BBC Ouch: Storytelling Live

issues. The show is produced by the BBC's disability strand, Ouch!, and

he strong language. -- and it contains strong language.

Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the host but tonight, Sofie Hagen.

-- your host for tonight. Thank you. Thank you very much. Hello and

welcome to BBC Ouch! Storytelling Live. The stories we are going to be

hearing tonight are about love and relationships, and I do have a very

long massive relationship with my psychologist. Am I right, BBC Ouch!

People? High five! I have been seeing him for ten years now. --

she. She is always tried to get me out of my mental health issues. And

that is quite a view. We have depression, we have anxiety, and

binge eating disorder, which is the cool one. I do not you know about

that. It is when you eat so that you can't feel anything. Write Mac

because there is a lot of pain inside, because, you know, you can

feel the bones, and to swallow them, and there is a lot of pain in my

throat after a good piece of chicken... My psychologist is

amazing. She is a very good psychologist. An incredible

psychologist. Those who can't see me, I am fat. And that is not a bad

thing. I like being fat. I love my body. I think everybody should love

my body. Because... Why wouldn't you? So that means that sometimes it

will give me advice on how to lose weight. It will be like, you need to

stop eating sugar. I am like a cannot. Because then I will feel. I

will feel. That is the reason I eat. So that I don't feel feelings. Eight

have depression and anxiety. I do want to fill my feeling. My

psychologist tried to fix as one. We were trained to deal with some of

the feelings that I can't show, like anger. I don't know how to express

anger. So when I do express anger, it kind of explodes, right? So she

tried to fix that. She said to me, you know,, next time you feel angry,

train express it. I said, oh no. I don't think that... I don't think

there is enough food in the world for me to feel angry. I'm sorry,

that will not happen. She said, next time you feel anger, said the words

I am angry. I said OK, this is a new. I went from that session, I was

very pleased with what I was about to do. I was like, I am going to go

out and try and feel my anger, and I to train express it. I was

practising the sentence, I am angry. Blee but it happened. I can set out

loud. And my best friend, it she is a very optimistic and happy person.

She is away smiling. Like, she believes in things they love... What

an idiot, right? And she met me the station, and I hoped her. And she

said my God, I am happy to see you. I said I was happy to see her. She

said you were to go to dinner? I Shaw. She said what you feel like

eating? I said I don't know. Asked. She said she wanted Greek food. And

then I punched in the face. I punched in the face. I saw this

happen in motion. I could just see my first... I was like I am

expressing feelings, and my heart was like, don't do it. This is what

we were afraid of! I saw my first just hit her stupid smiling face,

and she never once stopped smiling. She was just like, OK, we will get

pasta. I felt so bad. I did not know what to do. I hit my friend. I do

want to be that kind of person. I felt bad and she was looking at me

with her big blue eyes. I did not know what to say. And ideas that, I

am angry. -- and I just said that. And I stopped feeling feelings for

the rest of my life. That is somewhat of a fairytale. I would

love to introduce you to the first person in the stage. Are you up for

being very, very nice? Of course you are. Give it up for your first

guest. Everyone has taken all the good disabilities. So I got left

with dyspraxia. It is a developmental co-ordination

disorder. It is the less sexy cousin of dyslexia, which you will have

heard about. It largely affects motor control and speech and memory

and information processing. What generally happens as I fall over a

lot and cock everything out. As warning. Watch this space. I love

living alone, because people. So my favourite activity is sitting on the

server on my pants, watching the telly. I am all about that. I can't

keep pets or houseplants alive, so certainly can't keep love and

affection life. It is far too much affection to make responsibility. I

thought about online dating. It plays on your insecurities. It is

terrifying, because you're waiting there to meet the state, and you

have written your profile, and you're thinking, well, maybe taking

ten years off my age was too much. I did use flattering photos, and

pretend that I was not actually mental. Site because of their

worried about what they go dipping. So you're waiting to see him, and

you are thinking his could be right. Because people are better than that.

And in mainstream media would have us believe everybody is shallow and

observes that how you look, but I find in my experience that real

people will be able to see behind the method you really are, and

realise you're a beautiful person. And like that. So is feeling buoyed

up about it. I see him come out of the station. I clock on, and I

thought, you minger. And with dyspraxia, I was very loud is wary

and scary. Especially that no people, I get a bit overpowering and

overwhelming. People get nervous around it. This is what they said.

Obviously, it is nonsense, and I will fight anyone who says

otherwise. But this is just a classic dyspraxia symptom. I didn't

realise. As the ghost is this fascinating person with all these

quirks and so interesting, but it was very upsetting to find out that

I'm entirely 2-dimensional. Just take condition. So the state already

looks nervous. And that is before it all comes out. Just the presentation

alone is scaring the guy. I thought of thought we would go to the

nearest pub. And I am stumbling over, to be over, as they do. And we

try to get into the bouncer says you cannot come in. And the guy says you

are too drunk, you cannot come in. I get this a lot. Not always 1-iron

drunk. So turn to the guy and as you know, arguably bouncer, it you

always win. -- not always when I am drunk. So I am not being gracious in

defeat. I am just wearing a stumping off, having ago and vindicating him

under my breath. But I thought I was looking good because I was in my

high heels. I put them on a specially. I can't walk in high

heels. Cannot. Cannot stand in them. But this doesn't stop me. I am in

denial. I imagine that makes it look like some girly delicate flower, all

sanguine and sexy. Not like the angry tractor that are usually look

like. And evidently, we are going along and I fall. And I don't fall

in the wet I would fall in my head. -- the way. That is how I would like

to fall. No, I come along and stuck it on the pavement. It is just as

terrible mess of rigging. Everybody is aware of it. My advice is don't

start out. Just a on the ground. I have done it; is. You stay down,

they start to worry. They think, oh, hang on. -- just stay on the ground.

Stay on the ground. You have your pride. Stay on. So my day pics above

the ground, and I was quite amazed he did not let it -- stoppered in

the first place. So I go in and the landlady city bleeding everywhere,

and comes with toilet paper to say the furniture. I am sitting there

with blood and tissues, because that as to the ambulance of a sexy date.

-- meals. So at this point, I am covered bed drinking and crying. --

ambience. And I am just asking why it is happening to me. This part of

the day, your message out. Smalltalk conversation, I can't do. I don't

understand. I had written to use up my arm and tried to pass it off as a

trouble to do. So I am chatting away. What do you do? Where do you

live? Pause for response... I think, no. Every bit as scintillating as

you might imagine. So we decided to leave, of our own volition, which is

excellent. Not being asked to leave. So just get back home in traffic at

all about it, watch cartoons, sit on the sofa in my pants, watching

television. Equilibrium is restored. In a few days later, the date texts

me and wants to see me again. Why? Why would you put yourself through

that? What sort of person would want to experience is that all again?

What sort of self-esteem problems do have, large? Absolutely ridiculous.

I do know anyone who wants a go at me again. -- lad. What a loser. This

might be the reason I been single for ten years. -- I do not know

anyone who wants to go with me again. Thank you. You have been

fantastic. My God, that was her first time ever on stage. I have

slept with worse comedians than that. That was amazing. We are about

to have another storyteller on the stage. Are you ready for that? Yes!

Give an amazing round of applause for Mick Scarlett! Now, when I first

discussed with the BBC ouch team what I would be talking about today,

I asked to talk about how I met my wonderful wife, who is sitting quite

there. -- Ouch! . This arresting her across the gas law and how I

immediately knew she was the one for me. No, they said. No, that is

really boring. What we want is something edgy. Sabena will push

boundaries. And I thought, I know, I will talk about my Willy, and sex.

Because that is edgy, isn't it? -- willy. I work up on the day my

Germanotta level, and my legs hurt. And I fell over every, to

understand. And embolus was called and I was rushed to hospital. It

transpired that my spine has collapsed. Yes, it is true, you can

break your back in your sleep. I just thought I would tell all you

biped is that you make your day. Eventually, at out-of-hospital, and

as you can tell, I had lost the ability to walk. -- bipeds. There

was no more standing for me. There was also no more standing to

attention down there. I had lost what the doctors called erectile

function. I knew that would happen. Complete silence. I thought, that is

aired. Game over. I thought that was it. I got really down and depressed.

I thought, I would become the best male friend. And all my girlfriends

would come around and do their hair and do their make-up, and I were

dressed all up, and then I would send out on dates. Normally, with

blokes wearing leather jackets, which is why I always wear one, they

don't want pets, and if they are real bustards, they own a Ford

Capri. And that was a giveaway sign that it would be bad. And then what

would happen is that she would come back at the end of the night and

cry. She was a he had sex with me and dumped me, why could they be

late you? I, of course, did not see this as what I would now recognises

a come on. I saw the thought that they would never want to be in the

because I cannot tell. So I thought, or you, it you'll be fine excite. My

best e-mail friends said they had met this girl, adding she is great.

What you Country Party admit her and all of the President of course. So

of course I was the one where the most make-up and a room. We are all

getting along all famously. As was the fashion, back then, we played

again. Drew Butera. We played it at every party. I don't know why

because it always ended with a row. Normally because we'll always

truthful or two daring, too truthful, but I thought this could

be at. This could be my chance. I could tell my secret. Up till then,

I had kept it quiet. My brother did not know, might parents did not

know, even my doctor didn't. I was going to admit to Mr Floppy. What a

sympathetic and caring? Not at first. You know when people have bad

thing, where it is not funny any more, they are just upset. But

eventually, my friend wiped away her tears, got her breath back, wiped

her tears away, and likely across the head. She said we are girls, we

don't have willies. We make love to girls and do it well. I easily had

not worked that out. Which kind of shows how innocent I was as a

teenager. So at the time, lesbianism and feminism were very closely

associated, and very radical, these girls were. And they truly believe

what was wrong with the planet was men and their wrecked function and

penetration. All can treasure and was bad. So suddenly, I was this new

type of man, a man who... The next revolutionary leap, according to the

skills! They thought it was great! I really like these girls. Cool. And

they took me under their wing. And they even made me and I'm very

lesbian. And as to go on lesbian marches. There was me and a load of

girls and just this bloke wearing lots of make-up and looking like boy

George on wheels. Down with men, men are bad! And they also taught me how

to make love to a woman like a woman. I wonder how many people out

there are matching it with pornographic thing. No, I'm still a

guy. They still wouldn't go near me, but they just taught me, told me,

with words, not actions. Sadly, but there you go. And when I was telling

the BBC about this, they said Aegerter tell you in? Even tells of

a circus that a dinner tell us? Please tell us! Well I won't. No.

I'm afraid I will not let you know, because that would be betraying the

sisterhood. -- are you going to tell last? And let it as it was out. So

girls, if you want to know it is like, you will have to make love

dormant. That was amazing. I think everybody

could learn from that story. Everybody. Everybody! If anybody

wants to buy me a pint I will be at the bar. Ready for another

storyteller? Pick your hands together and give it up for the

amazing Sean Lucas. -- put your hands.

Hello. So, I grew up with hearing loss. It means that essentially I

cannot function in society without my hearing aids. The funny thing is

that I didn't wear them until I was about 20 years old. So for the first

20 years of my life I didn't hear much. So how did I get by? I

essentially hung out with a lot of lovely people. I grew up in Italy,

so, I mean... You have heard some of those people over there. I come from

a family, we are 14 people. Everybody is really loud. You can't

understand how loud they are. Every time I go back for Christmas I have

to take my hearing aids off. It is just crazy. So, I had a girlfriend.

Her name is a lease. She is the Tisch, from Newcastle, but she does

not have a Geordie accent otherwise I would not understand what she is

saying. She speaks very badly and moves her hands a lot. As an Italian

I find this very attractive. The only thing is, she can speak quite

fast. When we moved in together, communication was a little bit

complicated. The colours she is not used to speaking to somebody who has

hearing loss. -- because shears. So she speaks to me like have perfect

hearing. Even if I have my hearing aids, I cannot hear 100%. If I am in

the kitchen, cooking, and you walk into the room and start talking to

me right away when I am not seeing you. I cannot hear, very likely,

that the year of what you just said. Even worse, if you speak to me from

a different room. So I had to tell Elyce, when you speak to me, don't

cover your mouth, don't mumble, and don't speak to me from another room.

But Elyce will forget. So I had to come up with a new strategy. So my

strategy was, a sickly, I was going to train Elyce as if she was a dog.

-- basically. So every time I could not hear how I would interrupter and

tell her what she did wrong. Elyce, you didn't speak while facing me.

Elyce, you are mumbling. And I'm annoying myself now, so imagine how

annoying I was to her. So obviously I thought this was a great idea and

I kept going. I took it one step further and introduced the marks on

the wall. We had a chalkboard at home and I said, Elyce, every time

you make a mistake, we are going to make a mark on the wall. Which

didn't work out, because believe it or not, I realised one day that she

wasn't a dog. What really work, we decided on a couple of ground rules.

The first rule was that we would always speak in the same room, no

exceptions. The second rule was the attention rule. Elyce would always

try to get my attention first and I would always give my attention to

her, so I would stop doing something and tune in. This worked because we

were both relaxed and we were open to accepting criticism. It wasn't

like I was trying to interrupter all the time. -- interrupted her. Elyce

came up with ways of getting my attention instead of calling my name

all the time. What she did was start using filler words. So before

starting to speak to me she would start seeing, by the way, all, you

know what? This was great, because it gave me the time to tune in. I

miss much less now, but I still miss things, but a beautiful thing is

that I don't get frustrated any more it is I know that she cares. Thank

you. Amazing. That's so good. We have one

more storyteller this evening. Are you up for that? You have been

great, everybody has been great so far. The spec storyteller is

somebody I am very proud to know. You will love him. Please start

cheering and applauding for the amazing Harriet Dyer.

I am wearing an outfit that sums up metal health, you are welcome.

That's my thing. I've got bipolar and it has caused some mayhem in my

relationships. I've got a boyfriend at the moment and he is proper, it

is absolutely lovely. Before this understanding boyfriend, that guy I

was seeing before had a problem with me doing stand-up comedy, beakers, I

think, he thought it attacked his masculinity. He kept telling me that

his job was more important and all of that. One day we were in bed and

he was telling me how good he would be at comedy. So he was pretending

there was a front row of women, they were women in the front row, and he

was seen, if you do not laugh at my jokes, you are obviously lesbians.

That is who I was dating. And then he has seen my medication, by my

bed, and he asked what it was. I am an open book so I said what it was

and he goes, does that mean you are going to kill me in the night? It

didn't mean that, but if you carry on talking... The first time I

thought I was in love I was at university and this guy, I just

couldn't leave that somebody like him would be interested in me. --

believe. He was so good-looking. There were signs that maybe it was

not to be. This was a sign. Once in the bad I woke up in the middle of

the night with a very wet back. And I thought, why is my back wet. He

said, sorry, babe. I dreamt you were arrayed urinal. He dreamt that I was

a urinal, and he three weed on my back in the middle of the night.

That is not a keeper. At university there was this girl, I worshipped

the ground she walked on. I thought she was wonderful, really strong and

independent and funny, I really liked. So she became my best friend.

After a while, going out with this guy, I said to my friend, something

doesn't sit right with me. I don't trust him. She is my best friend, so

I opened up about stuff and all of that. She said, no, this is just

your mental health telling you this, it is all in your head. So I

thought, all right. When I spoke to him about it he said the same thing.

So I said, OK, that is what has happened. They were together, right?

They were getting together. And when I properly caught them, they were

doing the whole, yes, this is because of your childhood, Harriet,

dissent about. It was not even what they had done, it was the fact they

using that against me. I was livid. I was livid. They started lying to

me, and I punched them vote in the face, but, because I am not a

fighter, I have punched them both in the forehead, and I have broken both

my hands. Honestly. And then, because they were such horrible

people, that was not enough, I have gone home and then she has rang the

police. So the next morning I am in my residence, and I get woken up why

the police and they arrest me. So I have then been carted to a prison

cell, they just put me on the cell with this guy, and he had one tooth,

and he was just chatting nonsense to me. He told me he invented

toothpaste, right? I said, what are you on about? It made me laugh,

after all this nonsense. I have gone, mate, I don't think you did

invent toothpaste. And he's gone, no, if you think about it. If

somebody with lots of teeth invented toothpaste, it would be called

teethpaste. And I thought, you can't really argue with that, really. And

that is, honest to God, that is on my record forever. I used to do

teaching, and that is just so sad that is on my record. Thank you ever

so much. Cheers. Harriet Dyer! Give it up for all the stories you have

heard tonight. You have all been lovely. Have a good night!

There will be some chilly nights this weekend.

There will be frost for some of us as the weekend begins,