HOPE SPRINGS ETERNAL

*Trigger warning, discussions of suicidal thoughts and depression.

As you may already know, yesterday was National Poetry Day.  Tamara, the meditation coach I unwittingly hired when I ran over the free trial time on my Calm app, told me that I should write more poetry, she might have a point.  Her assertion was that putting our innermost emotions into words can be cathartic, a pressure valve for the build up of feelings that our brains may be struggling to process.  I’m sure many of you by now, in the year since we first went into national lockdown, will have your own backlog of fears and frustrations that have started to sit heavier on the soul, I know I have.  

The last few weeks since I launched this blog with a bang have been tough, this week is brighter but I’m learning never to be complacent and accept that Marley is not the only black dog in my life. It’s not an easy thing to admit, not to myself and definitely not to anyone else but hearing other people’s experiences has been helpful to me and so if this strikes a chord with someone else in a similar place then it’s worth it.  Plus I’ve reached out to others more qualified than I to speak on the subject for some guest posts.

For anyone who felt that they might have safely swerved any amateur poetry up until this point I apologise for this next bit, but it’s important to the piece.  For a brief moment in a previous life I was a rapper, and this is why I know Tamara was onto something.  Writing raps proved to be a perfect way to untangle my thoughts and feelings, to get things down on paper in a way that was simple for me to understand and accept.  I have gone so far as to say that it saved my life.

The reason for this rather grandiose (and in hindsight a little too simplistic) assumption is due to one of the darker sides of my depression. It’s something which more people than we could ever be aware of experience, you might well be one of them.  It’s the overwhelming feeling, that the best way out of your current hole is to kill yourself.  

Now I have to be careful here as I’m not qualified to give advice about these feelings, all I can do is relay my own experiences.  I will say that finding people that I can talk to in these moments  has been a major help and there are many numbers you can call if you’ve nobody you can trust in your circle, and even options to message online if you’re not so hot at talking.  It’s not always easy, believe me I know that, but help is out there.

They are feelings that are very difficult to explain to somebody who has never had them, but they can also be very difficult to understand yourself, in my late 20s I had been having them every day for months before I wrote this verse:

I’m sorry that I had to write this letter

But I needed a release from the everyday pressure

Cos seems that every time the pain stops and the rain clears

The cycle starts over again, so now it ends here

That’s it final, finito, finished - can’t take no more

So now I’m looking for the exit door to go through it.

I think I blew it, must have made a wrong turn

Now I can’t seem to go back, I think that I’ve learned that

There’s a nack to this that, I just don’t possess.

My life’s a mess, I’m looking forwards to the rest

Away from all of this, the stress and the shit

I hope you understand the reasons why I really had to quit 

I know it looks like I’m being selfish, that ain’t it

I’ve been trying to find another kind of way out for ages.

Now I’m leaving it to fate to come and show me the way

Not to escape but to make up for the mistakes I keep making.

It’s not my finest work, but I realise now that it wasn’t meant for anyone else but me. I also can’t really explain why writing it helped but it really did, it was like a huge weight coming off and at a crucial moment bought me the extra time I needed to get some help.  

Rapping helped with a lot of other feelings that often came from dark places and I finally retired when I no longer felt the need to do it.  I consider myself incredibly lucky to have reached that happier place and I have to admit that when the black dog came knocking at my door once more, some time after my mother died, it caught me seriously off guard.  It came with the complete package of suicidal thoughts and eventually after a couple of years, on the doctors advice, I started to take antidepressants. These managed to hold the worst of it at bay until a course of counselling and a greater routine of self care made me feel ready to come off them (with advice from the doctor on how to do this safely). 

I’d like to say that was the end of it, all is now sunshine and laughter,  it’s not and who knows, it might never be - but as I said at the beginning, I do feel brighter and I’m approaching the spring with a sense of renewal and revitalisation.  “Hope springs eternal in the human breast” said another poet (Alexander Pope), let’s hope that’s true as I think it’s hope that’s getting me through, although the rest of that line is, “Man never Is, but always To be blest. The soul, uneasy, and confin'd from home, Rests and expatiates in a life to come.” No I don’t fully understand it either, but it seems pretty relevant right now. Look after yourselves and each other.

This Saturday I will be DJing alongside a humbling list of legends, ‘fund-raving’ for the suicide prevention charity CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably).  Check out more information here and do come and join us on the night. 

Also here’s the link again for some of the helplines and organisations who you can contact.