Your Logic Makes Me Feel Like A Dick.

Here in England 11/11 is our "Memorial Day" where we commemorate and remember our fallen heroes and veterans. It's always been something I have actively participated in for many reasons. But sometimes I get asked why it means so much to me. Here I set out those reasons.

Firstly, like most of us, I have family who fought in wars. My granddad fought in the Second World War and I had family who fought in the First. My best friend's father and my "adoptive" Dad fought in the Falklands War. So first hand people I know and love have dedicated their lives to the service of our country in hopes of securing a future for us. I think most people can relate to that, and give their thoughts on this day to those they know and love

Secondly. My entire existence is due to the Second World War. Not just in the sense that, if those men and women hadn't fought for our country I mightn't be alive. As true as that is, the fact is that my Grandma only met my Granddad when she came to England as a refugee from Guernsey which at the time got invaded by Germans. She was sent away to be safe, and met and fell in love with my Granddad. When she got sent back, they wrote each other for months before she finally decided to move here and marry him. My favourite love story. So though there was lots of turmoil and loss and horror. Love still bloomed. And it is because of that love that I even exist. My Granddad didn't only fight for his country but he also created generations of life (they had four children!)

And lastly, and probably most prudent reason why this day matters so much to me is because I have felt it. When I was about 12 or 13 years old I was lucky enough to have experienced a school trip with my history class. I stood in the trenches. I saw the guns, the shells, the weapons, the tanks. I heard the noise and the sirens and alarms. I heard the terror and the screams. I stood in Flander's fields and wondered at the poppies. I went to the Somme and saw the tree. The barren land. I heard the poem read aloud outside some bunkers. I went to Menningate and heard the last post first hand. I stood there and read the thousands upon thousands of names scribed into the walls there. And it was harrowing and beautiful and eerie and moving and patriotic and so so sad. You could really feel everything that so many countless people, from all over our world put themselves through to fight for what they believed in.

And honestly I think that trip is something that every single young person should go through. I think that everyone should go there and experience it. If not for anything other than to gain appreciation for their elders and respect for their countries and learn their value in society and on Earth. You might think you're insignificant or feel like you don't matter, but to those men in those trenches you were their whole motivation and reason to carry on.

At the going down of the sun, and in the morning,

Personal Hygiene.

Many people are aware that people with depression can sometimes struggle with personal hygiene issues. Taking care of yourself when you don't care about anything including yourself- especially yourself- can be really difficult.

It can be anything from not shaving for weeks or even not showering for weeks. I personally struggle with all aspects of personal care and it varies from day to day. Some days I can get in the shower, shave and clean my teeth- other days I can just about manage one or the other- but one thing I- and I hope many others- find that is consistently difficult no matter what is taking care of my hair.

I find that my hair requires a level of energy and attention that I just cannot muster. I had, until very recently, thick curly long hair. I managed to wash it once a week if i was feeling okay otherwise if im honest, probably more often once a fortnight. It would get so greasy at the roots but then the other issue I had was that brushing it wasn't an option so every day I would just tie it up in a bun at the back of my head and then take it down every night just to tie it up in a messy top knot for bed.

This constant cycle of not washing or brushing my hair and constantly tying and tightening twisting and pulling on my hair ruined the ends of it and they were so damaged and dry that they were untamable. Not only that but i kept getting matted knots on the top and back of my head where the hair would tangle as i slept and everytime I pulled a bobble out hair would be wrapped around it and if have to rip it out. When i washed my hair clumps would fall out and even now if i run my hands through my hair it still comes out in little clumps.

After months of this agony- this horrible routine where I would just do nothing with my hair for weeks then have to wash it with a buttload of conditioner and tangle tease the hell out of it only to do the same thing again days later was getting me down. When you aren't depressed you don't think anything of washing and brushing your hair other than a mild annoyance maybe- and it's difficult to think of finding such simple tasks so draining but honestly even the thought of it now is making me exhausted.

Luckily I decided there was something I could do about it- so recently i went and I got all of the dead hair chopped off and has my hair thinned out- I had it dyed a nice colour that I like and now it's light- it looks nice and best of all its really easy to take care of. I can brush it in seconds and it's short enough to not have to tie up all the time! It's only a small thing but it has made a HUGE difference!

The point of the blog being- its ALL about little wins and little changes. Some days- showering is not an option- but if you manage to put clothes on and do a thing you need to- that's a win. If you manage to shower and then cant do anything else- that's a win. If your hair seems impossible to keep up to and you change it- that's a win. And to the people who surround someone who is depressed- acknowledging these tiny wins really really helps. My best friend will always tell me "well done" sometimes just for getting out of bed, and it is great to feel the acknowledgement that someone understands how hard that was for me. So look out for these little wins and these little changes. Because sometimes thats all you need.

Introductions.

Hello internet. I am about to embark on a journey; a mini-series if you will; to try and help further people's understanding of depression. Specifically I will be referring to my own depression, but (I hope) that a lot of other people living with depression will also be able to relate to some of what I say. This is an idea that came to me one day as I currently find myself in the midst of a huge depression slump and struggling to make the people I love the most truly understand what is going on in my head. Each series will start with the title "Depression, me and;" and then will have a subtitle explaining the category my blog will relate to; as there are so many parts of depression, so many aspects and hurdles and things you probably wouldnt think of unless you are a fellow endurer. So for those of you who haven't ever been depressed, or want a better understanding of what it's like, this mini series is for you.

But before I get into starting it: for those of you who don't know me, I ought to give you all some sort of background information on my own depression. I am the type of girl who you look at and think "naaah shes alright she seems fine!" Also I tend to get the age old "but WHY are you depressed- your life seems great!" So let's clear those two things up first shall we?

1. I may "look" fine to you, sometimes I might even come across as completely happy! News flash. Sometimes I am happy. Depression does not mean I walk around looking like gloom and doom all day every day. Even Eeyore smiled when it was his birthday!

Depression doesnt have a "look" so get that idea outta your head! Sometimes I might seem okay but inside there's a big old void of nothingness

Depressed people don't all look and talk and feel and think the same way. They aren't exclusively sad. Depression just likes to rock on in occasionally and set up camp in my brain. Leading us nicely onto point 2:

Depression does not need a reason to be here. Sometimes yes, depression can be triggered by a number of things, a bad day, bad memory, even a smell or something totally random. But depression doesnt need no invitation. It just decides to come along anyway sometimes at completely inappropriate times where everything is going great and its like

Bam! Depressed. So yeah tl;dr depression doesnt look like anything specific and doesnt need a reason to rock up and take a seat in ya brain.

As you can see: it doesn't necessarily change who you are as a person: fundamentally id like to say I'm about 4/10 hotness which means I have A GREAT PERSONALITY

And that includes what I like to think of as a wicked sense of humour and hopefully you'll be able to tell that although right now I am staring into a giant void of blackness inside and I have probably not felt this depressed ever, my sense of humour is still in tact (yay) sense of humour and depression usually results in satire, wit and sarcasm so that's an up side i guess?

I think that quite a lot of us have the desire, or the inspiration to be inspirational, to be heard, to make a difference. I think we all, to some level, want to be recognised for creativity, passion, something different. Nobody wants to be in the rat race, yet here we all are, most of us working tirelessly doing jobs we’d rather not for money that is barely enough to put food on the table with. We’ve all been there, or inevitably, are doomed to go there, so it seems. Then we look up, envious of those very few people in the working world who seem to be doing what they love, what they enjoy, an awesome job. “I want to do that!” We exclaim whilst we read internet articles about people who are paid to test water slides or people who travel the world writing articles about destinations and get paid for it. We look at them with longing, and envy, coveting everything they have. It’s true, no job is perfect and the grass always seems to be greener, these jobs must have downsides, too much chlorine exposure and the shits, for a start! But the reason we look at these things so wide-eyed and hopeful is because it shows us something. It shows us that, if we really applied ourselves, if we REALLY wanted, we could get out. We could escape. We could become these people who live life, enjoy work and earn money. There are people out there, doing just that, so it must be possible!

The truth of it is, regardless of how much we want something, there are only two ways of getting these kinds of jobs. ONE: have a lot of money. For the most part you have to spend money to make money, you want to start up your own business? That costs money. You want to travel the world? Money is what you need. You get my point, nothing is free in this world not even passion. The second option is HARD GRAFT. You want to be in a position where you are your own boss, or you feel free, or you can work from home? Most of these things require you to work hard, graft away, start from the bottom and work your way to the top. Now, this option is also easier to do if you have the first option behind you too. So what we’ve established here is that, to get anywhere in life, you need to work hard and have money- exactly the reason we are all suffering through the rat race. Chances are most people in your office will go home at the end of the day and tell themselves they’ll only be there until they have enough money to move to Batu Batu and become a turtle expert. The truth of it all, though, is this: you can do what you want. Within reason.

By this, I don’t mean that you can go into the office tomorrow, tell your boss that he’s a twat, snog the hottie you’ve been secretly drooling over for years, trash your computer and tell the managers you quit. Though if you do decide to do that, please put it on YouTube. No, what I mean is, really, like- really really, the only thing that’s stopping us from doing whatever it is that we want to do, from living our lives the way we want to, whatever that may be, is ourselves. We tell ourselves exactly what I’ve just told you in the above paragraph. I can’t do that, I need money, I can’t do that, I need to work hard first to gain recognition and establish myself. Do you know why we all think this way? Because we all keep telling ourselves these things. For centuries, our parents and our parents’ parents and their parents all keeping telling themselves and each other these things- and the reason it all started, is because one day, at some weird unexplained point in history, a group of people decided that we all needed to work, and we all needed to earn and spend “money” so that we can “buy” food and a place to live. Now get ready to jump down the rabbit hole, Alice, because none of this is actually real.

Before money was invented, people worked together, usually in villages, to hunt and gather food, and then they ate it in their homes which they built from what they had around them. Same thing as what we do now, really, only much more basic, and nothing then had VALUE. Good. Why do things need value? Money is, when you get down to the basics, essentially just a bit of paper that sums up as an “IOU.” When I lend you £5, I’m not really lending you £5. I’m lending you a bit of paper that says I’m lending you £5- but what is £5? Where is this £5? Where has it come from? “it came from your purse, emily, and now it’s in my hand.” Yes smartass I can hear that look on your face. What I mean is, essentially, there is no £5. There is no spoon. If you went back to the very very first occurance of two people exchanging money, it was one person writing on a scrap of paper “Hey I owe you for helping me, here is proof.” That then means that ALL money is not even real. NOT EVEN REAL! Now if at this point you’re feeling a bit Keeanu Reeves on me, put the spoon down, this is not the matrix.

So some people a long time ago decided that things have value and what those values were. Then some other people a bit later on decided that values could change and they should change in accordance with situations A, B, C, etc. THEN another group of people, lets call them... arseholes, decided that they should earn a PROFIT from these made up ever changing values to stuff, you know... so that they can have second houses and stuff they obviously need for doing the stressful job of making up rules and values and stuff to generally oppress the people (VIVA LA REVOLUTION!) No but really though. The only reasons these arseholes remain in power making our decisions for us and deciding how much we should pay and how much everything costs and what money is even worth (nothiiiiing!) Is because we LET them.

Admittedly, there’s a small percentage of each population who have rebelled against the system and they’ve either ended up imprisoned, dead, exported or just plain tired. Not exactly a promising prospect is it. The only way rebellion would ever actually work is if everybody, simultaneously, decided that they’d had enough. Logically, using the UK as an example, the total population of the UK is an estimated 65 million people. In the houses of common, parliament, the governing body and local authorities, they in total must make up about, 30% of the population, roughly. What I’m trying to say is there are more of us then there are of them, and if everybody in the UK stood up and said, together, “Now hang on a moment here, fuck you and everything you stand for.” Good old Queenie would be forced to hang parliament (pun intended) or something similar, until we can all sit down, have a nice cup of tea and wait for all this to blow over (the British solution to most things including revolution, genocide, the holocaust and standing on Lego.) That’s not going to happen though, even if I went into the town square and started a very enthusiastic and dramatic chorus of ‘Do you hear the people sing’ from Les Mis, people would just assume it was a flash mob and carry on in their monotonous lives.