It’s World Book Day! As my blog name highlights, I’m a massive bookworm! I’ve been this way since I picked up my first book in primary school. Books have been a constant companion through my life; they’ve been my escape, my friends, my councillors, my inspiration and my medicine.
I’ve struggled with severe depression since I was in my teens, and I genuinely believe there were times when picking up a book prevented me self-harming and prevented me making further harmful choices. I think the power of books to change a reader’s mood is magical, it’s an underrated element of reading. The power that authors have, to affect a readers’ mood; with just their words, is a factor that has fuelled my love of reading, and for writing. Another aspect of books and reading that impacted on my mental health is an author’s ability to connect and relate to someone they’ve never met. Books truly can bring people together. Depression is a cruel illness; it isolates you, makes you push people away, so you are stuck with your own thoughts. It makes you question your own mind and sanity. Depression makes it hard to interact with other people because there’s no way to express how you’re feeling. Books helped me with this aspect of mental illness too. If you look, there are so many books out there written by people brave enough to write about their struggle with mental illness and it’s these books which have the power to unite those struggling. It’s these books which can show a reader and a mental illness sufferer that they are not alone, that there are others going through the same struggle. One such book that really helped me understand my mental health and feel less alone is My Sh*t Therapist & other Mental Health Stories by Michelle Thomas (I will post amazon links to any book mentioned at the end). Reading this book gave me a huge insight into just how common mental illness is. There’s a huge stigma in opening up about mental illness and that’s what makes it so isolating; so, reading about someone else’s experience and reading thoughts that I was experiencing really had an impact on me. Another inspirational book on life with depression is: The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. The Bell Jar is classic literature, and I found the fact I could relate to someone who lived long before me, reassuring in a way. It’s a beautiful book and a really honest expression of living with mental illness. I connected to Sylvia Plath’s words; and her bravery to write about depression when it was so misunderstood boosted my own resilience and motivation to keep fighting.
After I developed M.E, reading became even more important to my wellbeing. Chronic illness is a daily struggle and there are aspects of it that limit how I live. I don’t like referring to it as life-limiting because that sounds like I don’t live, rather it’s that I have to live life at a slower and calmer pace. I was surprised to find that my reading tastes changed after developing chronic illness. I found myself searching for more adventure and exploration in books, maybe because I felt so stuck and stagnant. As a literature lover and a bit of a nerd, I am ashamed to say I’d never been interested in The Lord of the Rings! It’s a book that never appealed to me before developing chronic illness and it was my frustration with being stuck in bed that pushed me to give it a go. At that time, being housebound and bedbound, I just wanted adventure and a new experience; The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R Tolkien gave me that. It was the trilogy that opened my eyes to the fantasy genre and gave me a real love for the magical and fantastical in literature. The writing is so absorbing and engaging that despite being stuck in bed, I felt like I was meeting new characters and joining them on a truly great adventure, in a completely new world. I went on to read the Game of Thrones series by George R.R. Martin, which was a whole new experience, maybe not for the faint hearted because there is a lot of violence and death! But it took me out of my bed and into a new world for hours and it made my struggle with M.E manageable. I felt like I was still experiencing something, I wasn’t just sitting stagnant in bed; I was fighting great wars, flying dragons and running with wolves. It’s this experience that renews my love for literature every day, it’s such a powerful and underused asset. In a world that’s evolving and becoming more technology ruled, it seems like literature and books are falling out of fashion. I think that’s a huge shame because books have supported me through so many life events, so much heartache and struggle; that companionship shouldn’t be forgotten. I will endeavour to teach my nieces that books are far more exciting than Netflix, despite their eye rolling and disbelief; because literature is timeless. I shall conclude this post with the truly wise words of a much loved character: “Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, our most inexhaustible source of magic. Capable of both inflicting injury and remedying it.” – Albus Dumbledore (Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling).
Book Links
(Note, audio books are a great alternative if you suffer with fatigue, brought on by concentrating and eye strain. M.E means I have to take a lot more breaks when reading and audio books are a really good option if you suffer with brain fog. If You have a kindle then there are settings that reduce brightness and enlarge font etc which make reading a lot more accessible)
The Sleepy Bookworm 