Good-byes

This is my one-hundredth post to my blog. It is also my last. It will remain available on Facebook and Blogspot, but I doubt that I will add anything to it.

I’m stopping here because I think I’ve shared all that I need to share (also, one hundred is a nice round number). In TV talk, I’ve “jumped the shark.” (I vividly remember that episode of Happy Days, and thinking that Fonzie had gone too far).

I started this blog for selfish reasons. I needed a forum in which to open up, so that I would feel less shame about my illness. I wanted to help my family and friends understand me better. I needed to feel that I was doing something useful while my wife was in hospital and I was off work.

I was expecting a handful of readers. Instead, I got several thousand.

The internet is a crazy thing.

You have been reading Upsy/Downsy along with people from twenty different countries. Most are from Canada and the U.S., but there are also readers from Santiago, Chile; London, England; Paris, France; and even more in Norway, Finland, Venezuela, Croatia, New Zealand, Romania, South Africa and on and on. I enjoyed receiving e-mail from around the globe.

Mental illness exists all over the world. I worry about the stigma in Canada, but know that it is much worse in many other places.

I hope that all of you who have read Upsy/Downsy, if you aren’t already, can share a little bit of your understanding with others - to help lift some of the burden from the shoulders of the mentally ill around you.

If you are living with mental illness, I hope that this blog has provided some comfort, and that you find the tools and the support that you need to heal.

Thanks for reading. Be well, my friends.

D’Arcy