Blimey.

Well bugger me. Not actually mind, metaphorically.

When I was umming and ahhing over my depression post over the last 8months, re-reading it, picking holes in it and bottling it every time I came to publish it, I never ever thought it would get the reaction it did. For me, publishing such a personal post meant only preparing for the an inevitable shit storm of possible ignorant or mean comments.

Oh but how wrong I was. The cynic is eating humble pie my friends (and oh it’s a bittersweet pill/pie to swallow) because 100% of the feedback I received was positive, supportive, kind and quite frankly overwhelming.

I never wrote the post with a view to getting sympathy because Christ knows I’d rather receive sympathy for my love of syntho pop than for being saddled with a mental illness. Publishing the post put me in the company of those who were out the depression closet (No hope of finding Narnia in that MDF monstrosity) and other than making me feel extremely vulnerable it put me in the position of being able to talk about my depression in a (however misguided) attempt to create not just more understanding but also for anyone- from a long term follower, or someone stumbling across my blog on the off chance- to find some comfort however small in the fact someone else is out there feeling the same thing.

When your caught up in depression, as I’m sure any sufferer will tell you, its very easy to get spun up in how YOU feel, it can be hard to imagine that there are other people everyday going through the same thing.

For me, acknowledging that to myself and finally when I decided to write this post marked a significant turning point when I started to think of my depression in less selfish terms, and started to think in terms of ‘how can I turn this shit into gold’. Not actual gold like, I’m not David Blaine, but it has taken me a long  time to sieve through the crap to syphon off something positive not just in my depression but my physical illness as well.

Not that writing the post wasn’t cathartic to a point, but it was never my intention to use it in an exercise in self therapy.

So, thank-you to everyone who read the post, commented on it and tweeted or emailed me about it, this might have you running for the sick buckets but it made all the stress and worry about posting it all worth it and it meant an awful lot to me that people took the time to tell me what the post meant to them personally. It was like being  Professor X in his little brain pod and finding all the mutants all over the world, I felt like I was opening up a (good) can of worms. I don’t want to jinx myself but saying this, but writing that post was a big turning point for me in getting on the long and dusty road to getting better, in every sense of the word.

But listen guys, you can’t let this stuff go to my head, promise? But be gentle, yeah? I’ve got depression over here :P

I just want to say a massive thank-you to everyone who nominated and then voted for me for the Cosmo Blog Awards. Sadly I didn't win, but the awesome Skinny Latte Strikes Back won in my category and the lovely girls over at Where Are My Knees? won the commended blog which is fab news! I was gutted I couldn't go, but as per usual I was at the mercy of TOBP's but it looked like everyone had an amazing time (the jammy lot) and all the girls looked gorgeous and sparkly. So Thank-you, thank-you, thank-you.

MayDay

Hello my Lovelies and a big hello to my new lovelies, glad you could join us :)
May is one of those blah sort of nothing months for me, my birthday is a distance memory and all the exciting things are usually a whole month or more away. The only thing I've got to look forward to this month is the 'rents going away to Rome so I'll have free reign of the house, whatever that means since my parents stopped babygating my room when I was three.
Young Steven will be joining me (I'm far too much of a wuss to stay in my house alone for four days and he'll cook dinner every night) so I hope the weathers nice so we can have dinner in the garden and do nice summery things and wear maxi dresses (me, not Steve).
The 16th to the 22nd of May is Gluten-Free Week. Coeliac UK are asking people to shop, cook and eat gluten-free for one week to raise awareness (and also, I imagine, to demonstrate what a ball ache it can be sometimes). My dad has gallantly decided to take on the imaginatively named Gluten-Free Challenge for the week, and I'm interviewing him pre and post challenge for my blog just to see how he found it. He's (almost) as humourous as myself so I'm sure you'll find the interview if not interesting then at least entertaining.
Not coeliac or gluten-free and fancy taking up the gauntlet ? To get involved in The Challenge visit  coeliac.org.uk/glutenfreepledge .
Im doing my first ever guest post on saturday over at Where Are My Knees? so make sure you pop over and have a read. If your trying to diet, the girl's blog is a great community to get ideas, recipes and encouragement, plus some great testimonials and inspirtation from various guest bloggers and the girls themselves.