The Boy Between: A Mother and Son's Journey From a World Gone Grey

by Josiah Hartley

Secrecy, stigma, taboo, shame and judgement are enablers of this horrible illness when what we actually need is to expose how common this issue really is and confirm to those suffering that they are not alone.

Its grip is a powerful one, holding me fast, rendering me both blind and mute. If I believed in such things, I think this comes very close to my definition of hell.

For a long, long time I could see life only through the fog of mental illness, and in truth I wanted nothing more than for the interminable pain of nothingness to end.

there is still a long, long way to go before the depression and suicide narrative is greeted without prejudice, without embarrassment and without judgement.

There aren’t many worse feelings than being lonely in a crowded room.

‘Doctors put drugs of which they know little into bodies of which they know less for diseases of which they know nothing at all.’

‘When you love someone, you love the person as they are, and not as you’d like them to be.’

‘One swallow does not make a summer, neither does one fine day; similarly one day or brief time of happiness does not make a person entirely happy.’ Aristotle

We need as a nation, as parents, as carers and as educators to take a step back and ask what we really want for our kids, because driving them to succeed in this competitive, unforgiving, judgemental world could possibly cost them their happiness