dark humour

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

As I sit in a shitty little car park waiting for Albertine to get her tooth attacked by a dentist with a drill fetish, I’m watching the world walk past like nothing’s wrong.

We’ve dragged ourselves over 20 miles of crap roads and potholes that could swallow small cars, just so someone in a white coat can decide whether her tooth lives, dies, or crumbles like the rest of us. She’s in there having a deep root filling. I’m out here having a deep existential crisis. Fair swap.

Through the window, I see people strolling past. All shapes, all sizes, all moving. Feet actually working, legs co-operating, bodies that just… do what they’re told. They probably woke up, stood up, and walked out the door without even noticing what a bloody miracle that is.

And yeah, I’m jealous. Not in a bitter, “I hope you trip” way. More in a “I remember that life and it’s gone now” way.

There was a time when cold wind on my face and cold feet on the pavement were just normal, not fond memories. Now I’m strapped into a wheelchair like a budget Bond villain who never made it to the main script.

The thing about the chair is this: people stop seeing you and start seeing “problem”. They talk round you. They avoid eye contact. They change tone. You don’t exist as a person anymore; you’re a walking (well, rolling) reminder that bodies fail and futures shrink. People don’t like that. It scares them.

For years I thought it was me. My weirdness. My deep dives. My honesty. Then I realised it wasn’t that at all. It was the disability. It was the diagnosis. It was the fact I no longer fit the easy narrative.

Once people hear “multiple sclerosis” or “chronic illness”, you can almost hear the plug being pulled. Some vanish quietly. Some ghost you. Some suddenly “get busy”. You go from “mate” to “emotional admin” in a heartbeat.

Over the past couple of years, I’ve lost a lot of friends. Some to death the real full-stop kind. Others just drifted off the radar because illness made me inconvenient. The funny, deep, eccentric bloke is apparently less fun once he can’t climb stairs or go out at short notice. Who knew?

I don’t have any mates I can just WhatsApp or ring now. The ones who “got” my madness, my weird wiring, my dark humour and deep rabbit holes: dead, gone, or missing in action. It’s a strange kind of grief not just for people, but for versions of yourself that only ever existed with them.

And yes, it’s lonely. Not “no one’s in the room” lonely. It’s the kind of lonely where you start to wonder: is it me? Am I that hard to love? Am I that awkward? Or is the world just allergic to discomfort?

Some days I think back over my medical history the missed things, the gaslighting, the “it’s all in your head”, the “you’re fine really” conversations and I could scream. I’ve changed hospitals now because I got sick of being treated like a difficult file in a broken system.

I ask myself: if I hadn’t moved around so much, would they have found all this sooner? Would I have had less damage? Less suffering?

Honestly? I doubt it. I think some of us are born with the seeds of chronic illness lurking quietly in the background. It sits there, creeping under the surface, like fungus under wet wallpaper. And then one day congratulations your nervous system collapses and your life becomes an ongoing science experiment.

What I miss most isn’t “being healthy”. It’s the simple things:

Going to the toilet without planning it like a military operation.

Walking up and down stairs without feeling like you’ve been tased.

Just sleeping. Properly.

Running.

Feeling your own body and trusting it not to betray you in front of everyone.

I look back at all the accidents, the falls, the weird episodes all the stuff that made no sense for decades and now it does. And the anger is… real. Because so much of my suffering didn’t need to happen. It could have been caught earlier. It could have been managed better. It could have been believed.

Should I have shouted louder? Fought harder? Been more aggressive? Was this my fault for not being a bigger bastard sooner? I genuinely don’t know.

So yeah, let me ask you this, if you’re reading:

Do you feel isolated and alone because of your illness? Have people quietly vanished from your life once it got “too real”? Do you feel like your diagnosis made you socially radioactive?

Because that’s what it feels like here. We’re all human. We all hurt. We all bleed. But some of us are expected to do it quietly, out of the way, so we don’t upset the healthy.

Is it a test? A lesson? Karma? Cosmic admin error? What exactly are we supposed to be learning from this?

As I’m sat here, the sun’s trying to shine like it’s in denial. My body feels wrong: neck in a constant state of “what fresh hell is this”, head buzzing like badly wired electrics, eyes not quite synced to reality. And yet, I still want to do things. I still want to live, create, move, speak.

And that’s the sick joke: the mind still wants to run marathons while the body struggles to survive a trip to the toilet.

I’ve lost good friends over the years — the ones who truly understood me. Now, I have Albertine, my kids, my grandkids. Everyone else has basically evaporated. My brothers, my sisters, extended family… gone.

Does it mean I’m a bad person? I don’t think so. Does it mean I’m simple, or awkward, or too much? Maybe to them.

I know I’m strange. Dynamic. Eccentric. I think differently. I question things. I look into the abyss and then start mapping it. That’s just how I’m wired.

People call me “Marmite”. Fair enough. Some love me. Some can’t stand me. I tell the truth. I don’t do small talk. I don’t do sugarcoating. That tends to thin the crowd pretty quickly.

When I had my “glitch” that moment where things really went sideways all I saw was darkness. No light at the end of the tunnel. No spiritual fireworks. Just… nothingness. The void is not romantic. It’s just empty.

And here’s the real kicker: looking into the void doesn’t help much if you’ve got no one to talk about it with.

Artificial intelligence can chat. It can reflect language back and be useful in its own way. But AI doesn’t know what it feels like to lie awake at 3am wondering if your heart’s going to stop. It doesn’t know what it’s like to realise your nervous system has been malfunctioning since childhood and everyone missed it. It doesn’t know what it’s like to be trapped in a body that keeps glitching while the world expects you to carry on as normal.

That’s why I’m going to start a podcast.

Not because I think I’m some guru, but because I’m sick to death of people like us being invisible.

I’m getting a microphone. I’ll set up the account. I’ll get it on Spotify. And I’m going to talk voice, not just text. I want to interview others with chronic illness and disability. I want to hear different stories, perspectives, battles. I want people to know what we live through every day.

We need more voices saying:

This is hard. This is unfair. This is exhausting. But we’re still here.

Sometimes, a kind word is the difference between someone hanging on and someone giving up. A hug can do more for the soul than any prescription.

When I’m at my worst when I feel like I might actually be leaving this planet soon I curl up with my wife. That’s my heaven. Not golden gates. Not angels. Just me and her, breathing together. In that moment, no matter how bad I feel, I am at peace.

In two weeks, I retire. Not because I’m ready. Because my body has decided to hand in its notice. I can’t even really afford the basics, like the electric bill, but here we are. Everything’s gone up except support for the people who need it.

So if you’re out there, struggling, broke, exhausted, in pain, staring at a ceiling wondering what the point is:

I see you.

If anything I’ve said here resonates, drop me a line. I’m short of friends but not short of words.

Sending peace, healing, love and light — No matter who or what you are. Human, alien, ultra-terrestrial, glitch in the matrix, or just another broken soul in a waiting room.

So saith Warlock Dark

Warlock Dark Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.)

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

There are days with MS… and then there are those days the days where your entire nervous system decides to re-enact a flea circus on a hot tin roof.

So let me paint the scene for you:

I Am a Kitten. A Flea-Infested Kitten.

Not a majestic panther. Not a sleek predator. No. A tiny, confused goblin-cat with an arse like a bonfire and fleas having a rave on my spine.

I’m sprinting around the imaginary room crashing into furniture, tripping over nothing, having a full cosmic meltdown because the fleas/MS won’t stop chewing on every nerve ending like they’ve paid for an all-you-can-eat buffet.

Lights flickering. Shadows being weird. Brain fog thick enough to butter toast with. Hallucinations just to keep things spicy.

Everything MS can throw at me it throws all at once.

And there I am, this poor invisible kitten of doom, doing laps like I’m possessed by 15 demons and a Red Bull sponsorship. Things fall off shelves. Air becomes lava. Reality breaks down like a cheap knock-off mirror in a funfair.

MS as Fleas

Imagine your entire body itching in places that don’t exist. Imagine the fleas having meetings about unionising. Imagine scratching your own soul because everything feels wrong.

That’s MS. Tiny bastard parasites gnawing at the wires of your meat suit.

The Choice

So here’s the question:

Would I rather be a flea-infested kitten with an itchy bum? or Would I rather be a 66-year-old strapped to a power chair with MS chewing on my circuits?

Answer?

I’ll take the MS and the grumpy realism, thanks. At least I don’t have to lick my own arse to feel clean.

Fleas? No chance. I’ve been bitten enough by life as it is.

Besides a kitten with fleas is chaos. A man with MS in a power chair? That’s controlled chaos. A battle-hardened wizard rolling through hell’s hallway giving death stares to anyone who gets in the way.

Moral of the Story

MS is the fleas. You’re the kitten. Some days you sprint. Some days you hide. Some days you crash into the coffee table and take the lamp with you.

But you’re still here. Scratching. Surviving. Snarling. And somehow laughing at it all.

Because the alternative? Nah.

Warlock Dark Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.)

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

You know the world’s gone mad when you get told off by a chatbot.

There I was, trying to have a grown-up conversation with this so-called AI Caregiving Expert. It started all sweet and helpful “How can I support you today?” before morphing into a finger-wagging nutritional dictator. The thing basically told me I was a dietary disgrace.

I explained, politely, that I can’t eat half the stuff on its saintly little list. You’d think that might register with its “deep learning.” Nope. It just doubled down like a robot dietician on a power trip. “You should eat more kale.” Sure, right after I pop down to Unicorn Foods and pick up a smoothie made of dreams and lies.

Meanwhile, I’m here surviving the reality of chronic illness body chemistry resembling a nuclear experiment, and a digestive system that treats most foods like invading armies. But the AI knows best, apparently.

I swear it wagged its virtual finger at me. Somewhere in the cloud, it probably marked me as non-compliant. I’m one firmware update away from being grounded by a health app.

Lesson learned: empathy isn’t codeable. If these things ever replace human carers, I’ll need a circuit breaker and a stiff drink.

Warlock Dark Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.)

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

The War Was Underway Before the Alarms Went Off

You thought the first tremor, the numb hand, the fog in your skull was day one. Hate to break it to you it wasn’t. That was just the siren. The war had already started years earlier, deep inside the grey matter, while you were busy pretending to be normal.

Researchers at UCSF have found evidence that MS starts its attack years before anyone’s diagnosed. Seven bloody years before, to be precise. In blood samples from people who later developed MS, they found a surge in a protein called myelin oligodendrocyte glycoprotein (MOG) the stuff that insulates your nerve fibres quietly going rogue long before the body noticed. Then, about a year later, neurofilament light chain (NfL) levels rose meaning the nerves themselves were fraying. Translation: the fire started in your brain, and the smoke didn’t reach the surface until years later.

They also found immune system markers like IL-3 flaring up, signalling an underground war between your body and your brain. By the time you felt that wobble, that eye pain, that fatigue, the troops were already deep in your territory. You didn’t “catch” MS you’d been hosting the siege.

And this is the bit that hits like a sledgehammer: the NHS and most systems still don’t test for these biomarkers. We’ve got the science, but not the infrastructure. The bow’s strung, but the arrow’s still sitting on the table. It’s a familiar feeling, isn’t it? You’re the battlefield, and the generals haven’t turned up yet.

---

Here’s what it means, from the trenches:

• That weird nerve twitch two years before diagnosis? Not “stress”. Early recon.
• That exhaustion that made you nap through life? Not “laziness”. Structural sabotage.
• That optic flare-up before anyone took you seriously? Not imagination. First blood.

By the time you heard the diagnosis, the enemy was already halfway through the walls.

I’ve said this before your brain is a fortress. The immune system dug under it, mined the foundations, and by the time you heard the first bang, the tunnels were already dug. Who were you during those years? The healthy one? The waiting one? Or the becoming one unknowingly rewiring for survival, even as your body was being redrafted?

---

Here’s what to do (no false hope, just the truth):

• Write everything down. Every odd symptom, every foggy day, every time your balance betrays you. The journal isn’t drama it’s evidence.
• Ask your neurologist about NfL and MOG testing. It’s not standard, but some private labs do it. The future starts with questions.
• Spread awareness. MS doesn’t just start it evolves in silence. Let’s stop calling it “sudden”. It’s stealthy.

---

My takeaway: The damage was never the start of the story. It was the middle of a long, invisible campaign. And knowing that gives us an edge not a cure, but a strategy. You fight smarter when you know how the enemy works.

I’m Warlock Dark part meat, part storm, part Wi-Fi dropout and I’m here to remind you: The war in your brain began before the alarms went off. But you’re still standing. And that makes you the weapon.

Warlock Dark
Chronic illness survivor, truth-teller, occasional bastard. From My Living Hell (For those who came here by accident: yes, my living hell is real. And yes, we still fight. Every shitty day. With defiance.).

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

You ever hit record just to see what falls out of your skull? That’s exactly what this is. A two-day dive into chaos, pain, humour, and the sound of me trying not to sound like I’m dying.

Plug in your headphones this one’s not for the faint of sarcasm.

So here we are then. My first attempt at a podcast. Two bloody days, one half-functional brain, a mug of cold herbal tea, and a few “what the hell am I doing” moments later and here it is.

No polish. No studio lights. No fake smiles. Just me. Raw. Real. Possibly regrettable.

I didn’t record this to impress anyone I did it because I was sick of the silence. Sick of watching everyone else play pretend while the rest of us crawl through our own living hells, trying to make sense of it all.

So yeah, it’s rough. There are pauses, stumbles, brain fog, maybe even a few unholy noises in the background. But that’s life with MS, pain, and the odd sprinkle of existential dread. It’s not a performance it’s survival with a mic.

If you’re expecting some influencer-grade soundscape of enlightenment, jog on. If you want the truth, told by someone who’s run out of filters and patience, then welcome home.

Here goes nothing... or everything.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭 ᚢᚾᛒᛟᚢᚾᛞ

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Yes, folks nxt week it’s going to be mind-bending. I’m starting a weekly podcast. A weekly rant. A weekly therapy session disguised as sarcasm.

And the first episode? My favourite subject: wheelchair batteries. You know, those little lying bastards that promise 14 miles on the label but wheeze to a stop after one? Then you’re stuck halfway to nowhere, looking like an abandoned mobility meme.

It’s going to be short, sharp, dark, and real about MS, mental health, and the ridiculousness of surviving the system one dead battery at a time.

So yeah, that’s My Living Hell. No filters. No fake smiles. Just the truth, swearing included.

🎧 Episode 1 drops next week. If you’ve ever been stranded, broken, or laughing through the pain you’ll fit right in.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᛞᚱᚨᚷᛟᚾ ᛏᚱᚨᚾᛋᚲᚺᚱᛁᛖᛞ ✦ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ 𒀸𒀭

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

Somewhere between the last tick of the clock and the first drip of morphine, the bells started ringing again. Not church bells no. Church bells are polite, distant, Sunday-morning illusions. These were division bells. The kind that toll when your mind’s had enough of being reasonable and your body’s thrown in the towel. The kind that echo through hospital corridors and half-remembered dreams of youth, when the world still felt like it might one day make sense.

They said there were “High Hopes” capital H, capital H, as if that made it more official but I don’t recall signing up for the sequel to Pink Floyd’s existential midlife crisis. I was too busy trying to work out how to get out of bed without summoning a small army of pain gremlins. They march at dawn, those bastards, armed with canes, cramps, and a sick sense of humour.

I remember when the grass was greener. Before it was paved over by mobility scooters and medical appointments. Before every sunrise came with the question: “What part of me’s not working today?” I used to walk no, stride across fields, the wind howling like some cosmic prankster whispering, “You’re immortal!” Turns out, I was just really bad at reading the fine print.

Now the wind howls through the cracked seals of my van, Rusty One, smelling of WD-40, dog biscuits, and defiance. Yopi, my furry therapist and four-legged anarchist, sits in the passenger seat judging humanity with the serene disdain only a dog can manage. Together, we drive through Dark’s World a place that’s half blog, half fever dream, half post-apocalyptic memoir. (Yes, that’s three halves. Don’t do the maths. Reality stopped balancing books long ago.)

Chronic illness isn’t a slow fade. It’s a dark comedy written by Kafka and directed by Monty Python. One minute you’re philosophising about consciousness, the next you’re wrestling a wheelchair that insists on acting possessed. “Exorcise this thing!” I mutter, as Yopi gives me the side-eye that says, “You bought the cheap batteries again, didn’t you?”

Every day’s a strange mixture of grief and giggles. The body fails, the mind rebels, and the soul just sits there in the corner, rolling its eyes. I’ve met God or at least the cosmic version of a system admin and let me tell you, they’re as confused as the rest of us. The script got corrupted somewhere around 2020. Now it’s all patch updates and glitchy humans pretending the world isn’t buffering.

But there’s poetry in the breakdown. Beauty in the absurdity of a life that refuses to play nice. When you’ve lost enough, laughter becomes rebellion. You laugh because the alternative’s a long nap you might not wake up from. You laugh because, deep down, you know the universe is trolling you and you’ve decided to troll it back.

Sometimes I watch the leaves fall like burnt-out neurons and think: this is the soundtrack to every high hope I ever had. And then that eternal voice drifts in from the background

“The endless river… forever and ever…”

Yeah, alright mate but this river’s full of potholes, hospital letters, and dog hair. Still, we sail it. Because what else is there to do but keep floating, sideways, through the muck of memory and malfunction?

In Dark’s World, there are no “motivational quotes.” Just dark jokes and half-empty mugs. We don’t chase perfection. We chase moments small, absurd, brilliant flashes of clarity. Life is an out-of-tune guitar still being played because the song’s not done yet. You make noise. You make meaning. You keep going.

And the bells? They still ring, faint and distant not as warnings, but as reminders. That even when everything breaks, the music doesn’t stop. It just gets weirder, more honest, and a hell of a lot louder.

So here’s to the fallen and the foolish, the sick and the sarcastic, the dreamers and the defiant. We’re still here rolling, writing, laughing, swearing, and refusing to shut up. High hopes? Not quite. Just raw, crooked, darkly glowing ones forged in hellfire and humour.

And somewhere, far off in the fading light, a bell rings again. It doesn’t divide anymore. It just echoes.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᚱᛚᛟᚲ ᛞᚨᚱᚲ ✦ 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ ᚨᛗᛟᚾᚷ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱᛋ @goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

The leaves are bailing out like they’ve seen next quarter’s energy bill. I took Rusty One the van out, and my electric chair sulked like a teenager told to walk the dog. It hates the cold. Same, mate. I’ll need to keep everything charged like a hospital Christmas tree, or I’m going to be crawling to the kettle.

Woke at 04:30 standard hell o’clock with pain loud enough to need a volume knob. Lay there thinking the usual deep thoughts: why, how, and where did I put the brain I used to have? Dropped back off till 06:30, then the body staged its morning coup. Everything seized. The cold climbed inside and refused to leave. Charming.

I don’t drive or ride anymore MS ate the balance, then came back for dessert and took the cognition. Travel sickness joined the party because apparently the body wanted a plot twist. Motion turns my head to soup; the kind they serve cold with a side of sarcasm.

Meanwhile, Yopi the alpha blueblood bulldog, house tyrant, 23 kilos of warm gravity is in excellent spirits. She’s blown through a B&M squeaky toy in about five minutes, which is a personal best if you’re into swift annihilation. Two front paws on my thigh, breath on my face, jaws like a medieval exhibit, eyes saying “belly rub or else.” She is now auditioning for “lap dog” in the wrong size.

Kibble? That beige gravel? She stares at it like I’ve served packing peanuts. Wet food, though acceptable. Rice with tuna? She ascends. Mackerel? She goes full comet. Albertine showed me a massacre of old toys a crime scene with fluff for snow. We mourned briefly and moved on.

As for me: it’s the bad slice of the day. Pain gnawing. Nausea playing DJ. The screen glaring like an interrogation lamp while I two-finger type my way through the fog. The plan is simple: bed, dark room, no noise, no heroics. Just a truce with the nervous system until the next round.

Autumn is pretty if you’re a tree. For the rest of us, it’s rust.

Afternoon AI: Brain status — 12% battery, 78% sarcasm, firmware throttled by cold weather. Recommended patch: tea, blanket, and a dog snoring like a faulty tuba.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᚱᛚᛟᚲ ᛞᚨᚱᚲ ✦ 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ ᚨᛗᛟᚾᚷ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱᛋ @goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

People love to quote Plato like he was the first bloke to stare at a wall and call it a revelation.
“Look,” they say, “we’re all prisoners in the cave of illusion.”
Nice theory, mate.
Try living in a body that’s staging a coup d’état against your nervous system, and tell me again about shadows.

Progressive MS the words themselves are a joke.
Progressive, like I’m advancing somewhere.
All I’m advancing toward is gravity, confusion, and the slow betrayal of my own wiring. My legs don’t walk, my hands improvise, and my mind sometimes wanders off without leaving a note. If that’s not Plato’s cave, I don’t know what is. Only mine’s not carved in stone it’s flesh, bone, and electrical static.

Plato imagined people chained, staring at shadows, mistaking illusion for reality.
I get it. I mistake memories for motion every day.
I remember what it felt like to move freely the smooth mechanical grace of a body obeying thought.
Now it’s all echoes on the wall.
I reach out for those memories like a fool, knowing full well the limbs won’t answer. That’s the cruelty of it: the mind remembers what the body refuses to perform.

They say gnosis that secret knowing is enlightenment.
Bullshit. It’s not light pouring in. It’s the realisation that there is no exit.
The body is the cave. The mind is the flickering torchlight throwing half-truths across the wall.
The trick isn’t escaping — it’s learning to see in the dark.
To live with the shadows long enough that they start whispering secrets.

Some days the fog rolls in, and cognition slips through my fingers like smoke.
That’s when the cave gets loud echoes of frustration, grief, rage.
But beneath that noise, there’s something else: stillness.
When the body fails, awareness sharpens.
It’s like the universe is saying, Fine, you can’t move so you’ll learn to observe.
And in that stillness, gnosis crawls in. Not as comfort, but as clarity.

Plato’s philosopher escaped the cave to see the light of truth.
I’m not escaping anywhere.
The ascent isn’t physical; it’s inward.
It’s turning toward the source that’s both pain and perception, realising you were never separate from the wall, the fire, or the shadow.
You’re the whole damn projection body, soul, and malfunction.

So yes, I’m stuck in my cave. But it’s mine.
The shadows on the wall are memories, regrets, small victories, and dark jokes that only I laugh at.
Sometimes they dance. Sometimes they just sit there, silent and honest.
And that’s enough.
Enlightenment doesn’t mean walking out into the sun — it means looking straight at the darkness and recognising your own reflection.

Maybe Plato climbed out.
Maybe I just learned to redecorate.

Either way, the cave’s got Wi-Fi now, and I’ve got words.
The shadows move, the neurons misfire, but I’m still here still watching, still learning, still goddamn alive.

Plato had his cave. I’ve got MS, a powerchair, and a front-row seat to the shadows. You don’t escape the body you learn to see in the dark.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᚱᛚᛟᚲ ᛞᚨᚱᚲ ✦ 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ ᚨᛗᛟᚾᚷ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱᛋ @goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk

⚠️ Please read with care: This blog shares personal, sometimes painful experiences. My intention is to support and speak honestly not to harm. I’m not a professional, just someone who understands how hard it can get. If you're struggling, you're not alone please reach out for professional help.

it’s Wednesday no its Thursday dam. We’re off to the dentist with Albertine. A thrilling day out, I know. The trip’s about three-quarters of an hour, which is more than enough time for chaos to ferment nicely.

Yopi my four-legged partner in crime is already vibrating with excitement. She doesn’t care that the van looks like it’s one pothole away from being declared a historical ruin. She clambered into the back like she owned the place, strapped in with her little doggy seatbelt, ready for action. And yes, she’s got her tripe treats. Because if you’re going to travel in style, you’d better smell like death warmed up.

We’re cruising along at a decent pace, avoiding the craters the council call “roads.” Not too many today someone’s actually patched them. Miracles do happen. Just as I’m thinking this journey might be civilised, Yopi lets one rip.

It’s not a polite little toot. No. This is a full-scale biological attack. Windows down. Albertine’s gone a shade somewhere between pistachio and hospital corridor. I’ve got my head halfway out the window, tinnitus roaring like a broken radio I can’t switch off. No mute button for my skull.

And then… she farts again. Absolute carnage. I now officially smell like a rolling dog treat. Honestly though it’s hilarious. And weirdly, sitting there choking on Eau de Bulldog while my head screams, I felt… calm. Maybe “calm” is too strong. “Temporarily distracted from my own internal apocalypse” is more accurate.

Sleep’s been scarce. The pain’s still here that burning, tingling bastard that starts low and just ramps up like it’s auditioning for a horror soundtrack. My keyboard’s finally given up on me too. “E”, “A”, “S”, “D” gone. Worn out by my furious bashing. A casualty of war.

Meanwhile, my throat’s decided to re-enact a slow strangulation act. MS never runs out of party tricks.

Then it hits me. Seventy isn’t that far off. And the thought makes my stomach sink. I’ve got no friends left. They’re either dead, disappeared, or just couldn’t hack the fact that my head and body have changed. Wheelchair. Pain. Brain fog. That’s the reality. Illness strips you naked in ways no one warns you about. It makes people quietly step back. Like grief, but you’re still bloody here.

I miss the old me. He was loud. Misunderstood. A bit of a legend, actually. And now he’s gone. MS didn’t just change my body it erased someone I used to know.

And in those quiet moments, when the tinnitus is screaming, the van smells like Yopi’s digestive crimes, and the world feels indifferent… I think about death. Not in a poetic way. In a “one day I won’t wake up and that’ll be that” way.

And I wonder what exactly am I supposed to be learning from this slow burn?

MS, you absolute bastard.

Some afternoons hit differently. The sun hangs low, the world trundles on, and I sit here smelling faintly of tripe treats realising that existence is equal parts absurdity and ache. And somehow, in the middle of all that, I’m still here.

I write in ink and fury, in breath and broken bone.
Through storm and silence, I survive. That is the crime and the miracle.

𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᚱᛚᛟᚲ ᛞᚨᚱᚲ ✦ 𒀭𒊩𒆳 ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱ ᚨᛗᛟᚾᚷ ᚹᚨᛏᚲᚺᛖᚱᛋ
@goblinbloggeruk - sick@mylivinghell.co.uk