The Revolution Will be Televised

One for my fellow nerds...

In an attempt to unfuck my flat a bit, I'm trying to be tidier. What can I do with not-nicely-shaped tech stuff that I don't need out all of the time, but that I can't stick into the attic?

Thinking things like chargers that I use when travelling, cables for devices that only need charged every few weeks, spare bluetooth headphones, keyboards & phone/tablet cases.

I posted this on Twitter a couple of days ago, but I think it requires expanding on here.

Too often, discussions of mental health in both tech and in fandom (specifically SF fandom) focus ASD (autistic spectrum conditions). Sometimes, in tech, it also includes depression and anxiety, in the guise of “burnout”. But that’s less common.

I can think of a lot of reasons why this is the case: let’s start with “because they’re talked about more in those fields.” Tech and fandom are places where people “expect” to find people on the autistic spectrum because media portrays people with ASD as “belonging” (or being more comfortable) in tech/fandom related spaces, which is in turn because stereotypes about people with ASD and stereotypes of people involved in tech/fandom have significant overlap.

Some quotes that I’ve seen recently (no source given, because it’s not a public place) that sum up this attitude:

I think a lot of us computer geeks rate a little bit aspie

and

It’s a common thought in [snip] that computer geeks tend to fall somewhere on the spectrum.

and

I’d be very unsurprised to discover that mild ASD/Autism is common among authors, especially of genre fiction

I’ve got to admit, this attitude pisses me off far more than it should. Follow the chain:

• I’m active in tech
• I’m an author of both games and genre fiction
• I have a mental health condition
• I have no signs whatsoever of ASD

If I try to start a discussion about mental health in these fields, I’m immediately fighting against the idea that the only ones that have any relevance to the field are ASD and depression/burnout. Err, no. My work in both is directly impacted by being bipolar, but I can’t talk about it because nobody cares. It’s not one of the two acceptable mental health conditions to have in tech, so I can please piss off and let the “real” discussion happen.

Allow me to offer three points of rebuttal:

1. Fuck you
2. Fuck you
3. FUCK YOU

This deliberate attempt to minimise and ignore other mental health conditions in both fandom and tech is actively unhealthy. It makes the environment hostile to people like me. It keeps us excluded, feeling like we don’t belong, like we’re not worthy of support.

To everyone in fandom and tech: You need to be better because you are not good enough. If you are not willing to see that you need to change, you are part of the problem and I am sick of pretending that your mealy-mouthed appeals to two conditions amounts to a single iota of worthiness when you implicitly use that as a stick to beat the rest of us.

TL;DR: Depression is a bastard.

My brain chemistry is telling me I need to apologise to people for things I did five or more years ago, things that they may not remember, tiny and inconsequential. Not the big things. I felt the need to apologise to Jane not for the stuff that lead up to the breakup, but for an off-handed comment made in about 2008. Not even a negative comment, but one in which I wasn’t supportive enough.

This time, taken from the context of that comment, a context that I won’t share, I’m back to what is almost my “normal” expression of depression. That I’m a child who was told one day “you are a grown-up now, you have to be more mature”, without any chance to work out a transition. That so much of my life outside of work—of what I like to do rather than what I have to do—is centred on childish bullshit, on video games and lego and animated robots.

When I was a kid, the thing guaranteed to get me throwing punches—apart from “being my brother”—was to accuse me of being a baby about something. The implication (or outright statement) that I was a selfish brat, too immature to think of other people, one small step away from throwing a tantrum because I didn’t get my own way.

Now, it’s much the same thing but with a broader span that insults me. The accusation of immaturity hurts like hell, and it’s magnified when it’s my own brain chemistry throwing it at me. It tells me I should have life goals, that I should spend time working towards them. It tells me that I should grow up and start gardening (because that’s the only real hobby my parents have) instead of wasting my time with things that don’t matter; things that don’t have any lasting impact. It demonstrates the divide between knowledge and belief: I know it is wrong, but right now I don’t believe that it is.

I’ll get over it. I always do. I am one high-functioning motherfucker. But it doesn’t make it any easier to deal with in the meantime.

It was nine months at the start of June; I didn’t think to note it at the time. Things were—and indeed are—on a pretty even keel. I finessed my way out of the burnout, and while I wasn’t as up as I wanted to be, I was, and I still am, on an even keel.

Tonight, the longest night, was the first night I was hit by it in a long time. Stupid shit, looking in one of the kitchen cupboards and thinking “this is Jane’s”, like I have a hundred times since we split, but this time I noticed myself thinking it, and felt shitty because of it. Not for any reason beyond that I do still think it. Because while I’m still thinking that, have I really moved on?

I have no idea. Is it even possible to “move on”? What does “moving on” actually mean? All I can do is move forwards.

I had, rather naïvely, thought that the level of stress/headcrashyness that was going on during the run-up to Beltane might ease off once it was over. Insert “oh, you sweet summer child” here.

I’ve actually had a total of three evenings free since the 26th of April. Looking at it, I won’t have a fourth until the 16th of this month.

People write a bunch of shitty articles about the differences between introverts and extroverts. Like so many of these articles (e.g. ‘why smart people aren’t happy’¹), it’s bullshit. A horoscope-like selection of personality traits so that people can feel justified claiming a label that they’ve already decided applies to them. The only material² difference between introverts and extroverts is that introverts are energised by spending time alone, while extroverts are energised by spending time around people.

I am not an extrovert.

My motivation has been fucked over the past few days, which should come as no surprise. I’m having a harder and harder time focusing on anything. To quote the youth of today: I can’t even. When I have a rare free evening I’ve been coming home and hiding on the couch watching crap on Netflix rather than doing anything, relying on takeaway because I don’t have the energy to cook. So if you’re wondering why I’m flaking out on things—why I haven’t put anything new up on the food blog, why other things are taking longer than they should—that’s the reason.

In posting this, I am not looking for sympathy. It’s just an explanation for why I’ve been a bit shit recently.

This recipe requires hitting up an Asian supermarket or similar to get the Gochujang and Doenjang, but it is so very worth it. Stir the egg yolk through the rice right as you start eating. If you’re a spice-lover, keep some sambal or chilli-garlic sauce on the table.

Leave out the eggs to make it vegan, and omit the sesame if some of your diners are allergic to nuts/seeds.

Serves 2
Prep time 10 minutes
Cook time 25 minutes (15 if using pre-cooked rice)

Ingredients

• 120g long-grain or basmati rice
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed (or 1tbsp garlic paste)
• Half a white cabbage, sliced
• 2 scallions, finely sliced, whites and greens separated
• 150g (half a bag) beansprouts
• 125g (1 pack) shiitake mushrooms, sliced
• 1 tbsp Gochujang (Korean chilli paste)
• 1 tbsp Doenjang (Korean soybean paste)
• 2 eggs
• Sesame seeds

Optionally

• Chopped fresh vegetables, 100g each, sliced/batoned (e.g. carrot, red peppers, onions)
• 200g kimchi, siced
• 200-250g cooked meat leftovers (e.g. chicken breast, roast pork), chopped

Method

1. Cook the rice according to the instructions. Or, use left-over cooked rice.
2. Heat a glug of oil in a wok over a high heat. Add the garlic, cabbage, beansprouts, and mushrooms (and any other veg). Stir-fry until cooked, about 5 minutes. Remove from the wok and set aside.
3. In the same wok, add another glug of oil and turn the heat to medium. When the oil’s hot, add the rice. Don’t move it around too much, let it crackle and get some colour.
4. Stir in the gochujang and doenjang, and once the rice is fully coated add the scallion whites (and kimchi and cooked meat). Give it a minute to warm through, then add the cooked vegetables.
5. In a separate pan, fry the eggs until the whites have set but the yolks are still runny.
6. Scoop the rice mixture into two bowls. Top each with an egg, and garnish with the scallion greens and sesame seeds.

Get it down ye.

Mirrored from Little Pleasance Kitchen.

With thanks to Chuck Tingle.

Let’s talk about mental health for a minute. Specifically, my experiences, because I can’t really talk about anyone else’s with any authority. I have rapid cycling type II bipolar disorder. It’s a mood disorder. Sometimes I’m up, sometimes I’m down, and when I’m up I’m really up and when I’m down I’m really down. Like the Grand Old Duke of York, right? I have a relatively mild case. I’m high-functioning; never lost a job¹ or been locked up or anything because of it. Hell, I didn’t get a diagnosis until I was 30, having developed (not entirely healthy) coping mechanisms of my own.

Everyone has good and bad days, though. What makes mine special?

Maybe 80% of the time, I’m normal. Beige. Happy days, sad days, but nothing outwith the blah blah blah of neurotypical life. The rest of the time is where things get interesting. Anticonvulsants help — before I started taking lamotrigine, normal states were 65-70% at best, and the incidences of abnormal mood could last much longer. I still cycle fairly rapidly, though.

Hypomania is “a sustained state of elevated or irritable mood” which (unlike full mania) is not linked to psychosis or disassociation from reality.

I tend to only flag specifically elevated states as hypo states, because otherwise the term is useless to me. In my particular case, it’s signified by being smarter, thinking faster, needing less sleep, being much more productive, and massive egotism. And yeah, I can get quite pissed off with people who aren’t thinking ten thousand brilliant thoughts a second. ‘Um…’ and ‘Ah…’ are mortal sins. Beyond that, a hypo also does away with my issues of being around people,² a state that otherwise requires a couple of pints.

Depression is, well, depression. A state of constant low mood, low self-esteem³, insomnia, anhedonia, a general thrum of self-hatred, and causeless suicidal ideation.

Downswings are by far more common than other states. On the other hand, the drugs mitigate them — I haven’t been actually suicidal in a little under ten years at this point, which is a plus. And they’re the only states that get triggered by external stimuli as well as my own buggered brain chemistry. Unlike a hypo, depression leaves me massively anti-social and dulls cognitive faculties; it feels like my thoughts are swimming in treacle.

Many abnormal mood states don’t fit neatly into one little box. Clinicians who study bipolar II generally term these ‘mixed moods’, which is as much use as a chocolate ashtray. I haven’t properly tried to codify the effects of divergent states of mind before, but I might as well give it a shot to illustrate what can be going on sometimes.

Sometimes my brain misfires; a state that’s much like a hypo but without the focus. The thoughts come thick and fast, but they crash into one another and spark off like a Star Trek control panel. Restlessness, a need to do something but an inability to focus on one thing for more than a couple of minutes, massive irritability/anger, constantly being distracted, and a buggered sense of time — five minutes feels like an hour, while the next hour can pass in seconds.

An actual mixed mood blends the fast thinking of the hypo with the negative attitude and anhedonia of depression. Racing thoughts but focusing on everything wrong: mistakes I made twenty years ago, people I’ve hurt, every little thing about my flesh-sack that pisses me off, why the world is a terrible place, and how I am going to die alone and unloved. I get paranoid, and obsess over details and plot out what might happen if I do something — but of course I’m deliberately modelling the worst possible outcome, so I catastrophise like nobody’s business. Insomnia, irritability, and aggression. It’s like depression, but sped up to a hundred miles an hour.

Finally, there’s flow — a state common to people in knowledge-based or artistic professions. It’s what happens when the focus and clarity (and increased smarts) of a hypo show up without the racing thoughts. The world is easier to deal with, everything makes sense, and every problem has a solution. It’s the rarest state, but it’s how I write between three and six thousand words after and eight-hour day, or replace two hundred lines of buggy code with thirty that just work.

I have no idea why I’m writing this or making it public, but it might help people figure out what the fuck is going on in my head on any given day.

In a fit of insanity, I made resolutions last year. No, I don’t know what I was thinking either.

Might as well see how I’ve done…

• Complete/release all the books currently on my slate. ❌ I’ve made progress (one released, others progressed through the production pipeline) but the Paradox/WW buyout scuppered things timing-wise.
• Write on at least two new books. ✅ Signs of Sorcery and Geist 2e
• Write/release one new thing for myself. ✅ Two bits of fiction, a micro-game, and a poem. Counting this as a win.
• Be under 18 stone. ❌ I’m no bigger than I was at the start of the year, but no smaller.
• Be cycling to work at least three times a week by the end of May. ❌ Hahahahahafuckno
• Go on an actual holiday with J. somewhere outside the UK. ✅ (if you ignore the ‘with J.’ part)

50% is better than I thought it would be, to be honest.