Writing Horror as Therapy

I have never been someone who has read or written a great deal of horror fiction. Nor was I the kind of person who would watch scary movies, even from behind the sofa. It is therefore a strange turn of events to find myself interested in writing horror. The journey to the state of mind is not driven by mere impulse, but by an accumulation of experiences that have made it both possible and necessary.

I have a very long history of severe depression with over ten years of fluctuating moods. These have ranged over the day-to-day nature of existence from a fairly relaxed contentment to the pitch black darkness of personal torment. I struggle to attain those "peaks" of euphoria that may come more naturally to other people, though I can occasionally get a flicker of them thinking about certain times, people and situations. I have been very fortunate to have had my parents provide for me as I have been unable and unwilling to work for this time. It has been a very rewarding time in terms of intellectual exploration, but I would happily have filled it with some other measure of accomplishment marked by getting a job, making friends, having a boyfriend or a girlfriend and maybe getting in to a financial situation in which I could support myself and live on my own.

I was always a "good" person and the people pleasing "nice guy", but depression encourages you to break those patterns and to seek out the darker and more selfish side of life. You aren't really the good guy if you are doing it only out of fear of what other people will think of you. The authenticity of the villain and the courage to live fearless of the opinion of others are an intoxicating brew that ultimately makes you a better person for confronting hard truths about who you really are and what you really want. You are living for yourself after all and your sense of right and wrong undergoes a considerable evolution as you learn to enjoy things you once thought taboo. It is abundantly clear that I would be better off if I let me demons have a little more free reign to tip the balance in favour of enjoying life a little more. Fortunately, you can do monstrous things in fiction and question moral certainties and get away with it in the name of entertainment. So there is much fun to be had with a subversive intellect, a dark sense of humour and a willing audience.

Depression is simultaneously very ugly and very beautiful, a gift and a curse at once. I don't know whether it truly belongs in horror as a genre, but the ability to appreciate those subtle gradations of feelings that mark out the nature of tragedy is really healthy and like learning to see in colour after years of black and white. I have had quite a range of violent and suicidal thoughts over the past few years which have coloured my experience, even though I have never acted on them and believe I have safely reached a point of resilience where I would not act on them. Writing horror provides a therapeutic space to explore these feelings, the moral ambiguities, the complex motivations that bring the darker dimensions of ourselves to the surface. The fear of something is often worse than the thing fear itself.

Given these personal circumstances, I was never wildly optimistic about the future, but nowadays it is really important to grapple with the many complex and difficult emotions that the news headlines can elicit. If you have mental health problems, it is absolutely essential to cut down the amount of time you look at the news and focus on doing things for yourself. Ideally, those things that are rewarding, productive and leave you a sense of accomplishment. Perfectly the art of writing, being one example. But we are all caught up in some great storms and they will affect us eventually, if perhaps in different ways and to varying degrees.

The breaking point for me has been the grim realisation that people were going to put their own lives at risk in the middle of a pandemic. There really is no rational way for me to process that because I'm not cruel enough to think people deserve to suffer, even if it may be the result of their own actions. Whether it is protesting lock-down, refusing to wear masks or wash your hands, it is so very strange and frightening to think we know ways to keep ourselves safe and we have chosen not to do so. In choosing to endanger ourselves and others, based on some bizarre cocktail of refusing to accept facts or to make necessary changes, we are now solidly dealing with themes that belong in horror fiction. We are our own worst enemies, we are inflicting deep and lasting wounds on ourselves and grappling with trauma. We have unleashed our darkest thoughts, desires and ambitions on to the world and are still complacent to their effects. Future generations will have much opportunity to comment on what these events mean and what the context is, but they belong in a category of profound insight and self-awareness which we are struggling to achieve.

Looking further in the years and decades ahead in which I may play out my existence, there is the lurking expectation that things will not radically improve whatever my intentions may be. I could well make a full recovery from my mental health problems and fulfil the obligations and expectations of functioning in society: having a successful career, making money, having a family and providing for them, and all the rest. But that does increasingly feel as a vulnerable island of tranquillity in a stormy sea of torments.

Horror provides a set of symbols, images and stories to explore those difficult and complex emotions in a safer and more healthy way. From a mental health perspective, you could say it may increase your resilience and your tolerance to stress- not indefinitely, but just nudge it up a little by having a greater understanding of what you fear and why . As a work of fiction, it is therefore better to hold these problems at a distance, allowing them to filter though in works of fiction rather than their full and awesome intensity. I wouldn't call it outright denial, only a very selective one so that I am not overwhelmed given the vulnerability I have with my mental health.

For me personally though, I hold on to some sense that we can do better, even if we chose not to. It is simply that we keep choosing the counter-productive path and it reflects defects in character and our values. It is very weird to be someone who has been suicidal for such a long time and who has decided he wants to survive, even as he looks around and wanders if other people share that conviction by how much they seem to put themselves in harms way.

I look forward to getting through this year, ideally alive, sane and intact. Writing provides both a means of occupying myself and working through those aspects of my life and the world that need to be treated with care, even a degree of affection and yet do so in a way that is combines the best of being serious and playful without the dangers of brooding too deeply and darkly. I'll have to wait and see what I actually write when I set pen to paper though, but as a summary of where I am I think this is a fair amount of reflection to encourage the creative process. It is perhaps better to think of it as learning how to be a kid again and get in touch with that emotional core of self that never ages, but is only buried under the myth of maturity. Horror reminds us we are all basically children frightened of the monsters hiding under the bed.