• Sleeping Wide Awake

    Twenty

    Back in the 1980s when I was just a teen, I had a lot of mental health issues before I even knew what they were. They were my normal – being agitated, or having unexplainable bouts of melancholy, or feeling a disconnect from everybody else. It wasn’t until they exploded into panic attacks that the public hospital psychiatrist was able to give me some muddy clarity. But the worst of those mental health issues, the meltdowns, came at important times developmentally – when I should’ve been making my way out into the world, I was dealing with anxiety, cluster panic attacks, and OCD; when friends were marrying and working steadily,…

  • Books

    This

    Title: This Publisher: MidnightSun Publishing Publication Date: 1 August 2023 Category: Young Adult Paperback: (129 x 198mm) ISBN Print: 978-1-9228581-4-6 Ebook: 978-1-9228581-5-3 I don’t get this. I don’t have anything to worry about. I’m fifteen! And in Year 10! I should be thinking about the way Samantha keeps looking at me, nursing that crush she’s had on me since primary school. Or about Gabriella, who’s so cool and seems interested. Or the Boland Fellowship, an award given out for academic excellence that everybody thinks I could win. Or about my best friend Ash, and the way he’s sullen about his arguing parents, or our friend Riley, who’s becoming a bigger…