I suffered a lot with my own thoughts, couldn’t keep up with them. They rolled around in my head like a separate entity, like they had a mind of their own. Sometimes I felt clear, confident, in control and then the next minute I was inventing stories, dreaming up a narrative of other people’s behaviour and those stories hurt. They were completely fictional, but to me they were a stronger reality than the truth.

Did any one realise that below the surface my thoughts were complicated, had anyone asked the question, ‘how are you?’. I needed someone to ask, to relieve the tension, because if they didn’t perhaps the spring would snap, perhaps I would break.