Hyperbole And A Half is a blog run by Allie Brosh, who is also the author of a book by the same title — the blog is not super active now but it has an extensive set of archives to dive into. In her blog entries, she uses cartoons and words to describe her life-long experiences of living with anxiety and depression, all with a wry and humorous take. I find that this blog makes for practical and hopeful reading — she talks about being unable to get out of the house, reply to emails, buying groceries or even eat. She talks her spiral to rock bottom and then some and then about what helped her lift herself from that place. She is searingly honest about how hard all of it is and the monumental effort it took. She shares how things that seem so ordinary, so normal to other people, take on gigantic proportions in times of depression. I strongly recommend you read this, if only to understand the lived experience of anxiety and depression.
Below is an excerpt from her strip: Adventures in Depression, where she details her spiral into a severe depressive episode. Take a moment, head over to her blog, and perhaps you will see yourself or someone you know in one of the scenes, struggling to make it through the days when the depression is overpowering.
