Teaching

Recently, I received the opportunity to participate in a Mental Health Directorate public Consultation. For the sake of all Mental Health Services users, I thought it was important for me to make my comments public.

This is what I wrote:

Dear Ms xxxxxxxxx,

Thank you for sending me a copy of the Consultation papers for the Redesign of Mental Outreach and Day Services. I appreciate the opportunity to comment.

The death of young Jade Goody and the media circus that surrounds it has got me thinking.

For years, when people spoke of depression or moods, I felt like they were speaking a totally different language from mine.

For them, feeling depressed was feeling:

• Blah or blue
• Unenthusiastic
• Apathetic
• Disinterested
• Discouraged

Fo me, feeling depressed was feeling:

I love the above emoticon my son drew for me for two reasons:

For some reason, I felt attracted to re-read 'Ask and It Is Given' by Esther and Jerry Hicks. Those of you who are familiar with these authors' work on The Law of Attraction will recognise the irony in my statement :0)

Having just come back from a lovely pub lunch with my hubby, I was struck by a thought: change was something I had always made numerous assumptions about. This sudden 'revelation' led me to explore the change territory further.

This is what I had hitherto assumed about change:

When many people talk to me about depression, they actually talk about something else. They talk to me about hurt, pain, despair, the healing power of time passing. In short they talk to me about grief. They talk to me about sadness. I do my utmost to stay civil on the inside but inside my blood boils.

I don't know how you feel about it but I have felt overwhelmed and somewhat intimidated by all the technological innovations that are about these days: wiki, twitter, RSS, to name but a few. What is all that stuff ?!? Well, salvation is at hand.