Help! I'm not dying anymore!

Back when I was interesting

My old blog. All about me and my trials and tribulations of having an incurable disease; a death-sentence!

Oh, look at me! What an exotic condition to have! 

Love on me!

I am a martyr!

At last, I am interesting!!!

You cannot BUY publicity like this!

It's the kind of story that could get me somewhere! 

So I became a star in the Rare Dementia space (and it is a space too), being interviewed on radio stations and doing talks for - or rather at - uninterested NHS staff. 

I had sympathy, attention, and a reason for people to warm to me, which I certainly hadn’t had  to the same extent before. 

I had Frontotemporal dementia and it would lead to a horrible undignified death!

I could have gone to Dignitas in Switzerland and had a bolt-gun to the head, or whatever it is they do.

Get in!

Well get this: they’ve taken my crippling and undignified death away!

As of September 2025 I officially don’t have FTD!

I was - understandably - devastated.

Thing is, I wasn’t dying nearly as quickly as I should to merit this particular condition, and, like Donald Trump, I was acing my cognitive exams. (Although mine were a good deal more difficult than identifying giraffes from hamsters.)

Now, disowned by RDS and other dementia bodies, I found myself adrift in a sort of psycho-limbo.

I’ve since been advised to go down the mental-health route, but I don’t fancy having hundreds of hours of psychodynamic therapy. 

I’ve had 2 therapists before and found it to be an expensive, drawn-out process, rather like 2 blind men helping each other through a maze, leading to fuck all.

What I've actually got is probably boring old autism. Just like everyone else these days!

Or maybe even depression. 

I preferred the good old days of FTD. It gave me kudos, camaraderie, and was a bloody good excuse as to why I say weird shit and behave in sometimes odd, inexplicable ways. 

People ask how on earth I’m processing the news that I’m not dying: it must be revelatory!

Well it’s not. I’m on Sertraline and relatively unaware of most of my emotional states. 

Limbo is not as dramatic as people expect it to be. In fact it was never dramatic. It’s nothingness. 

I guess that’s why the Pope abolished it.

It's a difficult sell.

Teenage Armpits

I smelt them before I saw them. 3 geeky teenagers with multi-coloured hair, sat at the front of the pub. 

Stinking as teenagers often do.

Reeking, in fact.

That's yo mama, right there.

I went to the bar.

Wilbur. What have you got that’s…good?

I usually ask something inane like that because they know me here and they know what I like. Usually something with plenty of flavour that’s not too strong, like an 8lb sledgehammer made out of hops.

The teenagers giggled at me. 

Bastards.

I got my drink and went outside where I could sit in the shade and benefit from the cool breeze.

Then THEY came outside and sat near me. They’d obviously been drinking as they were drunk yet in good spirits.

I thought my DnD-themed t-shirt might have given me some kudos.  

No.

So there they are, smelling at me, laughing very loudly.

And then they leave 

And just as quickly they return, apologising for being loud, and giving the barman a £5 tip as an apology.

What lovely kids. 

Smelly, but lovely.

And what a judgmental bastard am I.