When all else fails, re-read your favourite book

Dive deep into a book that you loved before to reignite a fading love towards yourself

My hands are cold. My torso is wrapped in a purple jacket with fake fur. My anxious legs hurry me up to a coffee shop. Staying at home feels unbearably depressing.

Hello, Autumn. This year, you’re late.

September was still summer, weather-wise. Almost every day was sunny and warm. October comes with an abrupt drop in temperature. Ten degrees Celcius down. My mood slides down with the same abruptness. Ten degrees of happiness down. The bottom feels like a mental cage.

It’s biological, maybe. My psychiatrist says less sunlight can mean more depression, more sadness, and more anxiety. He also suggested I get a SAD lamp and let it shine in me for an hour every morning. A SAD lamp to make me happy? The mind works in mysterious ways. I’ll probably stick with happy pills. They helped before. They will probably help this time, too.

It’s my memory card, definitely. I don’t have many happy memories from the previous twenty-six autumns of my life. They were predominately sad. I remember going to a school and feeling unhappy about that all the time. I remember sinusitis, antritis and throat infections. I remember driving to a…