num_pages: 336
description: Sally Brampton id an optimist. The founding editor of Elle and a successful journalist and novelist, she loves gardening, friends and life. She is also a depressive. Shoot the damn dog is a memoir of her journey through depression. For four years her life stood still, mired in the tears, despair and desperate loneliness of mental illness. The brief joy of a stumbled recovery was cruelly, swiftly followed by a relapse into a deeper darkness, alcohol abuse and two suicide attempts. Hers is a story at once deeply personal and universal, one which offers a connection to those who feel so terribly alone and ashamed. Unflinching and humble in its honesty, Shoot the Damn Dog blasts the stigma of depression as a character failing or moral flaw and confronts the terrifying illness that Winston Churchill called ‘the black dog’. It is also a practical book, offering ideas about what might help. There are no promises, only small steps towards achieving an equilibrium and slowly coming back into the light. With its raw, understated eloquence, this book will speak to anyone whose life has been haunted by depression, and offers help and understanding to those with loved ones who suffer from this debilitating condition. (Taken from the inside dust jacket)
language: English
title: Shoot the Damn Dog: A Memoir of Depression
publisher: Bloomsbury