A New Podcast: Fractured Ink

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A significant transition is underway as I prepare to close "Schizophrenia as I Live it" and launch my new podcast "Fractured Ink." While schizophrenia has been central to my story, it's just one piece of a complex puzzle that includes complex PTSD, absence epilepsy, and my creative identity as a novelist and poet. These conditions, as I explain, "feed off each other" in ways that create a uniquely challenging yet creatively fertile internal landscape.

My journey from research mathematician and university professor to published fiction writer has given me new ways to explore and express my experiences. Through my novels "The Overlife: A Tale of Schizophrenia" and "Three Kidnapped, Three Siblings, Three Furies," I've chosen fiction over memoir as my medium for addressing difficult topics including mental illness and sibling abuse. As I share in the episode, "Tell Me A Story," this approach allows me "artistic freedom to wrap these topics in a story worth reading for its own sake."

The name "Fractured Ink" perfectly captures this next chapter – representing both the fracture of my mind as I navigate multiple disorders and my dedication to writing as a means of healing and connection. I hope you'll join me as this new podcast expands beyond schizophrenia to encompass all aspects of my life and creative work. The current podcast will remain available on all platforms, with the final episode announcing when "Fractured Ink" launches. Have you found that creative expression helps you process your own life challenges? I'd love to hear your thoughts as we continue this journey together.

#writer #fiction #schizophrenia #ComplexPTSD #epilepsy #families #friends #familyrelationships

Pastime With Good Company by King Henry VIII, played by The Chestnut Brass Company 

Pastime With Good Company, composed by King Henry VIII, played by The Chestnut Brass Company

Episode Transcript

Diana Dirkby (00:00):
Hello, my name is Diana Dirkby and I live with
paranoid schizophrenia.
You are listening to my podcastSchizophrenia As I Live It.
Today I want to announce thatthis podcast will have two more
episodes today's and a final one.
The final one will announce thestart of my new podcast,

(00:23):
Fractured Ink.
The new podcast will have abroader compass.
Video and audio versions willbe available If you like the
audio only option, you'll findthe new podcast on all the audio
platforms featuringSchizophrenia as I Live It.
Also, the podcast Schizophreniaas I Live It will remain on

(00:47):
these platforms if you want torefer to it in the future.
Fractured Ink will stillinclude accounts of how I live
with schizophrenia and generalinformation on this brain
disorder.
However, schizophrenia doesn'tdefine me, even as regards my
health.
I live with complexpost-traumatic stress disorder,

(01:10):
also known as complex PTSD orC-PTSD.
I have absence epilepsy, alsoknown as petit mal epilepsy,
which, although mild, is stillsensitive to the condition of my
overall mental and physicalhealth.
Passing out with little or nowarning due to a petit mal

(01:33):
episode can be physicallydangerous and mentally stressful
.
All these conditions feed offeach other.
Now that I have retired frombeing a research mathematician
and a university professor ofmathematics, my new job is
defined by my fiction writing.
I have published two novels theOverlife A Tale of

(01:55):
Schizophrenia, and ThreeKidnapped, Three Siblings, Three
Furies.
You can find them on Amazon.
Although fiction The Overlife,as I like to abbreviate the
title of the first novel isclosely based on my experience
of having a mother living withparanoid schizophrenia while

(02:15):
also living with this braindisorder myself.
Three Siblings, as I like toabbreviate the title of the
second novel features siblingabuse as its central theme and
is again closely based on myexperience and on the experience
of people I know who havebroken the silence surrounding

(02:36):
this type of child abuse.
Three Siblings features animportant character, isabel
Morse, who lives withschizophrenia.
Her brain disorder doesn'taffect the plot of the novel.
Therefore, it fits awkwardlyinto a podcast on schizophrenia,
but is perfect for one thatalso focuses on my writing about

(02:57):
, in this case, sibling abuse.
The title of the new podcastreflects the "fracture of my
mind as I deal with severaldisorders that affect the mind
and behavior.
The ink solidifies my ongoingwork as a fiction writer.
I should also add poet, as Iwrite poetry.

(03:17):
My podcast episode and blogpost Tell Me a Story defend my
use of fiction rather thanmemoir to discuss essential
issues that describe someaspects of my life and the lives
of others I know well.
I don't feel the need to go ondefending it, except to say that
my novels, as well as dealingwith critical issues, also tell

(03:42):
a good story.
I hope to reach a broaderaudience for complex topics via
fiction and give myself theartistic freedom to wrap these
topics in a story worth readingfor its own sake.
I hope you will continue tofollow my journey by tuning into
Fractured Ink when available.
The last episode of thispodcast will inform you when

(04:04):
this new podcast is published.
Thank you for listening.