On a more instantaneously cheery note, two things today made me beam with pride. Firstly, spiderboy, my number1 son, was literally spidered today. His face painted red and black at nursery, with his playmates a rainbow of witches, superheroes, butterflies and cows. As I type I am still finding glorious face paint smears on my clothes and teeny infant. His excitement and coyly proud face as I collected him and he messily kissed us both is seared to my memory. I love boys.
Secondly an online acquaintance on a forum posted about graduating from the loony bench, having come through hard times and come off antidepressants. Go her. I may never meet her but having shared my depression in the interweb’s secret corners too, I was moved and humbled. And mostly I was encouraged as reading her update I thought and felt a genuine sense of optimism that one day I could join her and talk with firm conviction about life off drugs. I suspect I’ll always have one buttock squished onto the loony bench, but I can certainly imagine a time when I’m not welded to it.