Chasing Butterflies A man sits alone in a dimly lit room, a depressed room devoid of any care and attention. Amidst the thick dust and worn out furnishings, a TV flickers silently in the corner whilst around him lay the detritus of his #life - a rolled up £10 note, lines of cocaine, a packet of Marlboro Lights, empty bottles of beer and wine, photograps and a small sharp knife. He is crying and mumbling to himself, scribbling away on a notepad at a desk. Every couple of minutes, he gulps from a bottle of cheap red wine, snorts a line of coke then picks up the knife and holds the edge to the underside of his forearm without breaking the skin. He repeats this cycle over and over again, each time becoming more and more distraught, until he makes 3 rapid slashing movements down his arm with the knife, wincing as the blood begins to flow. He stares at the crimson lines steadily trickling down his arm, opens and closes his fist a few times then wraps a tea towel around the fresh wound. He reclines in his chair, gulps some more wine and lights a cigarette. Moments later, he appears to be much less agitated. Placid. Almost stoned. As he draws on the cigarette, he closes his eyes. A few seconds later, he opens them and begins to speak aloud, as if addressing an audience. "I know what you're all thinking. I've seen it a thousand times before. Some of you will feel shocked, appalled even, by what I've just done. Some of you will simply be confused - 'how on earth could anyone take comfort from hurting themselves?' Others will feel some kind of pseudo empathy - 'y'know, I can really feel that guy's pain'. While the rest of you will feel nothing but apathy. However, what very few, if any, of you will consider is how and why. 'How does someone get into that state?' or 'Why does he do that to himself?'. Because that's what we do isn't it - we take things at face value. We don't need to know the why's and wherefore's. That's just scenery. 'Don't bother me with the background - I'm sure I'll read about something similar on the intranet or in the Daily Mail. Besides, I'm going for lunch'. For example, when was the last time you saw a homeless person, begging in the street, and, instead of simply giving them money and wandering off full of smug self satisfaction at your saintly deed, you sat down next to them and asked them about how they got into this state? Well, I think you need to know. I think you need to appreciate what sequence of events forced a young, level headed man to do this. I think you need to realise just what has occured in the lives of those people you cross the street to avoid whilst flippantly referring to them as 'nutters' or 'down and outs'. You see, I wasn't always like this, y'know. I suppose I was.....I dunno.....'normal' once. Just like you. It just depends where your tears have fallen. I was very lucky to be born into a loving, middle class family. We owned our own house, had a car, went on holidays. The sort of things millions upon millions of people would freely give a limb to have. Yeah, we had our fair share of shit like anyone else.....Dad lost his job and was out of work for a while....we got burgled once and the bastards cleared us out.....y'know, everyday stuff. But all that ended, very suddenly, one day when my Dad was rushed into hospital having suffered a heart attack. We got the call from the hospital the following day, asking us to come down. They were moving him from the critical coronary unit when he went. I remember getting to the hospital with my brother and being directed to a sterile, non-descript waiting room where Mum was sat with her head in her hands. She just looked at us both and said ‘He’s died.’ I was 19 years of age. My immediate reaction was to blame someone…..to lash out at something that may (or may not) have been responsible. I hysterically started picking up chairs and throwing them around the waiting room…..my face and mouth contorted with anger and riddled with pain, slowly being enveloped by tears. I wanted the doctor. I wanted him now. In that room. He did it. What were they thinking? How could they do this? I began shouting ‘Get the fucking doctor in here now! Get the fucking doctor in here now!’ My Mum was screaming, begging me to stop. I wasn’t paying too much attention. Suddenly, my brother decided enough was enough and he literally knocked me to the ground and lay on me until I calmed down. He's not the most delicate bloke in the world, my brother - he's not what you'd call an athlete either.....although, in a certain light, he tends to resemble a Russian shot putter.....on steroids.....who's really let herself go. To say he likes his food is an understatement. He is, in simplest terms, a fat bastard. So, when he sits on you, you're going nowhere. And I must admit, there have been several times since then that I wish he was able to sit on me again. It was about 8 months after Dad passed away that Mum announced she was getting remarried to a man called Peter. I knew it was a load of bollocks. We all did. To make matters worse, Peter was, what can only be described as, a complete and utter prick. He was a little know-all of a man. The sort of bloke who has an opinion on every single subject but is invariably wrong. The sort of person who, had you managed to drive up the side of Everest, he'd have driven it in half the time......in reverse. The sort of bloke who was the complete polar opposite of my Dad. Well, soon after Mum and Pete the prick married, Mum started to change. Just little things…..forgetfulness…..confusion…..clumsiness. Then things started to get worse and we discovered she was drinking…..alot. Now, when you’re a person who literally only ever has a sherry at Christmas, it doesn’t take long to see the affects that the daily consumption of a bottle and a half of Bell’s whisky will have. She didn’t last more than a year. Soon after, I knew I had to get away.....to escape. There was nothing left for me here except ghosts, ex girlfriends and bad memories. I soon found myself at Uni, and dived headfirst into the hedonism. It was fucking marvellous! It was just what I needed. When not struggling to cope with the back breaking intensity of 8 hours of lectures each week, my first year comprised of getting very drunk, very regularly. Thinking back, that's pretty much it! I just drank.....oh, and watched Countdown. Me and some 'mates' would regularly start drinking at midday and end up tuning in to Whiteley, Vorderman et al, to see who could come up with the best rude word. I know, 'typical juvenile student behaviour'. However, when I tell you that I once got 'cuntchops', I'm sure you'll agree that it was time well spent. Then, in my second year, a couple of 'mates' started taking E’s. I thought this was incredibly daring as I’d never really considered taking drugs. They were just never on my radar, really. I smoked, I drank…..but drugs? Well, being the social sheep that I am, I soon got stuck into the E’s….and the weed….and the speed….with aplomb! Those first 6 months of experimental drug taking were truly amazing and it’s incredible just how many really good 'mates' you have when you have a few pills in your back pocket. Then, one night at a house party, one of my 'mates' offered me a line of coke and I fell in love. I'm sure that many of you have felt that giddy rush of new love. I thought about my new love more and more. I wanted to be with her all the time, to the point where I would never leave my home without her. To begin with, we saw each other every other weekend. But before long, she'd moved in and was with me every single day. She became very high maintenance. We went everywhere together. Once the bars shut, it was back to Jay's house for more drinks and to finish off whatever little gear was left. This was the time when things would get messy, arguing over the last line of coke or the last pill. People would get really twitchy. I remember once attacking Jay with a wok in his kitchen over 3 tiny grains of coke. What a way to go, I thought.....wok'd to death. You wouldn't want that on your death certificate. Unfortunately, there's often a downside to this level of hedonism. To begin with, the severity of the hangovers gradually got worse and worse until they metamorphosised into comedowns. But, then the comedowns started getting worse. The only way I could fend off the comedowns was to ingest more coke and speed till eventually you can ingest no more. Well, as you can imagine, the comedowns quickly became colossally catastrophic and it became increasingly difficult to function like a normal member of society. When I wasn't off my tits on coke or pills or speed or MDMA, my mind was gradually.....well.....breaking. The next thing I knew I was cutting myself. It was never a conscious decision. In hindsight, it felt like a natural progression, like some kind of perverted evolutionary step. Self harm was the opposable thumbs to my forward facing eyes. I was eventually hospitalized for a couple of months, during which time I lost my home, my job, the majority of my possessions and several…..sorry, all…..of my great 'mates'. My family were shocked and scared of what I had become. Apart from the knowledge that I suffered from severe #depression and I was bi polar, I was left with literally fuck all. The only thing standing between me and total happiness was reality. You see, I know how it hurts to smile…..how you desperately try to fit in but you can’t…..how you hurt yourself on the outside to try to kill the whatever it is on the inside…..again and again and again. That's the thing with cutting. It's extremely addictive and suits my requirements perfectly by clearing my mind of all the clutter and the shit, allowing me to concentrate solely on the act itself.....on the pain. Although it's not pain as you know it. It's not like when you were a kid chasing butterflies in the back garden, only to see them flutter briskly away into the warm afternoon air whilst you lie on the path having fallen and grazed your knee. That's real pain. No, this is quite different. There's a feeling of release.....there's a feeling that the #depression, anger, guilt, sadness and hatred simply bleeds away. And you know what the biggest irony of all is? Well, the fact is, I'm you. I'm all of you. I'm your brother, sister, boyfriend, girlfriend, best mate. I'm your dirty Uncle Pete who always had his hands down his trousers at family gatherings. I'm the kid you went to school with who is now a partner at a law firm. I'm the old guy with the stammer who sometimes works in the off licence. I'm all of you. You can run, but you can't hide."