I've been writing a story at the moment that basically documents the time around Mum's death. I'm fobbing it off as fiction but basically it's non-fiction with changed names. I think it's very good therapy, although at times it can be quite upsetting to write about it and have to remember everything. But I feel good getting it down. It makes it feel like I'm not losing everything from then; that even though the memories suck they're not going to just fade away and become pain-free. That may sound like a bad thing but I don't want them to stop being painful. Maybe that sounds masochistic; it's just that sometimes I wonder if I'm becoming inured to everything in life and I don't think that's a very good, human place to be. I think pain can be a good thing sometimes. It makes me know I'm alive.

It'll probably be the piece I hand in for my next writing assessment, or at the very least for the next workshop I have to write something for. If the teacher tells me I don't know my character well enough or asks why I'm writing the story again, I'll probably scream.