Simon grew up in London in a working-class family and had an idyllic’ first six years; then his mother got very acute postnatal depression and ended up in hospital. He did very well at school and got into drugs at the age of 16 which he thinks was the beginning of [his] problems. He did LSD as it was all the rage’ and had some bad trips. Later he went to university and studied the wrong subject’ and couldn’t really get into the work. He took another LSD trip and he thinks his schizophrenia began then. He felt totally isolated’ and started hearing voices from the other students. He knew nothing about schizophrenia or hearing voices and just took them as part of reality. After this time he left university and his friend told him to stay in the country for a while with other people, which he did, although they also took drugs.

Simon went back to London and started reading Chinese philosophy which made him worse as he didn’t really understand what [he] was reading’. He was seeing visions of Jesus Christ saying in front of him You’re just like me’. Eventually he was taken to see a psychiatrist and he knew nothing about sections and things. He consented to have ECT, which improved his depression, but he felt that a course of 12 which was too many’, so he stopped. There was a whole chunk’ of his memory that was missing. He didn’t like hospital as they kept him in pyjamas and it was pretty awful’. He remembers seeing another man having the same ECT getting dozier and dozier’. He found hospital boring and asked to leave. Looking back he wished he’d stayed a bit longer, as he came home and got a job and couldn’t do it. He wandered around the streets as there weren’t any day centres to go to. He kept getting the sack because of his illness.

Simon was on Stelazine, Modecate, and Depixol in the early days and describes it as awful’. He used to drink as well and kept falling asleep in the pub with friends. After a holiday in Scotland he came off his tablets and it was pretty strange’. He ran out of money and went home and ended up in hospital again. He was there for four months, didn’t have ECT and got really into art work. He then went to a Richmond fellowship hostel which really helped [‚] a lot’. He was introduced to therapy and counselling and didn’t see its benefit at the time’ but says it did help.

Now he is resigned to taking the tablets, as he read a book which said draw your life as a graph with highs and lows, and he realised he threw away his tablets when he reached a high and then went down’ and stayed there for a couple of years. He stopped smoking cannabis at the age of 35 after being paranoid and gave up drinking at the age of 40. He did a degree and threw away his medication at the end of his first year (during which he had done very well) and just scraped through’ the next two years. After his degree he got a job, threw away his tablets and got involved with some mad therapists who encouraged him to come off medication, and he got ill again’. He had a job and kept getting the sack, and in the recession he spent 5 years looking for work. In the end his illness came back and has been out of work ever since, from the age of 45. He now doesn’t think anyone would employ him’. Five years ago he was in hospital after getting very isolated’ and got very strange indeed’. In hospital he was suicidal. He joined group therapy and was part of a gardening group.

Simon got involved with the mental health service users movement, does art, writing, and sculpture, and engages in voluntary work. He has been involved with the Hearing Voices Network.