Hi Stagger

I've sent you a friend request if that's OK by you as anybody who has an illness needs friends :-)

I've had clinical depression on and off for nigh on twenty years (about half my life) and whilst the head drugs and CBT play their part, nothing is a silver bullet. There will be good days. There will be not so good days.

Our society still views mental illness as a stigma. Far easier to talk about a physical condition, as that can at least be seen or envisaged at least. Everyone's mental health is as individual as we are. The tragic events of yesterday bring into all too stark relief how mental fragility needs attention (and I am not for one second implying anyone's mental state is any way shape or form as bad as Derrick Bird's).

Life is not black or white; look on it as varying shades of grey, or a sliding scale from 1 to 10. If you tried to score 10 out of 10 every day of your life, you would get knocked back so often as to admit defeat. Far better and far healthier for your mood to look on as anything from 5.5 out of 10 or better as a reall result and take it from there...anything of 7 and upwards is fan-bloody-tastic.

Take everyday as it comes...an hour at a time on a less than good day can seem long enough. Live in the now (I know that sounds a bit new age but there is a lot to be said for it).

Do NOT...I repeat myself...NOT beat yourself up or consider yourself any sort of failure. Believe you me, if beating myself up was an Olympic sport, I'd be up for platinum, never mind gold. You are a unique and special person. We all are. The very fact that we have a common love of the outdoors and running up and down the hilly bits, whether solo or together, brings us together, and there are people who will be physically fit and active who will find it almost impossible to get out of bed on a not so good and function as they normally would, never mind take part in the sport they love.

Always remember; just because you may feel crap on any one given day, it does not make you a crap person. I know that my depression is only part of my life. It is not the WHOLE of my life.

It is easier for us who suffer to stand on the periphary and look in and give sage advice, whereas you may often feel like you are looking through a telescope the wrong way round. No two people with depression will have the same symptoms, so comparisons can sometimes not be overly helpful. As are comments such as "chin up"...people mean well, but really, do they think we WANT to feel like we do sometimes?

Winston Churchill famously likened his depression to a black dog...sometimes at his heels, sometimes far far away, but always with him. I hunt my own black dog with my white hounds...that is, I seize onto anything that the black dog hates...fun, laughter, loving, singing, running, jelly babies. Sometimes we nail him, sometimes just put him to ground.

Use anything that will help you to visualise your own black dog and learn to become the master. Easier said than done but you WILL learn to control your black dog.

There is a world of stuff on line to help and any number of support groups.

You have made a huge step forward by the very fact you have posted on here. That takes inordinate strength.

For God's sake don't stop talking to us.

You ain't alone in any of this.

All the best and kick on.

Barty