It’s been less than two days since my counsellor and Mrs Blackbird both agreed that I need to take a month’s stress leave to buffer my depression, but I already feel like the ice beneath the fine powder of yesterday’s first snow – cracking. Having to take ‘stress leave’ is
Recently, I heard it described that depression is a liar. It deceives us into believing all hope and joy is sucked out of the moment in which we live. I don’t know if it’s a liar so much as a thief, sneaking in on little feet, gradually drawing all the
I come to writing today wrung out, hollowed, disappointed, ashamed. I can forgive myself the days that lapsed since my last entry. I sank into the recesses of a cave, and there I went through the motions of life in the grip of a depression so strange I can not
These words are sent out into the world with love and compassion. I dedicate them to my wife and daughters. You are good enough, strong enough and beautiful enough. That doesn’t mean you can’t be tired, scared and vulnerable too. Those feelings are all a part of us. Don’t selectively
I am the part of me I can’t accept. I think of dark things. I am twenty-five years old. I live behind closed doors, afraid of who might come to call, afraid that I will have to speak. Sometimes when I go outside. I cross the road so I don’t
So much of our daily lives revolve around cycles: rising eating working studying sleeping. No matter how many years pass, we like to think some intrinsic features of those cycles change. When our oldest daughter started at university, I felt so proud of her. However, I also felt afraid. Our
I wonder why it takes so long to feel compassion for the self? This was a difficult weekend in some ways. Sharing grief with a heart friend, and then joy with another, as she opened a yoga centre. I took part in many activities to foster both personal growth and
Some days there are no words, there are just images that flicker in the darkness. However, even in the eddies of gloom there are such brilliant flashes of light and colour. I have to look a little closer, but find myself entranced, following sparks of light. Many fear darkness, and
How strange the nature of the beast. You do all you can to combat it, but at times, all its victories pile up against the stanchions. Once more you feel adrift, treading water in the deepest shadows. Spoke to one daughter at lunch, who seems to be fighting her own