I Must Rescue Myself

1996

Somewhere in a deep recesses of my mind comes a sudden realisation… I’m depressed! Nothing makes me laugh, I can scarcely get up in the morning, there’s a nagging sadness, I have no energy, am listless, and tire easily. I know I have to get myself out of it.

I try music therapy. Not a good idea. It adds to my melancholy. Exercising exhausts me. In three days’ time I’ll be going to the Eastern Cape, far away from any psychologist, and at any rate I can’t afford one. What should I do? Art therapy? I force myself to gather everything I might need: shops give large sheets of waste printing paper, picture framers are happy to part with their colourful mat board offcuts, and I buy cheap boxes of paint, felt tipped pens, crayons, and coloured pencils.

We’ve arrived in Hogback. It’s midwinter. The rustic shack my husband and I are renting has four small rooms, is simply and sparsely furnished, has no electricity, and the wood-fed boiler that heats the water needs to be relit each day. The beauty of the surrounding forest isn’t entirely lost on me but somehow makes me feel sad.

Morosely I unpack my clothes and put my art paraphernalia on the rickety wooden table. Wearing a winter coat, scarf, and a beanie, and with a blanket over my knees I sit staring at the sheet of paper in front of me. Where to start? I’m no artist. Whatever I do I mustn’t be critical of myself. Feeling less than motivated I dip a brush in the jar of water, shake it out, swirl it around on a cake of watercolour paint and produce my first masterpiece… the sheet is completely black. Without waiting for it to dry I tear it up and crumple the pieces into a ball. The next sheet is covered haphazardly with all the colours in the paint box. This is followed by scribbling with crayons before graduating to drawing rough geometric shapes which I fill in with bold shades.

With the exception of the black paint, I repeat this sequence the following day and also attempt to draw child-like pictures with crayons. Amongst my many self-help books there’s one that deals with healing the inner child. The non-dominant hand expresses feelings as if a child writing to the parent, and the dominant hand responds as a non-critical parent. Once I’ve spent some time doing this, I make simple drawings with my left hand and use both hands to do vibrant random finger painting with acrylic paint. I’m simultaneously working on anger issues. Each day is a struggle. Each day I cry. And I’m cold.

Having endured three months of discomfort we leave for the subtropical climate of Pennington, a small town on the KwaZulu-Natal coast, where friends have kindly offered us their holiday home. All we need to do is pay for electricity. It’s brightly furnished, comfortable, and five minutes away from the sea. Shortly after we arrive we walk to the beach where, surprisingly, we don’t see any people, but there are ample seagulls, a few sail boats, and container ships are dimly visible on the horizon. I scoop up some warm sand and let it trickle through my fingers.

Back home in the midst of doing some scribbling I become aware of many negative thoughts milling around in my mind. Annoyed I pick up a book with affirmations, find a few that are suitable and appeal to me, write them down, and decide to use them frequently. I resolve to replace negative thoughts with positive ones, to try to visualise the depression disappearing, and to create images of a happy me. This intense inner work becomes crucial to my task. Doggedly I resume my scribbling.

Every painting or drawing I make I look at again and praise myself for making it and decide to attempt more complicated ones. I once saw a painting of a beautiful mythical flamboyant bird with a curly crown of feathers and three different-coloured long wavy tail feathers. Laboriously I try to replicate it on a large piece of white mat board. I concentrate hard on the beak. It has to be open, it has to be singing, and it must smile! I rub it out again and again. Frustrated I put it aside, make some silly drawings, add masses of colour, and start to cry. Sniffling I go back to the drawing and suddenly… oh wow! It’s smiling and looks as if it’s singing! I outline it with colourful felt-tip pens, colour it in with different shades of bright gouache paint, and put it on a shelf in the dining room. The following day I walk past it and giggle! That happens every time I look at it. I’ve not felt like this for so long and shed tears of joy, but I’m aware that there’s still a way to go.

The next major breakthrough comes when we are back in Johannesburg. I receive a card called Bert’s Bath. The bedraggled-looking Bert was photographed as he got out of the bath. He looks miserable yet comical, with one eye half shut and the other glaring in disgust. He obviously loathes being bathed. I identify with that cat and start to laugh! Before going to sleep I put the card next to my bed

Bert is the first thing I see when I wake up. I giggle, and a story about him begins to take form in my mind. I put on a dressing gown and slippers, go to my computer and start to type. The words flow and as I’m typing I decide to try to illustrate it. Much rubbing out is done and the results are far from perfect. A few months and six drafts later an adequate thirty-nine-page children’s story has been completed. I dedicate it to my first grandson and give to him on his sixth birthday.

The rescue operation took more than a year of daily effort. Much that had not seemed in any way amusing is funny to me again, I’ve regained my energy and zest for life, and it’s only after completely emerging from the thick gloomy fog in which I’d been immersed that I realised how far gone I’d been.

The reader will be well-aware that depression is a serious condition which takes many forms, has varying levels of severity, and that overcoming it generally requires professional help and a host of treatments. Yet I feel duty-bound to emphasise that anybody reading this who is depressed should seek the help of experts, and that those who are receiving treatment for depression should not stop their regime in favour of the above.