Life Signs
Reports of the unfortunate and sudden demise of Stargazer’s World are highly exaggerated. Even though I haven’t posted in the last few weeks doesn’t mean I plan to shut down the blog for good. I actually have a couple of posts in preparation and I hope to get things running again soon. But on the other hand I decided that taking a break from blogging wouldn’t be the end of the world. At the moment I slowly try to get things running again. So please excuse that this post is of a more personal nature than what you’re used to.
The last weeks and months have been quite hard for me. Even though I have been in therapy for the last months, my mental health issues flared up again earlier this year. I had to cancel a SWN campaign I wanted to run, because the fear I could mess up things again, turned into fully-blown anxiety attacks. Focussing on anything became exeedingly hard and I had to be signed off work for four weeks.
According to my therapist I suffer from a moderate depressive episode. In my case anxiety and sleep disorders are among the major symptoms. I am also pretty thin-skinned and prone to bouts of anger. I easily get frustrated, which doesn’t really help with creative endeavours like preparing for a roleplaying campaign or writing blog posts. In the last few months it has become pretty obvious that I suffer from some kind of mental health issue. But looking back, I realized that I have been suffering from depression for much, much longer.
Being able to call my mental health issues by name is actually helping a lot. Up until a while ago, I always had to give some pretty fuzzy explanations on what was wrong with me. Now that I know that it’s depression I suffer from, things are easier. I still have to cope with the symptoms from time to time, but it’s easier to talk about my problems. In addition to that the new medication my doctor prescribed seems to help.
Since I haven’t run any games in a while, writing about RPGs is becoming harder. I always drew a lot of inspirations from what I’ve experienced at the game table and at this moment I feel like a fake when I am writing about something I actually don’t do at the moment. There are also a couple of books on my shelf that need to be reviewed, but I haven’t managed to read them thouroughly – and my bad conscience isn’t helping.
I am pretty sure that things will slowly improve over time, but currently I am still struggling to cope with the daily chores. So please bear with me, if I don’t manage to post in a regular manner. I also hope you don’t mind if I use this blog to write about my depressions from time to time. Talking with other people about my problems has always helped me to cope and writing about it isn’t much different. I also got the impression that depression and other mental health issues are not uncommon in the RPG scene, so perhaps this topic is not completely off-topic at all.
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