Thank you for taking the time to come here, i appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.

There is much suffering in this turbulent world of ours. Suffering that screams for attention. Sometimes its cries are heard sometimes they fall upon deaf ears and on other occasions those in the direst of need can be little heard or understood. 

I have chosen Rethink as a charity i wish to raise money for because i wanted to help with an illness that is close to my heart and closer still to my mind. The insular and introverted worlds of Schizophrenics are full of an acute form of suffering simply incomparable to sufferance of a physical nature.

Individuals experiences of Psychosis/Schizophrenia vary drastically yet they all hold some common ground. The predominant factor being an all-encompasing loneliness/hopelessness with a weight of suffering that should not, without exaggeration or sentimentality, be carried by anything. It is a by-product of an unhealthy mode/mentality towards living which our current society seems to accept as the norm. The most sensitive among us are the most prone to the disease.

Thank you for taking the time to come here, i appreciate it from the bottom of my heart.

This illness has been described by Rethink as an abandoned one. An apt and deserved title. It is all to easy to cast a form of suffering that is not instantly visible to the eye to one side or more commonly still, under the rug. It is all too easy to be afraid of what we do not understand.

"Goverment and Media have played up the risks mentally ill people pose rather than the risks they run. Though this has improved in recent years both still contribute to the stigmatisation of the most vulnerable in society. It must stop." - Jeremy Laurance - Member of the Commision Rethink. 

Imagine a still mind, one numb to seemingly external interference. A peaceful mind that could set task to whatever it wished. A mind as a tool to be used and perhaps more importantly to be put down by its owner at his or her will. This is the goal. to defeat the horrors which entail in the lives of those whose minds are not their own, who's minds torture and and emaciate their souls. The fact of the matter is that our minds are the most precious things we will ever own and are subsequently worth proper nourishment, care and protection. Our biggest enemies are always ourselves, a schizophrenics most certainly is. We wage civil war, and for what? 

I wish the world was a more gentle place but this notion couldn't be further from the truth. There is simply no use in pretending it is by covering our eyes. Something all of us especially here in the west are guilty of. We cannot heal our wounds until we accept them.

If you have money that you can spare please consider donating to this cause as it is much needed and will be intelligently used, trust me i have made enquiries.

To motivate you into parting with your change and believing in this cause i will be running the full length of Hadrian's Wall on the 8th of January with Marc Wallace, one of my dearest and most trusted friends. It was Marc who got me out of Germany and back home safely during my first psychotic episode.  An act which he described as one of the most tiring of his life, and the guy has run ultra-marathons all over the world. 

So he's the one who talked me into this and i am so excited to have this adventure with him. It will hold different meanings for us both but it will feel good to battle, endure and achieve them together! 88 miles on rough terrain as fast as we can probably in the snow. Marc has also convinced me despite my projections and concerns that real men would do this run "unsupported", which essentially means no pub dinners or B&B's. Imagine my horror to discover our biggest comforts will be ration packs and sleeping bags. But he's promised me a good night out in Newcastle after we've made it!?!?! If we make it, please feel free to join us!

Lots of love

Joey