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

by Josiah Hartley

because I will fight until my last breath to keep him with me, to keep him alive.

but I also understand a little more about the battle he fights every single day. No wonder he is so tired.

The truth is there isn’t much that life can throw at you that is harder than watching your child suffer.

realising in that moment that he was striving for something far more elusive than a career in space exploration. Happiness.

we begin with prevention, identify symptoms, and develop a plan of action to reverse and hopefully stop the progression of the disease. So why don’t we do the same for individuals who are dealing with potentially serious mental illness?’

‘Existence is exhausting, you experience and process one moment in time and immediately there’s another one to be processed. It’s an endless, daunting, relentless cycle going on forever till we die. I think the closest we can ever get to Nirvana is that infinite nothingness of before we were rudely ripped into consciousness.’

Waving Josh off to school every day knowing he was going to have to hurdle over dyslexia, anxiety and now the debilitating Elhers Danlos whilst struggling to fit in with his peers, took its toll. The temptation was to wrap him in cotton wool and keep him safe and sound at home, but I knew this was not the way to build resilience in him.

‘Anything you like,’ came his nonchalant reply. ‘I don’t actually need them. I just couldn’t think how else to occupy you for ten minutes and as there weren’t any pegs that needed sorting into colours . . .’ Busted.

Brilliant!!!!

think I only fully realised that I lived with this baseline worry about Josh when it was lifted and I felt the difference.

wanted to climb to the top of the school chapel and wave those offer letters from the roof whilst shouting, ‘Fuck you all! Look what I got!’

It is fair to say that my decisions were based on two things: ignorance of what might be best for my son’s mental health, and my desires for Josh, driven partly by what I thought was best for his future – my own standard – and all propped up by my belief that the golden life at university might be just like it was in the movies.

To be honest the therapist was disappointing; we did not connect at all and he was not someone I would ever have chosen to confide in.

We have never lived in a more connected world, yet loneliness is only increasing.

I was in turmoil and was desperate to be alone, even though I was lonely when I was alone. But then I was also lonely in a crowd.

A word the misuse of which makes my hackles rise and my gut jump.

I figured, again naively (how many times do I have to write that word until the ping of shame ceases to fire around my gut?)

was basing his travelling experience on my own mindset,

a mere eight or twelve weeks after leaving school that same child could falter, become isolated, depressed even, self-harm, fail to attend a lecture or could get into any number of difficulties and you the parent had absolutely no line of sight of the issue and therefore no way of helping/supporting the person you love in their time of need.

The shame factor and stigma of mental illness was for me greater than my ability to ask for the help I desperately needed.

My bed was like a black hole, sucking me in. I didn’t feel like part of the world. I had gone beyond feeling isolated and lonely or even sad. I felt nothing.

I didn’t matter.

because all I wanted to do was fix him, fix him, fix him . .

yet it also felt good to be able to talk to someone,

He said, ‘You know this is nothing to do with you, don’t you?’ That was it. That was all.

‘I mean it is nothing to do with you. This is Josh’s journey, Josh’s battle, and he will have to figure it out. You can’t do it for him.’

It’s at times like this you truly find out who your real friends are.

He was interested in my studies and spoke to me calmly like an equal. I trusted him; I guess that was the fundamental difference.

‘That’s right, you fucker! I am going to win!’

‘God, Mum, why are you crying again?’ ‘I’m crying because I came close to losing you and I can’t even think about it. I love you, Josh.’ ‘Stop with the crying! You promised.’ ‘I didn’t promise. I only said I’d try not to.’ ‘Well try harder! For Fuck’s sake!’

We need to recalibrate what constitutes success, as currently I feel there is no scale and often no truth – I would have fared better if I’d known it was okay to fail and be average – but again, no one puts the truth on social media. You are effectively comparing your mundane life to other

Never forget, whether you are a sufferer or a carer, that you are not alone.

Depression doesn’t discriminate.