Published by Spare Change Books. First Edition 2000.
INTO THE DEEP END
By Pete Shaughnessy
I know Mad Pride doesn't define what madness is. It's a concept which
in my book is self-defining. The other day I was giving out Mad
Pride literature and this Eco-Couple were really probing me. Yeah, they
had all the right answers, but what did they want from me? An M.P. badge!
In the end, I said "Well, Normal Steve and Normal Sue, it's nice
meeting you." They both had uncomfortable smiles. "For 750 years,
people have been taking the piss out of, killing and dumping people like
me. It's about time we made up on some of the piss taking."
My chapter is about direct action. Ironically my road into
'madness' began with direct action. I worked on the buses at Peckham,
south London for three years, and had to put up with some shit there.
So, when the company announced longer hours and less wages to a group
of drivers at my garage, enough was enough.
SILENCE OF A SHEEP: DIRECT ACTION
I went on a hunger and speech strike at the bus stop outside the garage.
Most drivers at the time said that this was when I went 'mad'.
Others put it down to iron bar assault I experienced earlier, going to
the aid of a conductress I was working with. She got kicked in the face
at 10am, because a guy wouldn't show his pass, and I got cracked with
an iron bar by his mate. Nice bit of sanity!! My shrink reckoned I got
good value at £3,000 criminal injuries for that "nice bit of
sanity". My sanity for 3K. Cheers Doc.
Anyhow, back to the strike. It lasted from 4.18am to 19.30pm. I wrote to Simon Hughes MP, and he came to visit me. My manager came out with Hughes to try to get me on a bus. I wrote 'Fuck off.' The reason I finished the strike was I accidentally spoke to some kids. They picked up a load of newspapers that I was going to stick up my jumper that night to keep me warm, and threw them in a puddle.
One turned round and asked, "Are they yours?" "Yeah," I said.
I'd broken my vow, my personal principle. The strike was over.
Amazingly, at exactly the same time, 7.30pm, there was a "mad" coincidence: a memorial service started for my sister's best mate's dad, a British rail employee who was murdered for £20 one night outside Peckham train sation. That event hurt too.
Looking back at the sea of exploitation and violence of the time, it was no wonder that I took the only logical way out: go into my 'madness'. Fantasy was the only relief. I was going through my own personal Vietnam.
The day after the strike, I went to my GP, who, incredibly for a medical person, understood my distress and gave me a six week sick note. The next direct action was to find the Holy Grail.
THE HOLY GRAIL
I picked up the 'Spear of Destiny' and became fixated with the Nazis'
obsession with the Holy Grail and the spear that killed Jesus. Hitler's
theory was that whoever controlled the spear, controlled world destiny.
So, their cocktail of occult, pagan and all things Jesus, was
Indiana Jones stuff to me. I went trawling round the Grand Masonic Lodge,
Connaught Hall in Covent Garden. I then decided to find what they never
could: the Holy Grail.
Via buses and train I encountered the Donga tribe, who were an eco-action group blocking the by-pass at Tyford Down. I promised a woman at the Donga tribe that when I found the Holy Grail, I would bring back some holy water to 'bless' the site.
I then took to my stage-coach - literally the bus company -
taking two days of bus hopping to arrive at Glastonbury. Walking up the
road outside the town, I discovered the Chalice Well, in the Chalice Gardens.
I had found my Mecca, the Holy Grail. I washed myself in the well water
- which pissed an old woman off, as she was holding her bottle, ready
to drink from it.
I filled my bottle for the Donga tribe, and went off to sample the pre-Xmas delights of Glastonbury. On the way, I bumped into some hippies who invited me into their squat. It was all idyllic: no electricity, candle lights and pot boiling over the open fire. They thought they were radical, but I was obviously pissing them off with my theories. To articulate a point I raised my arm and my jacket caught fire. Fortunately, Chalice Well water was available to douse me. The Holy Grail water saved my life!!
We went into town to get some sarnies off the Sally Army and I was entertained by the hippies skanking to the Sally Army's Xmas tunes in the High Street.
Back at the squat two of the hippies wanted to have a shag. Two's company
as it were. "Go and find Mohammed," they said.
So at 2am on a dark December night in Glastonbury, with a massive hole
in my coat, I decided to walk the seven miles back to Wells to
begin my journey back to the Donga tribe. I arrived back at Tyford Down
at sunset to see them being evicted by the police. I poured the water
on the mud to 'bless' it.
Then back to London, a new second-hand coat from Warminster
and the Holy Grail found, it was time to move on. A Celts book in a
second-hand bookshop gave me inspiration. My Celtic roots were drawing
me in. I especially liked a story where a tribe of Celts sacked Rome.
Their secret weapon was to put lemon juice in their long hair, which bleached
it.
But what really shook up the Romans was the fact that the Celts would
strip off naked when they went into battle, and run at them with a blood
curdling roar. This technique definitely captured my imagination, and
I have to say I have occasionally repeated it in psychiatric institutions
when the staff shout "Breakfast". A nurse once dropped the corn
flakes because of the fright. Needless to say I got an injection for breakfast.
So, it was New Year, I dreamed of sending my kids into space, 'Star Trek'
style, but first of all there was the Irish problem to sort
out. There was also, however, the small matter of London buses to deal
with. On 2nd January, 1993, I was called back to work. I was sent straight
to the London Transport doctor in Marylebone, right next door to Saneline.
As I waited in the reception, the date - 2nd January - had signs for me.
It was my sister's birthday and sadly she died nearly three years later
on 2nd October 1995. Also, the 2nd of January 1990 was my first day at
London buses, and as I sat in a customer care session I got a nosebleed.
I NEVER get nose bleeds - this was an ominous sign.
Sure enough, as I sat at Marylebone, I looked back at the assault and
remembered the broken nose I received from a wicked
head-butt. I was now confined to a life of snoring and always having a
bogey up my nose which I can never get out. All for £3K.
Anyhow, this doctor with the white coat called me in and sat
me down.
"Listen," he said, "I haven't got you here to examine
you, I just wanted to hear how your hunger strike went." I told him.
He was empathetic. When I finished, he said, "Well done, you've succeeded
in your mission. You've really wasted management's time. By the way, you're
fit for work."
Back at work, they made me sit around for a day before giving me my first
job on the road. At 8.20am on the 4th of January 1993 I went to pick up
a bus in Peckham. I spotted the brake light wasn't working, so I should've
got the engineer out to fix it, but instead decided to drive the bus as
far away from the garage as possible. At Harrow Road Police Station, I
booted the last two remaining passengers off, told the police about the
defects. I.e. no brake
light, no fare chart, dummy video and a cold bus, as said 'PC Harrow Road'.
I rang the engineer and he choked in his tea when I said 'No
fare chart.'
"What fucking bus has got a fare chart?" he said.
"Not my problem," says I. "In the rule book it says there
must be one."
"Wait there you cunt," he said.
I had no fears - I had the rule book (or my bible) with me. I was now
doing everything by the book!!
Three hours later, a proverbial dirty old man got on the
bus. I was about to shoo him away, when he opened his mac and flashed
his warrant at me. "Inspector Fisher, Chessington."
"What the zoo?" I said. Fisher and I didn't like each other.
"For the third time," he asked, "are you refusing to drive
this bus in
service?" 'Pontuis Pilate' Fisher then ordered me off the bus and
proceeded to drive off. I reported him to the police, he was a madman.
London Transport have some weird rules. When I got back to
the Garage, they told me I was self-suspended. "You've suspended
me, put it in writing," I told 'em. But they wouldn't, and whatever
bullshit they have in equal ops, they had a rule 22 in their book for
inspectors, that they can suspend anyone for no reason.
Eventually, my last action for London Buses was to be arrested at Head Office for doing a sit-in. I was charged with disrupting the Queen's Peace. I never wore the uniform again.
When I got home that night, after spending all day in the cell, I asked
my Buddhist hippy chick neighbour if she could borrow me £1.50 for
some fags. She said No - "Because you've been bad." I told her
"to stick her karma up her fucking arse."
I had been putting lemon juice in my hair as it was now time to get back to my Celtic Roots.
CELTIC ROOTS
I arrived at Heathrow Airport with my trench coat, paisley scarf and
lemon smelling, long hair, feeling like a Celtic warrior. In fact, I was
much chuffed when some guy said to his mate, "He looks like a
right Paddy."
I blew my Dad's mind, when I rang from the airport saying I was off
to visit my uncle. "What the hell are you doing?" When I arrived
at
Dublin I went through the Goods To Declare channel. I had a big orange
with me, it was all symbolic. I had a quiet night. The next day I was
to make up for it.
In my uncle's town, Naas Co. Kildare, there is a Wolfe Tone Pub. Wolfe
Tone was a Protestant that the IRA well respect. At 11am, I
walked up to it with my younger cousins, and said to them, "This
is a BAD pub."
"That's right," they said. "When the Wolfe Tone Annual
Commemoration is held here, it's the only pub to be shut."
"I tell you what," I said, "we pretend that I'm dumb."
"Good idea," said my cousin.
So in we went and I gestured that I wanted a Guinness, proceeding to
drink three in 20 minutes, which alarmed my cousins, who feared
I'd be paralytic by lunch - or shot. After lunch, we went to Dublin, where
I must have drunk ten pints.
That night I slept in the Graveyard. Some kids gave me some blankets
and some Mars bars. I slept in the grave digger's hut.
Looking back, I felt rather comfortable. Life was hectic, but I felt a
freedom that I never had before. Arguably, my last night of mental freedom
ever was spent in graveyard - symbolic.
Later, that Sunday night I went round my aunt's house and they weren't
sure what was wrong with me. They gave me whisky which made it worse.
I took to the streets again. With no money in my pockets, my journey was
coming to an end. I tried to get served a free pint - no way. Some kids
outside said if I stripped naked that would help. I took my trousers and
boots off and lay in the middle of the junction. I saw a bus coming at
me. I wasn't expecting to
be hit, I thought he might just stop and get help. The bus swerved round
me.
I got up and walked to a canal bridge, still half-naked I leaned over
and looked to see how deep it was. Suddenly a bloke jumped on
top of me, and for a split second if you're an Oz watcher like me, you
know what's going to happen next. I thought I was going to be buggered.
No, but this is where my mental health file starts. "Don't jump,"
says the bloke.
"I'm not, stop squashing me."
"Don't worry I'll call the police."
The police came, reclaimed my trousers and put me in a cell. Well, what
do you do in this situation? You do what all Celtic warriors do. Strip
off and scream.
After a while I was put face down on an ambulance stretcher.
My ankles and hands were chained together and I was brought to my first
padded cell. Welcome to mental slavery.
Held down naked in a padded cell, I still remember that female nurse coming at me with a re-assuring voice and then sticking that injection in my arse.
MENTAL SLAVERY
I woke up clothed in a dorm, similar to the open wards of Carry on Doctor.
Except of course, there was no hanky panky here. In all I
spent three weeks in ward 8a, St Brendan's Hospital. I didn't get out
of the door except to get escorted home. Not once in that time did I hear
anyone laugh, let alone smile.
Ironically, when I woke that first morning, I heard cheering on the tv.
I
thought they were cheering for me, I thought I'd cracked the system. I
laugh now, painfully. The system well and truly cracked me. The
freedom I had found for six short weeks was now over. Everything I had
felt, loved, over that time, I was told was "all a delusion".
Time to conform.
I often compare my experiences in acute care with being a cow on my uncle's
farm. The cow has to know what my uncle wants, otherwise the cow gets
the stick. In mental health, the stick is of course, medication. The carrot
is freedom; to get your freedom you must conform, or at least pretend
to conform.
Nearly three years later, I am sitting in chair in Robert Gillespie Ward,
Guys. Beside me, on my bed, sits my girlfriend and my key
nurse. I cry uncontrollably for ten minutes, not bending down, not wiping
tears from my eyes. I just look at the nurse. My girlfriend doesn't move.
The nurse looks at me, then back to my girlfriend, then back again until
she can stand it no more and leaves. I was learning - female nurses are
not allowed to touch male psychiatric patients.
I had just been admitted for punching a policeman. My sister
had just been killed by her boyfriend who was psychotic, stabbed her 15
times, whilst my other sister tried to save her. When Brixton police let
me back in the flat, they let me find the bloody duvet that she was attacked
on. No warning. But, where's the respect for me, I'm one of 'em, mentally
ill.
One of the rules for my section, was that I could go out with my girlfriend.
So twice a day she had to take me out, every day. At the end of the section
my consultant, an Irish doctor who took the rap for
Christopher Clunis, said to me "Your girlfriend visits too much,
it's bad for you." I had to bite my tongue - I'm still on a section.
He said to me, "When you are in hospital you complain a lot."
"Yeah, that's right," I said.
"Complaining is a symptom of your illness. Next time you come in,
we'll ignore them."
"Thanks Doc."
Next day I was off my section. As one of my fellow patients said to me
on the street one day: "I had to pretend I was well to get out of
there."
That's the system.
RECLAIM BEDLAM
Maudsley & Bethlem Mental Health Trust saw itself as la crème
de la crème of mental health. In 1997, it was more like the Manchester
City of mental health. Situated in one of the poorest areas of the country,
it put a lot of resources into its national projects, and neglected its
local ones.
It's history went back to the first Bedlam, the first institution of
mental
health. If you pop down to the museum at Bethlem Hospital, you will see
a picture proudly displayed of the 700th celebrations in 1947, with the
Queen Mother planting a tree. Well, not exactly planting, more like putting
her foot on a spade.
So, when some PR bureaucrat came up with the idea of 750th
celebrations, it must have all made sense. An excuse for a year of corporate
beanos. The Chief Executive could picture the MBE in the cabinet. There
was only one problem: in 1947, the patients would have been well pleased
with a party, in 1997 some patients wanted more.
In the so-called 'user friendly' 90s, I thought 'commemoration' was more appropriate. So, a few of us went to battle with the Maudsley PR machine. It was commemoration vs. celebration.
I think for the first time, we were taking the user movement out of the
ghetto of smoky hospital rooms and into the mainstream. We spoke at Reclaim
the Streets and political events. We would gatecrash conferences to push
the message. I know we pissed users off by our
style; personally I found some users more judgemental than the staff we
talked to. They were even a few users who wanted to have their stall at
the 'Funday' and cross our picket line. Frustrating. When that proposal
was put to me, I lost my nut, which meant I threatened to
bring Reclaim the Streets down to smash up their stall. Because of that
remark, I had two police stations hassling me up to the day
of our Reclaim Bedlam picnic and the picket at the staff ball, the
appropriate opening event of the celebrations, had to be dropped.
We had our first picnic at Imperial War Museum, one of the sites of Bedlam
Hospital; Simon Hughes MP came and spoke. Features in Big Issue and Nursing
Times, and we were afloat.
Our next event was to screw up the Thanksgiving Service at St Paul's
Cathedral which a member of the Royal Family was attending. BBC2's 'From
the Edge' got in on the act for that one, and it's widely
thought that because of our antics on the steps of St Paul's - as well
as stopping the traffic at 11am with a boat forcing Tower Bridge to open
- that the Chief Exec didn't get his MBE. The best part of the day for
me, was going back with my mate Simon 'Mr Mad Pride' Barnett. We got stuck
in a traffic jam at Rotherhithe Tunnel. He couldn't contain himself, so
he went for a pee in the tunnel. It
was such a long pee the cab driver drove off and left him!
Our next event was to join up with ECT Anonymous and the All
Wales User and Survivor Group and picket the Royal College of Psychiatry.
It was the first time Reclaim Bedlam had been involved in International
Direct Action. Keeping up the pressure on the Royal College of Psychiatry
we hijacked their anti-stigma campaign, 'In Every Family in the Land'.
The soundbite I used was: 'the psychiatrist is patting you on the head
with one hand, and with the other hand he /she is using compulsory treatment
to inject you up the bum.' We needed a target to get an anti-compulsory
treatment message. Unanimously, everyone went for Marjorie Wallace and
SANE. Up to our demo, she was an advocate for it, mysteriously she has
changed her tune since. 200 people turned up for the SANE demo, which
shows that if people feel strongly, they will say "I'm MAD and PROUD."
People often ask what are the alternatives to the current system and
despair? To me, it's quite simple. How would you like to be treated?
As an object, or with dignity? It's almost like walking up to the nurse
wearing wet clothes, and the nurse treats you for a cold. The nurse then
lets you walk out without changing your clothes. When you return the next
day, the nurse wonders why you still have a cold.
Similarly, I'm walking around a product of emotional and physical abuse,
broken relationships, no meaningful employment, stressful
housing - and I'm taking a tablet for the symptoms.
An ex-girlfriend of mine rang me up one day, and said, "I want to
kill
myself, but I'm scared of going to hell." She had tried many times
so it was not new to hear this. I looked out of the window and said,
"This is hell Louise. It can't be no worse after." She said
she felt
re-assured. I carried on, "When Jesus talked about being like a child
to get into the kingdom of heaven, what I see it as, you are innocent,
naïve like a child before the child receives pain and is sprung into
the adult world." I never spoke to Louise again, but she was sexually
abused as a six-year-old in Barnardo's home and never recovered. I was
her first boyfriend. Hand on heart, she's probably better off where she
is now.
I see life as one big swimming pool. Some of us are thrust in the deep
end and we manage to survive. We make our way down to the
shallow end, where it's easy, boring. The people there are scared of the
deep end, scared of the unknown, so they shun people like me and call
me MAD. Madness is a natural reaction. The worker who abused Louise at
six years old is the killer.
THE END.