BBC’s ‘Ghosts’… is my reality

This blog may contain spoilers for the TV show ‘Ghosts’

In case you’re not aware Ghosts is a BBC comedy about a couple (Alison and Mike) who inherit a mansion. Alison falls out of a window and has a head injury which causes her to be able to see and hear ghosts. And there are several ghosts living in their house.

The BBC comedy series Ghosts is one of my very favourite things to watch. I am incredibly in love with it, so much so that I have watched the first four series about 15 times, and the latest fifth series 3 times.

It is a show that I love, the humour, and the writing just makes me laugh and cry.

However, there is another reason why I resonate with the show so much. And that is that I am schizophrenic.

The ways Alison interacts with the ghosts really resonates with how I interact with my various hallucinations.

I have multiply hallucinations, including:

-visual

-auditory

-olfactory (smell)

-texture/touch

-taste

All of these types of hallucinations are featured in how I resonate with the show Ghosts.

When Alison first starts to see and hear the Ghosts, it starts of as if ghost Julian is one of the builders and she reacts to him just as a regular person.

However, then as she starts to see and hear more of the ghosts then Alison becomes very scared, overwhelmed and distressed.

When I first started to have hallucinations they were things like I heard my name being shouted or random alarms and bells. Originally I didn’t think much of it. I presumed they were things that were real and actually happening.

However, it wasn’t until I was around others that couldn’t hear the sounds I could that I began to realise that they were only being heard by myself.

As the ghosts start to show themselves more visually and auditory, plus smell in Mary’s case, then Alison started to become increasingly distressed.

As I started to experience more hallucinations. Especially the visual hallucinations that I was seeing myself dead. I became more and more distressed.

Alison begins to accept the ghosts and with this acceptance comes new relationships.

As Alison accepts the ghosts then she begins to interact with them differently. No longer scared or distressed but rather acquaintances.

For me beginning to accept the various hallucinations took many, many years of turmoil and distress.

Of distressing hallucinations, being scared and frightened.

Constantly scared.

However, as I began to accept the hallucinations then things changed.

In Ghosts Alison often has to pretend to be doing something else to be able to interact with the ghosts.

For example an episode where Alison and her husband Mike have a party at their house, then Alison pretends to be on the phone in order to talk to one of the ghosts called Kitty. She says ‘I’m sorry kitty but I can’t talk right now because I have friends over’

Trying to come up with ways in which to not let those around me know that I’m hallucinating, is exhausting.

I have in the past pretended to be on the phone when I was semi verbal and often talked to the voices or shouted at them to go away.

One episode in the first series where Alison and Mike have their very posh neighbours over for dinner.

The ghosts are celebrating the moon and come into the room where Alison and Mike are hosting. The ghosts sing and dance around and through the table. Alison is struggling to concentrate on what is being said.

She starts to raise her voice and shout as the ghosts overwhelm her.

Having constant auditory hallucinations is very overwhelming. They can be so overwhelming that I can’t concentrate on anything else around me. I zone out of what is going on around me.

When the visual hallucinations also join in then what is around me is just a right off. I can’t cope at all.

When one of the ghosts, Mary, moves on (or gets sucked off as Mary called it!) then there is a sadness amongst the fellow ghosts and Alison. They mourn her. And are generally sad and confused.

And although I haven’t mourned hallucinations, I have definitely had a sense of confusion and some sadness when some of them go.

Especially when my orchestral music hallucination has come and gone. I like that hallucination for the whole and it is sad when it goes, I do miss it.

Although Ghosts is a comedy series, for me it’s much more than that.

It’s a comfort show that I watch over and over. However, it is also a way in which I can explain a part of my schizophrenia, the hallucination parts, to others.

I am Alison and the ghosts are my hallucinations.

As a schizophrenic trying to pretend to not be hallucinating is constantly exhausting and draining.

People who don’t hallucinate can never comprehend what hallucinating is like. However, if you get a chance to watch the series ‘Ghosts’ then it can give you a small insight into what it is like to hallucinate. And how interacting with said hallucinations is exhausting and takes a lot of energy to hide it from others.