The following blog posts are written by people with personal experience of depression. By talking openly, our bloggers hope to increase understanding around mental health, break stereotypes and take the taboo out of something that – like physical health – affects us all.
Depression: personal blogs and stories
Nikki Llewellyn was one of our inspirational Champions who spoke alongside the Deputy Prime Minister at Time to Change's reception last week. This is a transcript of the speech that she gave:
Acknowledging you have a mental illness can be difficult, even more so when you have spent your life working as a qualified mental health nurse dedicated to helping others. Herein lies the irony I suppose. In 2004 I experienced severe depression which had been insidiously creeping up on me for many months before.
Depression is like a slippery serpent, slinking about in the shadows. It slithers into your mind, where it feasts on – and feeds – your fears, doubts, worries and anger. And once it’s got hold of you, it makes you jive to its sinister tunes. You could look at it as a vampire.Need support?
If you need support, there are organisations who can help you.