A bird Spirit and some other thoughts

First of all I would like to introduce you to my recent piece "Bird Spirit." I'm exploring with different things lately and this is one of those results. I hope I captured his essence and I hope you can see mine as well. It is about nothing and everything, solitude and what we carry around with us, the things that are not visible…

Secondly I want to write a bit more about the subject of depression, just to say some things that were left out last monday...

I haven't had depression for the past 15 or 16 years, in fact my husband doesn't know that part of me. He does know my moody self rather well though. But even if I haven't felt depression lately, I did feel it for many years. So what I meant on monday is that I felt it was creeping back at me. My last pregnancy left me with a hormonal imbalance and lately my downs have been really down - like down there on the minus 10th floor or something. It doesn't mean I am depressed, … I don't think it is something I should feel ashamed of now, but I did many years ago. It was mostly how people made me feel -on top of what I was already feeling.  Some people said to me, among many other things; that depression is a joke, that we are just unhappy and  ungrateful people, that it is all in our heads… Guess what? Yes, it is all in our heads - a chemical imbalance - that most of the times need to be treated with medicine…

Depression doesn't go away because you stop listening to sad music, or exercise daily, pray to God and every saint there is, change the way you dress, read the right books, surround yourself with flowers and nature… It doesn't work like that. Just like explaining what depression is to a person who has never felt it - you simply can't. I doesn't go away because you wish it so… and the harder you fight it, the stronger it clings on to you.

I've had feelings of sadness, melancholy, frustration, failure, abandonment, you name it, I've felt it, haven't we all? - but those feelings are not depression… I can't explain what depression is, because I only know my depression, no one else's, and we are all different.

I only hope that if you are suffering from this illness you go out there and find help in any way you can.
I suffered in silence for many years until I could no longer do it. In my experience there is light at the end of the tunnel, but it also takes a looong time to find it, and once you find it - it doesn't necessarily mean it will be a constant, and bright light all the time. Life is never the same. It is filled with many ups and downs and beautiful and ugly moments along the way.

Here are a Few Things I'm enjoying at the moment:

- the view from my desk.
- this photographer's landscapes which I find stunning.
-I relish this newsletter every week, it is a joy to receive. I can't recommend it enough.
-And this work for some reason is giving me the strength to keep going on with mine. I've always been in awe of her work, but lately even more.

I hope all is well at your end, and that you have a beautiful yellow tree to look at,
Giova

Getting a grip

It has been more than a while. I didn't expect this break to take so long, but I sort of let it slip by, and the more time I was away the harder it was to come back.  Strange… I would have thought that after that "resting period" it would've been easier to get back, but no!

I'm rusty. I thought I was done and had nothing more to share, plus a lot of past demons kept resurfacing and I needed to be strong… to make them go away. But they just won't go away, they are there and perhaps they will always be, as a reminder of sorts…

Sometimes I think I am so fragile -handle with care- at other times I surprise myself with the strength that I have -unbreakable- but it is never the two at the same time -what a shame- … anyway this is starting to look like a never ending story… I'll just say that my hair fell out in chunks which led me to a doctor that said; "you have a thyroid problem take this medicine probably for the rest of your life." which made me look for an alternative route, but during this search I've been visiting the dark abyss of what used to be my old depressive self. Oh, boy!! I thought I will never have to see that self again, not look at her scared eyes in the mirror and ask her, NOW WHAT???

I will find a way out, this time with out any medicine (crossing fingers), I'm writing on my journal again, and I'm back at my sofa stitching, doing what I love, little by little, hoping, praying…

This is one of my recent works. Very personal... not at all what I usually show here, but what the heck! I'm all about opening up and confronting my "demons."

I hope you are well where ever you are, and thank you for still being here - if you are-
Giova