A Descent Into Psychosis: When Reality Became Unrecognisable
In January 2015, medical professionals arrived at a mother's home to find a young man wearing his deceased grandfather's tasselled cowboy jacket with his chest bare, a shoelace fashioned as a headband, and what appeared to be blood smeared across his forehead. The crimson substance was artificial, but the crisis was profoundly real. This marked the beginning of a harrowing mental health journey for Cal Speet, then aged twenty, who had recently withdrawn from the University of Brighton due to deteriorating psychological wellbeing.
The Buildup to Breakdown
Months of escalating mania preceded this intervention, driven by multiple factors. The perceived collapse of his future prospects created significant stress, while excessive cannabis consumption exacerbated his fragile mental state. This potent combination propelled him toward a psychological breaking point where conventional reality dissolved entirely.
Understanding Time to Talk Day
Time to Talk Day represents an annual initiative within the United Kingdom focused on mental health awareness and dialogue. The event aims to diminish stigma while encouraging open conversations about psychological wellbeing through community activities, digital campaigns, and supportive resources.
The Height of Delusion: Believing in Divine Purpose
As mania transitioned into full-blown psychosis, Speet developed increasingly bizarre behaviours. These included applying tribal face paint, sending emotional video messages to authors he admired, and conducting nocturnal runs through his hometown while leaving banknotes beneath plant containers. His conviction that the world rather than himself had lost rationality became increasingly difficult to maintain.
Like numerous individuals experiencing psychotic episodes, he became convinced of his own divinity. He believed himself a celestial being sent to prevent planetary destruction by an approaching meteor. His elaborate plan involved correlating celestial patterns with markings on his forearm before leaping from Stonehenge's heights, expecting to sprout wings and avert catastrophe.
The Logic of Delusion
This self-deification seemed rational within his altered perception. Having transformed profound post-university depression into daily euphoria, he concluded supernatural explanation was necessary. He partially attributed his supposed anointment to standing barefoot outdoors while staring directly at the sun—a practice he mistakenly believed represented forgotten photosynthesis, but which actually damaged his vision permanently.
Medical Intervention and Pharmaceutical Reality
Ultimately, his mother contacted their local general practitioner regarding his erratic conduct, prompting an urgent home assessment. Medical professionals persuaded him to trial anti-psychotic medication with compelling logic: if his experiences were authentic, pharmaceutical intervention wouldn't negate them. The medication proved effective, initiating a gradual then precipitous return to conventional reality.
The Crushing Aftermath
Following prescription compliance, Speet descended into profound sedation before becoming largely bedbound. This post-psychosis depression differed fundamentally from previous experiences, characterized by emotional numbness, cognitive void, and memory loss due to common side-effects of his condition. His internal dialogue ceased entirely, leaving only persistent underlying terror about identity and future.
The Restorative Power of Human Connection
During three months of bleak isolation, with only repeated film screenings for company, salvation emerged through friendship. Despite initial resistance, his best friend Ruby persisted in visiting his squalid living space. Without hesitation, she joined him in bed, watching familiar television episodes while offering consistent companionship.
Finding Humour in Darkness
Her gentle reminders of his psychotic behaviours—including stealing a plasma ball while believing it could facilitate communication with celebrity Nicki Minaj—eventually sparked laughter. This absurdity began displacing devastation as regular visits created routine comfort. Her approach combined tenderness, kindness, and humour to gradually rebuild his connection to humanity.
Gradual Recovery and New Perspectives
Incremental improvement followed as memories resurfaced and basic self-care resumed. Remarkably, both post-psychosis depression and longstanding pre-psychosis melancholy eventually dissipated. Speet reconnected with friends, secured employment, and ultimately completed university education in Manchester.
Creative Expression and Moving Forward
A decade later, his novel Spiralling emerged from this experience, published by HarperNorth and set in Manchester. This relationship comedy follows a young man navigating emotional trauma while clinging to friendship's sustaining power—the same lifeline that preserved Speet during his darkest period.
The experience created definitive division between his pre- and post-psychosis identity, leaving psychological bruises but also transformative perspective. Having survived public humiliation and perceived future destruction, he emerged with hard-won understanding about mental health resilience and recovery pathways.
