Product Description

Depression is a dark and isolating experience. Countless people suffer from it. Anyone who has fallen into a pit of depression wants to climb back out. but that is not easy to do. Depressed people often feel paralyzed into inaction. So help is needed - practical, humane and spiritual help. Which is just what this book offers. Aimed at people suffering from depression, this text provides a wealth of practical advice and ideas for overcoming it. The connecting thread throughout the chapters is the picture of someone who has fallen down a cliff, making the climb back up. Sue Atkinson has suffered years of depression herself. She does not write as an expert, but as someone who knows the feelings from close personal experience. This is what makes this book helpful. It does not contain page after page of unbroken print, but a varied menu of hints, quotations and illustrations. This is a book to dip into as fits a person's mood and the need of the moment. The reader should find it a dependable guide for the climb. Each section opens with a line drawing of a lemming at the relevant stage of the climb.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #211535 in Books
• Published on: 1993-07-30
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 176 pages

Customer Reviews

A Gentle, Hopeful, Reassuring Book
I have just bought my second copy of this lovely book, and I was glad to find it in hardback because my paperback copy fell apart! That's hardly surprising since it has been so, so valuable to me throughout my struggle with depression. This is the only book I have read with such a gentle approach. The author's long experience with depression is evident and while her advice for action is excellent, she also clearly understands that on some days, any action is impossible. For such awful times she discusses the concept of retreating to a safe place until you feel stronger without ever suggesting that this need to hide from the world is a weakness. She covers many other aspects of depression in a simple and approachable way that an exhausted sufferer can accept. I cannot recommend this book too highly.

Simply amazing. Most helpful one I've read on the subject.
I've suffered from bi-polar illness for over 20 years. This is the first book I've come across that is helpful, witty, in an easy to read format, doesn't talk down to you, doesn't tell you to 'snap out of it'.

The layout is ideal for a sufferer- no huge chunks of text to put you off when concentration is difficult. And yet what is written is helpful, indepth in places- not just cliches and platitudes. The text is broken up with quotations and helpful snippets that make browsing and skimming through just as rewarding as sitting down to read it front-to-back.

The cartoons of the lemming gradually climbing up the cliff were a nice, original touch. The author approaches the subject as one to be taken seriously, but at the same time inserts a little humour- usually at the expense of those who annoy us when we're depressed. Ha!

Brilliant.
Buy it if you're a sufferer. Treat youself. You'll love it.
Buy it for a friend who is a sufferer. They'll love you for it.

After 9 years of depression, I finally have hope!
A small book, but filled with big things. This inspirational work is not only changing my life, but that of my immediate friends and family who now have an understanding of what has been going on. If you suffer from depression it may well help you get started on the road to recovery, if you know somoeone who suffers read it - it will help you to help them and in turn they can help themselves. I can't recommend this book highly enough.