Depression Talk

My legs are itchy.

No good can come of my legs being itchy.

Every summer I act as field manager for a dear friend’s berry farm. It is a wonderful job that I love, and at the same time, it is an insidious job that no one in the free world should ever have to do. I go back every year because I love the owners and their beautiful, wonderful children, and the Berry Queen always keeps me well stocked in beer. Not to mention that her husband, the Berry King, makes the best Strawberry Daquiris on the planet, and the kids all make me beautiful cards for my birthday. Plus, they pay me money to do this job, and ninety five per cent of the time, I actually do love the job itself.

Last year I had one particularly stressful day that led to me having hives. I’d love to recount the entire incident, but it was long, involved, spanned over three days, and might make you want to shatter your screen so that you can poke your own eye out with a shard of glass.

The end result of the incident was a serious case of hives. It was so serious that I ended up buying out the entire pharmacy’s stock of anti-itch creams. I kept them with me all season long, and had to apply them multiple times each day. The Berry Queen eventually felt that if she saw me apply an itch cream to my red and swollen legs one more time, she would break my beer bottle over my head and proceed to poke her own eye out with its shards of glass. The hives were that irritating to those around me; use your imagination to determine how irritating they were to me.

I’m not exactly stressed at this point in my life, although I do have a fair amount of stuff going on. I can usually pinpoint exactly what it is that leads me to break out in hives. It usually has to do with a boyfriend or my need to be heavily sedated; this time, however, I can’t seem to figure out what it is.

The last few nights I have gone to bed with large, conspicuous itchy bumps on my legs. They haven’t been breaking out in droves like hives usually do. Instead, they have been breaking out one at a time, starting as a little pink itchy spot, growing to about the size of a nickel, itching like mad, and then disappearing before dawn.

Perhaps I am allergic to one of the new fabric softeners I’ve been using; perhaps I am allergic to working in the barn or digging about in my garden.

Either way, my legs have been itching like mad for the last several hours and I’m starting to think that the hives are imminent.

Bring on the anti-itch cream. It could be a long and scratchy summer.

My mother and I have become addicted to ER on DVD, so addicted that we are going to cancel all the fancy channels on our satellite dish because really, why bother watching TLC when we could drool over Dr. Kovac and Dr. Benton? I mean, really. I’m sure there are hotties on What Not To Wear, but in the long run, our time is much better spent oggling people who aren’t gay.

There have been several scenes from this season that have struck nothing but pure, unadulterated terror into my heart. I’ve watched Abby’s mother be restrained, sedated, carried hither and yon. She suffers from Bipolar disorder and Abby has lived her life wondering what will happen to her mother next. In the episode we watched last night, she had holed up in a motel in Oklahoma, refusing to leave.

This is part of the problem with being Insane, even though at this point, I am completely sane. What if I lose it again?

No matter where I go, or what I do, I will always be a person who is Insane. I have to wonder sometimes, what if I turn out like that? What if, as time goes on, I’m the type of person who ends up screaming and flailing her arms in a hospital emergency room, with doctors surrounding her and demanding Haldol from the nurses?

I’ve never been at that point. At one point hospitalization was discussed, but it was my choice. I chose to go home and have my family care for me until I was better. But what if I had no family? What if I had no mother, no father, no Dixie-Dawg to comfort me and make me better? What then?

My biggest fear is losing my mind past the point where I will be aware that my mind is lost. And this is the problem with being me: No matter where I go or what I do, no matter what is happening in my life at the time, there will always be that fear. That pit of your stomach fear that the Insanity will come up out of nowhere and wrestle me into Its grips. That I will have to fight a battle that I can not win.

This fear does not overwhelm me on a daily basis. This fear does not control me, or interfere with my ability to live my life.

But it is always there, in the back of my mind, and sometiems I really wonder what I would do if it came out and jumped up from behind the curtains at me one more time.

I think a lot about the things that could make me happy in this world. Sometimes I think that really spectacular things could make me happy, like owning my own farm, or owning my very own brand new Dodge Dakota quad cab. Or better yet, a stunningly wonderful husband who is rich and grand and who will bring me flowers every day, and who would buy me my farm and truck.

But those are such big things. Husbands are so time consuming. They come with demands for things like the preparation of food and the bearing of children. Ugh.

I was out shopping with my mother today, and we bought some new Gain fabric softener. It smells ever so nice, like thoughts of kittens and butterflies and cotton candy all wrapped up into one big wonderful scent. And every time I open my dresser drawers, all that will ever enter my head are thoughts of kittens and butterflies and cotton candy. And the detergent aisle of Wal-Mart.

Sometimes you have to focus on the little things. I recently went a little over three months where my entire wardrobe consisted of jogging pants, boxer shorts, sports bras, and oversized T-shirts. I bought this entire wardrobe and wore articles from it every day. I simply did not have the energy to deal with matters pertaining to clothing. Hell, I did not have the energy to get myself out of my bed. So on the days when I did have the energy to get out of bed, it was all I could do to put on something.

The first time I put on clothes after those three months led me to tears. I actually sat on my bedroom floor crying because once I had clothes on — the type of clothes that actually fit, and that consist of more than oversized sportswear you buy in the Men’s section at Old Navy — I was purely exhausted and I had no idea if I could make it beyond the front door or not.

I suppose that after having gone through periods like that in my life, I do have a greater understanding of the small things. Like pants. And fabric softener.

Tonight, while I danced with glee, while I shrieked about the wonder of Gain fabric softener, while I headed up the stairs to collect all fifty pairs of socks, my mother laughed. She called up to me “I suppose its a good thing that you can appreciate the small things in life.”

I have to say that I concur. Yes. Appreciating the small things.

That’s what its all about.

Small Things, Baby Steps, Clothes for Depression, Get out of bed, Appreciate the Small Things, Fabric Softener, Kittens

My newest medication is a wonder drug. Really. It has made me so absolutely sane and rational that words can’t begin to describe the amount of sane-ness and rationality that exists in my life right now.

But there is a down side to every up, and as with everything, this new wonder drug has a down side.

My new wonder drug has created within my mind a monster that will not go away. I have become a dreamer. I have vivid dreams on an almost daily basis. They are so vivid that the afternoon after I have the dream, it is still on my mind, replaying like a video that won’t turn off.

The dreams that I have now are incredibly vivid, as though they are real life. I occasionally wake up feeling disoriented, and not knowing what is real and what I have drempt. Sometimes my dreams are exhausting, and I wake up drenched in sweat and completely ready to head back to bed because dreaming the things that I dreamed took so much out of me that I need a nap.

I love sleep, and I love everything that is associated with sleep. I even love dreaming now and then. I just wish I didn’t have to dream until sleep itself is exhausting.

I’ve learned over the last twenty two years that a lot can happen in this life that you don’t expect or want to happen.

My parents were dairy farmers from 1972 until 2003. Thirty one years. Not a short period of time by any means. Thirty one years during which time my mother literally broke her back working. (Seriously. She broke her back working. But that’s another story for another day.)

When I was little, I was told at school that if you work hard, you make money. And I watched my parents bust their asses for my entire life.

I do think that in many cases, hard work pays off. But it doesn’t pay off when you are a farmer in Canada. I could go on a fifteen page diatribe right now about how our government treats the people who provide our food for us, but I’ll spare you.

The bureaucracy involved in running a dairy farm had worn on my parents for thirty one years. We chose to sell our cows in spring 2003, and the day we sold the cows is not one I will ever forget. The cows moved like poetry in motion, walking beautifully out of the barn and into their truck to be shipped to a dairy in Wisconsin.

The barn remained for several years exactly as it did the day the cows left. I wondered to myself why we, as a family, did not go down and clean it from top to bottom, sweeping, mucking, scrubbing until it was perfect.

I was at a friend’s house last weekend, and she had recently purchased her father’s farm. She was telling me of the work she had to do to make the barn functional again, and I looked at her and said, ‘You know, when our cows left my family did the same thing. We didn’t go back to the barn to clean out a single thing.’

My friend sighed and looked at me and said ‘Well, sometimes you just can’t.’ And its true. Sometimes this life throws a curve ball that you just have no desire to deal with. The milkers, the bulk tank, the stalls, the neck rails: These are all things you used to work with daily, implements that were a part of your lifestyle and your carreer. In farming, those two are inextricably tied to one another, lifestyle and carreer, and they never fully or even partially separate.

I have been puttering about the barn lately, and a few times my dad has come to chat or offer a suggestion here or there. I hope to get things rolling again, not large scale, but large enough that I can work at it and feel that I’ve accomplished something with my time.

It took quite a while for us to heal after the cows were gone. While we knew that ending our lives as dairy farmers was a choice that we made, it was still a difficult one. I cried when my pet cow was led from the barn. I’m sure my parents had moments that pulled at their heartstrings while we were arranging to have the cows shipped South.

I’m amazed at myself because the wounds have healed. I’m no longer bitter and angry at the politicians who were the reasons we decided to stop milking. I don’t tear up any more when I think of my favorite cow, or when I think of the barn cats who used to play and scamper about while I worked.

I suppose it is true that time can heal anything, and I suppose that I am very lucky to say that time has healed this particular hurt, so that I can go on to be a productive and forward thinking person.

Dairy Farming, Career Change, Life Changes, Time, Unexpected Changes, Moving Forward

I love to sleep. I really hate to be cliche, but if sleeping were an Olympic Sport, I would have the gold medal in it every year since 1984. I have always been a wonderful sleeper, and I remember being little and asking my mom if I could take a nap after school when I started the first grade. I never really did give up my habit of napping, and I suppose that in this sense, my parents did NOT get the short end of the stick. In every other sense, I’m kind of a dud, but hey! THEY GOT MANY NIGHTS OF SOLID SLEEP even after I came into the world. Daughter of the year, right there.

When things are wrong with me, I stop sleeping. I become a person who is no longer capable of sleeping at all. My eyes become wide and red-rimmed, dark circles grow under them, my face becomes pale and every ounce of energy I have is devoted to trying to find a way to make me fall asleep.

I’m not sure what it is that keeps me from sleeping when I’m unwell. It is partially the fact that all the scary things that are for sure going to happen to me are whirling about my head. And yes, when I’m unwell it does seem entirely likely that I may be maimed or killed in a car wreck on my way home for the weekend; or that everyone I know will be mad at me and start yelling the next time they see me; or that something terrible is happening to someone I love RIGHT AT THAT VERY MOMENT and if I fall asleep, I might just miss their call. I never claimed that being Insane was fun.

Napping very rarely interferes with my ability to sleep at night. I am one of those fortunate souls who can sleep from midnight until ten in the morning, and then from one until four the following afternoon, and still be ready to hit the hay again at midnight. My sleep is deep and comfortable; I love to sink into my pillows and my luxurious sheets and wrap myself around the extra sheet and pillow I keep on hand, neatly arranged the way that only a person with OCD can arrange them.

I love every single aspect of sleep: I love drifting off and catching myself so that I can feel as though I am drifting off one more time. I love rolling over when I wake up to find myself all tangled up in the sheets (and sometimes at the wrong end of the bed) and wondering what I was dreaming about that would cause me to wake in such a position. I love laying on my pillows for a few minutes before I step out of bed, and then I love curling back in so that I can be in my sheets with my down duvet for just five more minutes.

Because of the deep love I have for everything related to sleeping, and because getting enough sleep is just so good for a person, I have to wonder why, when I’m not well — when the Crazy has sunk in, and Insanity reigns over all — why, is sleep so hard to come by? This is a question that I could ask myself until I’ve driven myself nearly mad, and OH! WAIT! I’ve already done that. Twice. And then the heavy duty sedatives came along and brought me back to the place where the sane people live.

Like so many aspects of this illness, the fact that I can’t partake in my favorite activity when nothing in the world could would be better than partaking in this activity really confounds me.

But for topics related to depression to be confounding — well, is that really surprising to anyone?

Sleep, Insomnia, Sleepless, Nap, Napping, Sleep Aids, Depression, Anxiety

I’ve taken a numbe rof medications for my Insanity over the years, a large number. At one point in my life I was taking pills out of seven different bottles, bottles that my mother had to code with letters and numbers so I wouldn’t confuse them and end up seizing on the kitchen floor in front of Grandma. Because there is nothing worse than seizing on the kitchen floor in front of Grandma.

Medication for Insanity is very tricky, because there is no set in stone rules about which medications will work for which person. The first meds I took made me shake like shaking was my job, as though my entire body had been taken over by one of those little electric toothbrushes, only it didn’t have an OFF button and I couldn’t remove the batteries. I’m sure that if I had worked at one of those illicit sex shops during that time in my life, I would have made wonderful presentations without draining the batteries on the objects they sell there. But I was not working at one of those illicit sex shops, and so my unstoppable shake-y shaking was of no use to anyone.

After that experience, I was more than a little wary of trying any more drugs. If I had to forfeit any type of life I had because I couldn’t leave the house for fear of vibrating my car right into the ditch, what would the point of being sane be? Off meds, I couldn’t leave because it is hard to go places without your mind. On meds, I was shaking like a leaf and its hard to go places when moving is IMPOSSIBLE because YOU CAN’T STOP SHAKING.

I was really lucky in that the third drug I took managed to make me sane again. I was amazed that I had once more become capable of sleeping, eating, and leaving the house at appropriate intervals and in appropriate amounts. All three of those things are affected when I’m not sane, and when you can’t eat, sleep, or leave the house, the rest of your life tends to be affected negatively as well, because really, what else is there in life than eating, sleeping, and leaving the house?

I guess my point here is that the first batch of pills sucked. The second batch of pills just didn’t do anything. And the third batch of pills made me all better again, made me a happily functioning human being capable of living. Capable of BEING ALIVE.

You can’t lose faith entirely if your first treatment options don’t pan out. I had to be cajoled after the side effects of the first pills, I really had to be convinced to give it a try after the second. Eventually I found one that worked, though, and then my life became a life worth living once more.

medication, depression, anxiety, seizures, Grandma

Did you know that May is Mental Health month? A dear friend also informed me that May is the month of strawberries, so it must be my month for sure.

I’m not sure what one is supposed to do in celebration of mental health month. Perhaps those of you who are sane should do a little dance around your living rooms in celebration of being so; while those of us who are insane should find a comfortable chair and choose a liquor. I don’t really see what good any of that will do. At any rate, I’ve chosen beer and my family’s computer chair.

This article lists some of the everyday factors leading to poor mental health. Stressors like being overworked, undernourished, under-rested, and a fast-paced lifestyle are what lead people to be stressed and unpleasant in the modern day.

Clearly, the best way to deal with each of these stressors is to assume a position in life that keeps you away from work, fast food, air pollution, and the rest of the conveniences we have come to depend on. Unfortunately, I’m not ready to give up my MP3 player just yet, so anxiety attacks over finding batteries in time are sure to remain a part of my life. Perhaps we would all live in perfect mental health if we lived in grass huts in the desert. But if we did that, we would probably miss out on McDonald’s and really? No one wants to drink home-made beer. Trust me. The stuff from the liquor store is JUST THAT GOOD.

I have no idea what good a mental health month can do for any of us. Is it a month devoted to being insane, or is it a month devoted to becoming less insane? Valiuum for everyone! Or is that not a good way to go about acheiving a society of good mental health?

I really do wonder about all these arbitrarily named months and days devoted to this and that. I’m not sure what good they do. Raising awareness is always a positive step; however, because everything has become a pet cause for so many people, the realities of some peoples’ situations tend to get diminished.

Do you participate in arbitrary days created for cultural reasons? Examples would be Mental Health Month, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day, Secretary’s Day and so forth. How do you feel about these?

My life is one that is very full of children, all of whom belong to other people. I make it a point to never mention my insanity to small children for a few reasons, one being that I’m not sure how to say “Sweetie, your Auntie is a fucking nutjob sometimes and during those times you are going to want to RUN. Fast. In another direction. For a long time.” I just don’t think the young ‘uns can handle that sort of information, and so I try not to give it out.

I do worry about the effect that having a crazy person near you can have while you’re growing and developing, but there will always be the nature/nurture debate and I don’t think any of us will ever have that one figured out.

Feet is one of my ‘things’ and I really detest feet. Sandal weather makes my skin crawl and if a person is going to put their feet anywhere near my person, it had better be to kick a rabid raccoon out of my vicinity and for no other reason than that. Sometimes feet make me want to vomit and other times I just want to put my hands over my ears and curl up into the fetal position. I once dated someone who thought this was funny and who would spend time putting his feet near my feet — which is the ultimate double-whammy — and you know what happened to him? I’d love to tell you but then several people might end up in jail and if they ever do find the body, I don’t want it to be because of a post on my blog.

My mother tends to like feet, particularly the type that are attached to rolly-polly babies who gigle when you tickle them. My mother and I were visiting my neice this weekend and at eighteen months old, she has already decided that no person shall ever come into contact with her feet. If you try to tickle her feet, or touch them in any way, she curls them up and hides them from your reach and I have to say WAY TO BE, BABY!

This discovery made me so deliriously happy over the weekend for a variety of reasons, the primary one being that at eighteen months of age, she can’t have already been influenced by my insane presence in her life.

Long live the feet-haters, I say. I’m sure this will be one more thing for my neice and I to bond over in years to come, and if insanity can bring about bonding, why the hell not?

I did laundry last night, a task that I have learned to love now that I am not required to traverse six floors that smell like drugs and stale beer; neither do I have to consider selling my organs on the black market in order to afford to complete this task, the washing of my clothes.

The first load I do is always socks. I make it no secret that I have a love affair going on with socks. There are days when I will switch socks sometimes four or five times because I just love having clean, fluffy socks on. I’ve been known to break up with people who have come to my house — or been in my vicinity — sporting socks that I find unappealing. I’ve also been known to stop being friends with people I don’t like using the fact that they have holes in their socks as a reason. There is nothing more detestable in this world than dirty, ill-fitting, or hole-ridden socks. They cost like fifty cents a pair. Invest, people.

There are very few other items that I would consider putting in the wash with my socks. Sometimes I will allow socks and a bath towel in the same load, and sometimes pale T-shirts if I can remember exactly where I wore them. I don’t want the wash water contaminated because that might interfere with the purity of my socks. The purity of my soul? Gets contaminated on a daily basis. But if my socks get fucked with, I get testy.

I was folding up all my socks last night which is not an easy task. I have a variety of styles of socks, six to be precise, and when you are dealing with over forty pairs of six different types of socks, things can get fairly hectic. When I completed my sock-folding mission, I had a laundry basket full of them and I was beaming at my collection the way mothers beam at new babies and my own mother was staring at me in horror. She asked me: “Does that make you feel happy?”

And I have to say that yes, yes it does make me happy. If I ever have a pair that gets dirty, I can toss them. If I ever go away on vacation, half of my bag is filled with socks because if one pair gets wet? I have six more right when I need them! If holes get ground into them, they can go.

Add to that the fact that if I go shopping and my heart soars for the next seven consecutive days?

And I’m sure it makes perfect sense to have that many socks.

My best friend spent the day with me today, sitting on the couch in my new room, chain smoking and giving me Hell for becoming someone who I’m not.

I led another life a long time ago, and I don’t wish to divulge any information about that other life other than at this point, I had everything I ever wanted, every dream come true. Shortly thereafter it all blew up in my face, leaving me a steaming mess of debris that needed to be picked up and carted away.

I’m not sure how you go about getting over the past. Sometimes I’m not sure how to go about getting over the present.

My best friend is a wonderful friend in that when everything goes to Hell, she tells it exactly like it is, with whatever amount of harshness is required. She said today that I need to move on, I need to get over this person I’ve become and go back to being the old me. Its been a number of years now, and its time to move forward.

Surprisingly, the truth didn’t hurt too much today. I find that usually the truth stings as though you’ve just ground salt into an open wound, but today it all sank in and made perfect sense.

I suppose I’m just writing today to sing the praises of being surrounded by wonderful people. I really needed to hear what my best friend had to say, and I think I’m probably a better person for it.

Sometimes being beaten about the ears with a big old stick of truth turns out to be the best thing to happen to you since prescription sedatives and beer.

I had a rather ridiculously busy weekend, one which involved a wedding, a night of drunken foolishness, and not sleeping at all Sunday night in order to arrive back home in time to sleep from six until noon.

Weekends like this often interfere with my drug regime, a regime that according to my doctor should never, ever be interfered with unless there is some kind of apocolypse that shuts down every pharmaceutical company on the planet Earth.

So I neglected to take my drugs two days in a row.

I typically keep my drugs in the pocket of my lumberjack jacket because I wear it every day and when I pick it up and hear that familiar rattle, I can just reach in and grab them. However, because I waxn’t sleeping at home and I have a friend who refuses to be seen in public with me while I wear it, the drugs were in my toothpaste and drug holder. Its the one that should be large enough to house every personal item I have use for, but instead holds only a few key items, my drugs, and my toothpaste. They were not conveniently located, and by conveniently located I mean in a place that I can get to without having to expend any energy whatsoever. If my drugs are upstairs, I don’t take them. If they are in the car, I don’t take them. If they are in a bathroom cabinet, I don’t take them.

So today I am suffering the consequences. My brain is gyrating about inside my skull; my hands feel shaky and I can’t do anything but sleep because of the way everything feels like it is moving as though it is a bad techno song on acid.

You’d think that after a while I would learn that putting the damn pills in my mouth and swallowing would be a happier alternative to these nasty side effects, but six drug-filled years later, I’m still sitting here shaking like its my job.

I wish there was a point to this entry, like I’m going to really, really learn to start taking my meds because messing around with my brain chemicals like this IS JUST NOT GOOD. Unfortunately, its been six years now and I tend to think that if I haven’t learned yet, I’m probably not going to learn any time soon.

So, I’m sure you gathered from yesterday’s entry that I talked to my doctor about changing my medications. The CrazyMeds.

When I mentioned the fact that I wanted to take less meds, the man actually gripped the wireless keyboard sitting in his lap, face blank and eyes wide, and flatly refused to consider me with fewer drugs running through my system.

I think there will always be a part of me that wants to try life unmedicated. Or at least less medicated.

Things are going well right now, though. I suppose that risking having another downward spiral at this point might not be worth it.

Surprisingly, I’m comfortable with it. I only ever sort of wanted to lower my doses, without any real reason for wanting to do so.

Living through chemistry is better than living with uncontrolled Insanity, anyhow.

Plus, I’m happy.

Why mess with a good thing?

“So, I’ve been worried about my meds.”

“What about them?”

“Well, I take a lot.”

“Yes, I prescribed them. I know you take a high dose.”

“Well, I’m worried about the long-term effects.”

“Which ones?”

“Well, any side effects. Are there long term ones?”

“Well, you have to weigh the pros and cons of each side of the issue.”

“Right. Well, I’d like to reduce the amount of drugs I take.”

“You want to WHAT?”

“Take less?”

“Uhm. Well. See… Well. Hm.”

*Crickets*

“I don’t think we should alter the amount of medication you take.”

“Really?”

“I don’t think we should EVER ALTER THE AMOUNT OF MEDICATION YOU TAKE.”

Well, I guess that settles that, then.

I’ve been working online with a few different blogs for going on three years now. I really love my time on the Internet: The comments I get, the fact that friends and family can keep up on my life with the click of a mouse. I also find very therapeutic reasons to continue blogging online. I love working out my thoughts in front of me, paging through the archives and seeing where I’ve changed over the weeks and months.

I have a really, really close friend coming down for the weekend and on our last night together in her apartment (Where I spent the best six weeks of my life living as a nomad) she was paging through her paper journals, laughing at the things she wrote years ago. She wants to give her kids her journals one day, to let them know the type of person she was back then, how she became the person she one day will be.

I have to say that I felt a little bit sad about that, because it is doubtful that the pages I’ve written over the last few years will still be up on the Internet by the time my kids are ready to read their mother’s life story. (If I’m still stuck with only a cat at that point, I suppose it will all be a moot point…)

So today I went to Wal-Mart and I fell in love with a spiral journal, with lined pages that have little decorative flowers at each corner. It is a hard cover one with a beige on beige design, and with it I bought a really fancy Bic pen. (My definition of a fancy pen is one that has a push-button thingy. I’m not ready to slip into the world of hundred dollar pens just yet.)

They say that journaling is a really healthy way to work out the arguments you have with yourself, the potential arguments you may have with others. Writing down the problems you’re having can help clear your mind for a better night’s rest and you can look over them in the morning with a clearer mind and refreshed attitude.

I don’t know that I agree with all I’ve heard about journaling. I’ve never been good at it before: I sporadically jounalled through high school just for record-keeping’s sake. Beyond that, I’ve never used it for therapeutic purposes.

As it stands now, I plan to journal for record-keeping again. I want to keep my thoughts and feelings on paper so that in years to come, I can look back on what I was doing and how I was feeling in the eyar 2007. However, hopefully it will allow me to express my more intimate thoughts in a private avenue that can’t be accessed by the whole world through google.

I plan to keep the site updated with my journaling progress from time to time. If it works for me, I generally recommend it because hey! It works for me! At the same time, I also tend to recommend things that don’t work for me because hey! I’m not the only person in the world.

Does anyone here journal? Which purposes do you use it for? And has it helped in dealing with life’s issues, depression, anxiety, decision-making? Feel free to share!

Journaling, Depression, Journal, Anxiety, Life Goals, Blog, Diary