Imagine spending your entire adult life being afraid to be happy. That was me.
2017 found me in St John of Gods mental health hospital being treated for severe depression and PTSD, for which I will be forever grateful. It was here I learned I’d been misdiagnosed in 1976 as being manic-depressive or what is now called bipolar.
The help and support I got from my mental health team and more importantly, my fellow patients could not have been better. They helped me learn it was okay to be happy and it was okay no not be good at everything. Sometimes enjoyment is the point.
The poems I will post here over the next 52 weeks are born out of the two or three years prior to my treatment and recovery. They deal with loneliness, isolation and depression, but are also full of hope.