Mad as a Bucket of Frogs in Vinegar

                                                                 Predictable, Flaxen

I am about to reveal personal information to my readership that is known only to my doctors and close family. I am unknown to all who linger here, and long shall it remain. Please keep it a secret.

Mental health acronyms are everywhere, and everyone has one. PTSD is very much in vogue. In years passed, this was called 'shell shock' and was the sole preserve of those affected by their combat experience. Now, however, the condition has seeped into civilian life and is awarded to those who didn't achieve a merit badge back in the day when they were in High School. I'm being flippant, but I don't want to denigrate the horror, distress and misery mental illness causes. I should know, or know better, as my family has been marred and blighted through the generations.

My mother, at age 21, shoved her head into the gas oven in a serious attempt to end it all. By luck, she was found in time. Back in the 1950s, piped gas was generated from coal and contained significant amounts of carbon monoxide. My poor mother was sectioned and sent to the local Mental Health Facility. I could never determine how long she spent there, as the family considered the matter taboo. My maternal grandmother strenuously denied that we had that 'sort of thing' in the family. The irony: she also experienced a 'mental episode' when young. As regards the incident, all my mother would reveal was that she was subjected to electric shock treatment, which filled her with horror; she raved about the treatment until the day she died. 

The doctors diagnosed my mother as suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and placed her on medication, and she was eventually released into society.

Schizophrenia can be highly debilitating and destroys lives. However, she responded well to the strong meds and father, whilst alive, skillfully managed her delusions and prevented a recurrent episode warranting readmittance; this all changed when he died. 

From an early age, I knew I was 'different' from others my age. My thinking always seemed off-centre, and I was often careless and inattentive. As I aged, odd behaviour and thinking became more apparent. By young adulthood, I realised that I had cognitive blank spots. Certain actions and behaviours that appeared natural and easy to others were extremely difficult for me. Subsequently, I developed coping mechanisms to help ameliorate the symptoms and to hide the problems from my peers and adults. As for why I was neurodivergent, as they say in the modern medical parlance, I ascribed my issues to aberrant genes from my mother. I learned that schizophrenia has a strong genetic component, and many contributing genes are responsible. Exceeding a 'bad gene' threshold results in the condition.  I reasoned that I had received a goodly amount of the aberrant genes, but not enough to present the condition. I was spared true schizophrenia, but I wasn't untouched by the genetic taint. My mind could be in turmoil, with rolling/roiling and cascading thoughts that blazed throughout my brain with chaotic glee. On the plus side, I seemed endowed with a degree of creativity and spontaneity that was denied to most. It is the muse that drives my blog content and provides it with its singular character. My self-diagnosis seemed fair to me, and as I aged, I accepted my idiosyncrasies and the perception of being different with indifference and got about the business of life. 

Coming to modern times, my two grown-up children, male and female, experienced mental health symptoms that developed with age. Eventually, they were both seen by psychiatrists for help. Both had to rely on private treatment, as the public mental health system is but a name, unless you are a juvenile and virtually impossible to access as an adult, as the bar for acceptance is set impossibly high. Unfortunately, this is not a cheap route, and Kiwis with mental health problems are left to wallow in their mental abyss due to cost.  And so it transpires that both of my beautiful children are affected by ADHD and have been prescribed the stimulant Ritalin. The outcome for both my children has been good, and they have attained a degree of peace, calm, and focus. I've noticed my daughter, who was burdened with inactivity and lacked motivation, has since become 'awakened' as if from a dream of lassitude. She now makes jewellery and trinkets and is opening her own business. As for my son, who experienced severe bouts of doubt and mental tumult is now an esteemed professional. Not only does he work full-time, but he also runs two businesses of his own design. One of his enterprises is starting to become lucrative, and he is working toward making the dizzying leap to full-time businessman. I wish him luck in his endeavours and vow to support him in his hard-fought/thought ventures. 

With two children with ADHD, likely, one or both parents are thus affected. The spotlight deservedly fell upon me, and I became concerned that my self-diagnosis (never a good thing) was in error, and so I sought medical counsel. I will not linger on the process, which in my case proved challenging and a long time a coming. Eventually, I was booked to consult with an eminent psychiatrist with a special interest and expertise in ADHD diagnosis and treatment. Like my children, I trod the private road. A toll road well worth the access fee.  

The initial session with the doctor was helpful, informative and deeply revealing. I filled in tests akimbo, and in the final part of the 2.5-hour consultation, I was diagnosed with ADHD. This came as no great surprise. However, the good doctor was not finished with his professional verdict. It transpires that I have a comorbidity. I will not reveal the additional mental issue in this post as it has started to veer into 'too long, won't read' territory. Suffice it to say, it was a shocking revelation to me and for a while, I was thrown into mental turmoil. Perceptive and long-time visitors may be endowed with the powers of psychic divination and thus can discern my cohabiting malady with grace. It was no surprise to my daughter- she knew all this time. Insight was denied to this blogger, and I had to wait nearly 70 years for disclosure.

A second post is warranted and is coming soon.  

 

 

Madame Guillotine

                                        Halifax Gibbet, Looking Mean 

I recently asked one of my readers, 'Would he rather I write about the Guillotine or Hanged, Drawn and Quartered' as a punishment?' To date, he hasn't replied, so I have decided to force the issue- I have powers beyond the ken of mortals. By the power of divination, I have picked (drum roll), the Guillotine.

The Guillotine as a form of capital punishment is forever linked with the French and, notably, the French Revolution. During the 'Reign of Terror' (1793- 1794), it is estimated that over 15,000 folk faced decapitation by this technique. This execution method was not exclusive to the French and was not first introduced during the French Revolution. Read on, gentle reader, and if not entertained, at least be enlightened.

One of the earliest mechanical beheading devices, 'The Halifax Gibbet', saw service from 1286 to 1650, in the sleepy Yorkshire town of Halifax. It was considered a more humane method than manual beheading with an axe. The device consisted of an axe head attached to a weighted block. The block and axe were fitted in grooves in two upright beams of 15 feet in extent. The block was hoisted by rope and pulley until it rested at the top of the beams. The block was secured by a pin which, when released, sent the block and axe hurtling down to sever the miscreant's noggin. This way, about 100 people were sent to paradise, purgatory, hell or oblivion, depending on the viewer's preference. Of the choices, I prefer the latter. In those days, stealing was the most common crime punishable by death. The condemned would remain in custody for three market days. During this time, the poor man was displayed to the public in the stocks as an act of humiliation and to deter others. The Scots were not to be outdone by English ingenuity, and in the 16th to the 18th centuries, 'The Scottish Maiden' in Edinburgh was readied to sever a criminal's head. The construction and execution of the device were similar to the English version, although a mite cruder.   

The German version of the mechanical kopf removal device was first used in the Rhineland in the late 18th century. By 1871, it had become the most common method of execution throughout Germany. Like the English variety, it used an axe head for the butcher's work. It differed from the French array as it was constructed of metal, unlike the Guillotine, which was built of wood. Also, the drop was decidedly short, and to compensate, the axe and block were made to be extremely heavy. Death by fallbeil became very popular during the Nazi regime (1933 - 1945), with nearly 12,000 prisoners executed by this means: rest in pieces, Sophie Scholl.  

Before the execution by machine, decapitation was often carried out by a headsman with an axe or, less commonly, a sword. The ancient Romans used the gladius to send German tribesmen to Valhalla. In the Middle Ages, decapitation was reserved for noble folk as it was considered more humane than hanging, which was the fate of the rabble. King Henry desperately wanted to marry his mistress, but unfortunately, he was married to Anne Bolynn. So trumped charges of infidelity were manufactured. Poor Anne would die because of a passionate whim of an unstable king. However, the king did not want his former beloved wife to suffer and therefore engaged the services of a highly skilled headsman from Calais. The headsman responded to the call and cut through Anne's slender neck with a single swing of a sword as Anne remained kneeling (1536). Not all headsmen exhibited this level of professionalism, and the skill of the headsman varied enormously. Nobles executed during the French Revolution would give the headsman gelt to encourage a clean and efficient cut. Not all beheadings went to plan. Behold, Margaret Pole, whom King Henry executed for political reasons. Her crime of 'Last of the Plantagenets'  was a grievous offence to the king, and surely her head must go. Sadly, the axeman was not up to the task, and several clumsy attempts were necessary before her bonce rolled orwf.

Most folk would like to know whether residual consciousness exists after removing the head. The cut is clean, the brain is undamaged, and oxygen will remain within the structure to support cognitive behaviour.  Without continued oxygen input, it takes several minutes for the brain to die. Imagine the existential horror of knowing that your head has been removed from your body, and you are still able to frame coherent thoughts several minutes after removal. This could be an argument against the humanity of this form of execution. Indeed, a medical doctor, during the French Revolution, tried to determine whether this was the case. My personal opinion: I suspect that loss of consciousness is instantaneous after the cutting of all the blood vessels supplying the brain. What is not considered is the catastrophic loss of blood pressure following head removal. Low blood pressure alone can foster unconsciousness, so imagine the effect after the complete loss of blood pressure in a millisecond. It could be argued that an unconscious dream state might intervene for mayhap a minute or two, but I can't imagine that full consciousness exists after decapitation. The neurons would still fire until the oxygen is exhausted, then true death would intervene. I hypothesise that an internal reverie would happen without awareness of the external world. Perhaps the dark tunnel would be experienced with the bright light at the end, then oblivion. Of course, I could be wrong, and, of course, there is no objective way we could test my musings. Regardless, I'm intensely interested in the opinions of my readership. I await, my mind agape- is there a neurosurgeon in the audience?