but one wish, I know what it would be.
To have been a good Dad
The Dad that you need.
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 10:37 pm

RAINING - 15/10/06

How can people write of sun-filled days
Picnics on beaches or time spent in play
Are they all blind?
Why can’t they see?
Days are all gray, with terror-filled nights
When demons rummage through
The debris of my minds darkest thoughts
Tossing them here and jumbling them up
Nothing makes sense, not one damn thing
A cracking façade, no sanctuary behind
Where others see sunshine, I only feel rain.
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Sun Sep 28, 2008 10:44 pm

ANOTHER NIGHT - 29/07/06

All sleep abandoned for another night
Sore body, diseased mind all too hard to fight
Thoughts, disturbing thoughts and hurtful memories
Cartwheeling like a steroid-crazed gymnast
In my head.
Yet another night when it’s not safe to sleep
Got to keep my guard up.
Against what, you ask?
Random thoughts kalaidescoping in
Chaotic fashion and I’m beyond mere
Exhaustion now – a twilight zone of
Endless time feeding off a beat up mind
Where out of control neurons trigger off a
Destructive half-heard voice, a
Seductive, enticing voice enunciating an
Overwhelming sense of failure: a mocking voice
Spewing forth words of self derision.
My words. My voice.
Ahh, it’s going to be another long, lonely night.
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by ZenMonsta Mon Sep 29, 2008 5:27 am

Thanks for sharing these Pat.....they are so very moving..........and........its nice to put a face to the name. Your a braver man than I!!!!!
ZenMonsta
ZenMonsta

Number of posts : 541
Age : 55
Location : Auckland
Registration date : 2008-09-21

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by jerrykins Thu Oct 02, 2008 4:24 am

Hi Pat
I have just joined this forum so am new and not too sure what I am doing.Thanks for sharing your thoughts-I can identify with lots of them. I have had depression now for 20years. Some days I can't believe how I am still alive. Its great to have a forum like this to share.

jerrykins

Number of posts : 1
Age : 70
Location : Waihi
Registration date : 2008-10-02

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Thu Oct 02, 2008 8:11 am

Jerrykins,
Hi and Welcome.

The best thing about being here is - you don't have to worry about what you are doing - just do it. I haven't got a clue what I'm doing most of the time, but it seems to be working, more or less.

I hope reading from my tortured mind helps people understand that they are not alone in what they fear, and too that is OK and even necessary sometimes, to face them. For me, writing helped. I wouldn't have got thru 2006 - early 2007 without it.

I'm delighted you're a survivor too. Tis hard work some days, but worth it, I'm hoping. Please, feel free to tell others about us - the more who are here, the more we can help ourselves and each other. Take care and stay safe.

Cheers,
Pat. Smile
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Paddy Fri Oct 03, 2008 9:06 am

I wrote this after looking at a photograph of Hunterville, in its early days, when the hills were being stripped and burnt. I never especially thought of myself as a greenie, but I guess I am.

THE PASSING.

I dreamt I strode this land of ours
As if Gulliver on his travels and saw
An advancing army of axe bite into timbers tall
Hundreds of years in the growing; and heard
The heart rendering sound of living trees
Shrieking in their death throes, the noise of which
Overwhelmed the sheer distress of birds dispossessed.

Axes like a living army of fire ants consumed
All that had stood tall and firm, survived
Volcano, storm, snow and time
Relentlessly piercing trunk and bough
Exposing fragile land to biting wind and rain;
Land that for centuries had lain sheltered, canopied
Lies now and evermore exposed.

I watched as around my ankles swarmed
Men of avarice, thoughtless, narrow-minded men
Who laboured long, drained swamp after swamp
And I felt a panic of eels seek futile refuge beneath my toes.

I wept as in my dream I watched and understood
That I was witness to the passing of more
Than a way of life in this harsh yet awesome land.
For it was the passing too,
Of a people who it seemed to me, from my lofty height
Had learnt to live with the land, not defile it as if by right.

A people who had understood in a way not known to most
Of the need to nurture, reach a balance, to give thanks.
Surely to live with the land undisturbed as they did
For all those hundreds and hundred of years
Required a wisdom and vision now almost lost.

And in my dream I too finally felt that fire ant bite
As the hordes of sweating axemen hacked away at my shins
So now I too shriek in my dying pain as I
Fall to an earth bereft of bush to line my grave.

10/12/06
Paddy
Paddy
Moderator

Number of posts : 1607
Age : 63
Location : Rangitikei
Registration date : 2008-09-25

http://www.thebigblackdog.co.nz

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by ZenMonsta Fri Oct 03, 2008 7:02 pm

Wow.....all this creativity is making me jealous. I have some creative talent with writing but always its got to be funny for me and usually specifically for someone. I do a few poems for people for birthdays and work leavings etc. so not in the same category.

I think you guys are amazing with your writings. So very very moving.

Monsta
ZenMonsta
ZenMonsta

Number of posts : 541
Age : 55
Location : Auckland
Registration date : 2008-09-21

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Books4NZ Sun Oct 19, 2008 10:25 am

Hugs for you Pat.. I'm glad you've made it through and are the person you are..
Books4NZ
Books4NZ

Number of posts : 139
Location : Bay of Plenty
Registration date : 2008-08-17

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Pixie1time Mon Nov 17, 2008 10:19 am

Its good to see you have maintained a sense of humour santa

Pixie1time

Number of posts : 14
Age : 61
Location : Mangaonoho
Registration date : 2008-11-15

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Pixie1time Mon Nov 17, 2008 10:26 am

The Passing. I was born from Hunterville Pioneers. I carry a weight of responsibility for my Ancestors rape and pilliage attutude towards the land.
That land, Our whole Land, Our Whole Earth

Pixie1time

Number of posts : 14
Age : 61
Location : Mangaonoho
Registration date : 2008-11-15

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by maidy Sun Nov 23, 2008 8:47 am

This has definitly been one of your strengths pat...putting pen to paper.
I would love to see you publish something like the letters ya use to send me..something that i know would make everyone laff. And like they say..laffter IS the best medicene.
maidy
maidy

Number of posts : 37
Location : Wainuiomata
Registration date : 2008-11-20

Back to top Go down

Over the next wee while Empty Re: Over the next wee while

Post by Sponsored content


Sponsored content


Back to top Go down

Back to top


 
Permissions in this forum:
You cannot reply to topics in this forum