I find that living in my local area I am somewhat socially isolated, and I sometimes think that I would have been better off living in London where I was born, where I lived the first five years of my life, and where there are more people, and the people are much more sociable and friendly. Still, not everyone in Thanet are cold and unfriendly, and I have met and befriended some very nice, progressive, friendly, and sociable people here.
Up until a year ago, I also made some friends with some other people with mental health problems in another town thrity miles away, most of whom were intellectuals such as myself, but due to my agoraphobia playing up again, and because I have concentrated on my local friends more, I have not been to this other town for over a year.
Amongst my friends in this other town, were Bob, Jerry, and Jon, all of whom are very friendly and sociable people with a mutual interest in books, films, and writing. I met Bob, Jerry, and Jon through thier local mental health service users forumForum, and after receiving psychotherapy twice from their local day-centre, organised by a female Forum worker, I used the cafe where Bob and the crew all meet up and socialise. The cafe was a great place to meet up, have a good meal, socialise, and chat. We met in the cafe once a week, and I must at some stage get back into meeting up in Canterbury with these friends, because I like this other town as a place, and I like the people there.
When I was in my early teens I had a CB (Citizens Band) Radio, and through chatting on CB Radio I made some friends with some older boys at my secondary school, who I would not usually have befriended and socialised with. One person that I met and befriended on CB Radio was Paul, who was a couple of years older than me, but he was very good at organising us all and getting us all together, and we used to socialise and meet up in pubs with his other four friends who I also befriended. This meant that I was a drinker at an early age, and which later led to an alcohol addiction, but which I am now cured of, thanks to therapy, and to personal strength and will power that has led me into much more moderate drinking.
Whilst Paul was very friendly and good at organising and getting us all together, I also found him a bit petty, bossy and domineering, and our friendship drifted apart over the years. I stopped seeing these normal or non-diagnosed friends, and through my friend Steve I was introduced to Bill and Luke, who also have mental health problems, and who have remained close and dear friends of mine.
I find it hard to find places to socialise and make friends, partly because I am an intellectual and seek mutual intellectual friendships, although I also like ordinary people and ordinary conversation. I have checked out my local day centre, and whilst the workers there who also had mental health problems, were very nice, warm, and friendly people, there was no actual organised activities going on there, and the people were all sitting around drinking tea or coffee or watching TV.
I now socialise with my friends Luke and Bill, and with their friends too, but another place I go to now for my socialisation are Internet mental health chat rooms. These chat rooms are not as good as face-to-face social interaction and friendships, but they have a unique ethereal quality, and are places where I find I can find some solace and friendship with others, and places where I can talk about my problems without being misunderstood or judged for it. I can talk about my mental health problems there and receive sympathy, understanding, and empathy from others who have similar problems.
The conversation in mental health chat rooms can sometimes be a bit fragmented, but at the best of times it's like stream-of-consciousness communication, I have got to know people in mental health chat, and there most definitely is a kind of non-material love and friendship between us. Internet chat is much more ethereal and spiritual, because you can't see hear or see the person, and it all goes on in cyberspace, and so it's much more of a mental and in some ways a creative thing. Also, because the conversation in mental health chat rooms is very disorganised and fragmented, it still can have a comprehensible stream, flow, and exchange of communication, and the nature and spirit of it can help one understand and interact with diagnosed madness.
In some ways, CB Radio was a lot better because you actually hear the persons voice, and talk to local people who you could meet up with, but mental health chat is also different and better in a way because it's more international, not restricted by distance, and many people can talk at once without interrupting each other or blotting each other out. Mental health chat is much more of a group experience than CB Radio, because you get more than two or three people talking, and the words are written down and don't overlap like they would do in spoken conversation. Many people can be in the room and all talking at once with one another, and which is another thing that makes it unique.
One problem with mental health chat rooms, is that most of the chat - however creative - is small talk, and I don't really get any intellectual or very interesting conversations. (I found one chat room for intellectuals which was also a conservative chat room, but I found that many of the people there were racist, very nationalistic, and illiberal, and I am not a conservative by nature or by experience, creativity, and learning). Still mental health chat is creative and unique, and it is paradoxically a part of my privacy with others that I share and socialise with as a safe haven, and a place of ordinary and unusual conversation.
One thing that occurs to me about mental health chat, is that it helps a person be more attentive and fluid in ordinary mundane everyday conversation, and it can help improve ones sense of humour and mood, because the abbreviation 'lol' (and which means 'laugh out loud') can be used more easily and spontaneously, thus making it easier to share and interact with humourous remarks and realisations. At first this may manifest just as a written abbreviation and idea, but can after a while lead to smiles, happiness, or laughter. This doesn't improve wit, but it can improve a sense of an everyday ordinary sense of humour, happiness, and well being.
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