The Hulk Freaked Me Out

The original movie, The Incredible Hulk, is full-on scary. Well, for me as an eight year-old it was anyway. I was in grade three at school and a girl from our class had a birthday party. She hired out a local movie theatre and invited everyone in our year to attend.

Little did I know, this party would affect the way I sleep for the next 10 years...

I was excited with anticipation at attending the party in the first place and can remember walking through the open doors to the cinema and shuffling in single file to find a seat. The movie started and I'm not sure I fully grasped the story, but it was about this guy who when he got angry, would turn into this angry green thing.

When the Bruce Banner turned into the Incredible Hulk by turning green and into this muscle-bound monster with his clothes all shredded, I totally freaked out. The girl whose party it was' Mum had to call my parents and tell them to come and get me. I missed out on the rest of the movie, but I remember being picked up and driven home with the feeling that life would never, ever be the same.

My parents spent a lot of time explaining that it was just a movie, but I don't think I quite got it. That night and from then on, up until about the age of 18 (eventually out of habit), I slept with the covers pulled up over my head with just my nose poking out so I could breathe. I was convinced the Hulk was coming for me. And I had to fantasize about nice things before I went to sleep in order not to panic, such as ferris wheel rides and carnivals.

More recently (like in the last year or two), I told Mum about how the movie and experience had affected me, and she said that she had had no idea at all, otherwise she would have done more to comfort me. But I kept it to myself.

I've since seen the recent remake of the movie and felt it was cathartic - like I had revisited a nightmare from my childhood and resolved it.

The Bored Artist, My Friend

This is a sketch I found in my friend's rubbish bin. I'm not usually one to go rummaging around in other people's bins, but it was something I spotted and fished out - one of the many examples of the brilliant artist she has the potential to become.

The image was apparently copied from a magazine, purely by eye, whilst she sat bored behind the reception desk at work. Yet, she doesn't enjoy it. Will attempt to interview her about her drawing some time, so watch this space.

I've fished strange things out of Jade's bin before... Once when I was visiting her on a hospital stay I found a pair of perfectly good jeans crumpled up and stuffed in the rubbish. Jade was in an adult psych ward due to 'Ice' (crystal amphetamine) use, having suffered a psychosis. On this particular occasion I asked her, "What are a perfectly good pair of jeans doing in the rubbish bin?" Her reply was that she didn't want to be a bee. She explained that they had a honeycomb pattern if you look for it, and that she was becoming a bee and she didn't want to. One couldn't argue with that. I wouldn't want to be a bee either really. Too much work.

Speaking of 'Ice', it's apparently fast becoming one of Australia's biggest drug problems, overtaking heroin for it's accessibility and low cost. However, it is imho, far worse and more frightening than heroin in the problems it causes, its addictiveness and affect on mental and physical health. 'Ice' is really scary stuff - don't touch it kids. For an in-depth look at the lives of some Australians addicted to 'Ice', you can view the documentary that aired on Australia's Four Corners, The Ice Age.

For more information about 'Ice' and some compelling reasons not to take it, click here.

RIP Solly

Solly was a lovely boy. His meow preceded him. Unfortunately he is no longer of this world and this post is dedicated to him.

Born in March, 1998, he was brought into a household of three other cats. He was tormented by them and tormenting to them. He loved plastic bags and belly rubs, cat toys and cotton buds. He made friends with the others eventually and had an extra special friend in Merly the cat (my housemate's).

We moved a number of different places over the years and Solly always found ways to make friends with the local neighbourhood cats and people. He was always vocal and had interesting stuff to say about his adventures. And adventures he had.

We moved to Hobart, Tasmania in 2000 and for the most part, Solly loved it. However, one of his adventures and life challenges was being hit by a car. I had been out and about and came home to be greeted by my next-door-neighbour who had taken him to the vet. Apparently he had been hit on the main road by a ute and left for dead. An elderly couple happened to be walking by (thanks to whoever you are!) and took it upon themselves to alert my neighbour.

He was at the vet for a week and I was advised that the best case scenario was that he would lose his tail, as he had a fractured pelvis. They weren't sure whether he could feel anything at his rear. I visited him every day and he always greeted me cheerfully, no matter the pain he was in. The vet said to me that it didn't look good and that I would just have to say the word and they would put him down. He couldn't pee on his own or poo, and they had to use a catheter and bladder massage to express him on a regular basis.

After that first week I took him home. There was no way I could have him put down. I cried and prayed (I'm not religious, but yes, I prayed) that he would recover. He could hardly walk. But eventually he got better and much to the vet's surprise and perplexion, he even got use of his tail back and no one was any the wiser.

About one and a half years later, I got sick (refer to previous posts on mental illness) and had to move back to Melbourne. Unfortunately I had to leave Solly behind as I was moving back with my parents and they already had two cats and so did I. As Winnie (my other beautiful cat) was the eldest and less adaptable, Solly was the one.

In leaving him behind, however, he had the best of best cat homes he could have had - living with my neighbour and friend, Allison. She is one of the most cat-loving people I know or have met and she sure did love him. I'm grateful to her for taking him on and I know they were close.

Sadly, in January of this year, Solly was yet again hit by a car and this time not so lucky. Apparently it was instant and he wouldn't have felt much. I missed him when he lived in Hobart and I in Melbourne, but I miss him even more now, knowing he's no longer alive.

Thanks Solly for having been a part of my life and I'll love you forever. RIP.

The following is Allison's contribution:

Solly died 8.30 pm on the 19th of December [2006], on Regent Street [Sandy Bay, Tasmania] by a young girl who was kind enough to collect his body for burial and then seek his owner out the next day. At first she went to the service station next door to put up a flyer about him, but they sent her to speak to me directly. She was very upset and I think a bit scared.

Solly's favourite food was Whitemeat Tuna in the Dine brand. His favourite interests were meowing, sleeping under the doona with his human in the late afternoon, flicking his tail, being loved and being cute. His favourite things were the old chair outside, the backyard over the road, and meowing, and meowing, and meowing.

His dislikes included loud music, diarrhea, and not getting his own way. Needless to say, he always got his own way (so there was never any loud music).

Solly was a connoisseur of water - I often observed drink from his water bowl in the kitchen, then move to his water bowl outside in the garden, and then go from blade of grass to blade of grass to lick the dew. Rain puddles were also considered a delicacy of the watery kind.

[Thanks Allison so much, for taking him on and taking such good care of him as I know you did. He had a good life. Hugs.]

Fundamentally Preoccupied

Just recently I've been riding a bit of a rollercoaster, starting early November when my partner of two years and I broke up. We had been living together but mid-year I went off both the anti-depressants and the anti-psychs and I kind of plunged into a depression that I found difficult to get myself out of. I realised a month or so later I shouldn't have gone off the anti-depressants at the very least (one tends to learn the hard way), and I went back on. But it was a bit late.

My partner (as much as I still care about her and we're still friends) found it difficult to cope with my lack of drive and motivation, particularly around the house and she ended the relationship.

Then, having gone back on the anti-depressants, things started to pick up. I managed to score a full-time job with a major call centre about 10 minutes down the road and started almost two weeks after I applied. It's a great environment with an excellent crowd and I'm really enjoying it. Considering I've never worked in a call centre before, it's a new experience and was a huge learning curve.

So anyway, there was that and then there was moving house - apparently one of life's most stressful events - up there in the top three anyway. Plus a close member of my family got sick (which I won't go into at this point). Because I had been advised after my second psychotic episode that I had to watch my stress levels, I was starting to worry that I might be headed for another one considering all that had been happening. I was very energetic to start with, which felt like borderline mania, couldn't sleep and was up at all hours. My head felt like I had plugged in to some sort of information download system and I was having trouble integrating everything that I was meant to.

Then, one day at work I thought I overheard a conversation taking place between my team leader and another team member that related directly to me. I still don't know whether the conversation actually took place, although evidence suggests that it did, but it freaked me out as it wasn't exactly positive. Essentially it went along the lines that the team member thought I was behaving erratically and that I might have been on drugs. My team leader suggested that perhaps I was but that they were legal ones. At that point, I got up, very nearly burst into tears and suggested the three of us go down for a cigarette.

Without giving too much information I informed them both of how stressed I had been and of some of the things that had been going on, and they both (thankfully) reacted really well and neither have treated me any differently since. Like I said, it's a good place to work. I've since gone back on the anti-psychotics as a preventative measure more than anything else, and I'll see where I'm at in a few months.

It hasn't always been the case that people have reacted well when I've discussed some of my mental issues, but I find that with honesty and openness, most people deal pretty well. I think so much of the stigma associated with mental illness comes from a lack of understanding and openness in talking about it and the media has a hell of a lot to answer to. Media representation of mental illness is getting better and films such as Proof (with Gwyneth Paltrow, Anthony Hopkins and Jake Gyllenhaal) doing much to dissolve some of the mysteriousness that hinders societal understanding of the experience.