Chris Reilly talked to us about how he has learnt to manage his mental well-being through writing and performance. Chris grew up in Liverpool 8. He lived with depression throughout his childhood, and first attempted suicide aged 11. Battling long periods of mental ill-health throughout his adolescence, things took a turn for the worse last year when he attempted suicide again. He overdosed on sleeping pills, but survived. Just. He spoke to us about how being creative with words and learning to express his emotions has freed his mind, and changed his life. Chris, can you tell me what you think made you feel so desperate so young? "Bullying. It was just an every day occurrence; part of every day life. I had got battered that much that I just thought it was normal. I just wanted to be like other people, but I couldn't. I was always seen as the bad kid in the crowd - that didn't help at all and just meant people turned a blind eye to the problem." So at the age of 11 you felt desperate enough to try and hang yourself. Do you think you really wanted to kill yourself at that stage? Can you remember how you were feeling at the time? "I just hated myself. I hated school and the way I was living. I was always putting on a front, trying to impress people, like I was afraid of nothing. But inside I was full of fear. I was terrified. A complete fake. Trying to be like other people instead of being myself. It led me down the wrong paths.
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"I did want to die. I had a big blue fat towing rope in the attic. I didn't see a future. But my brother came up and found me before I had really done anything. It all happened so quickly, at 11 I didn't realise how serious the matter was. My parents were never told." Did you have support from your parents and family? "When you get bullied most people just keep it inside because it's so hard to deal with. You don't realise that other people go through it, you think it's only you. You think that's there's no-one you can turn to. You only ever turn to your parents when it's the last straw." What kind of things do you think makes someone become a bully?
"I think often a bully might have problems at home, or maybe it's just growing up in a tough society. Some people bully because they are jealous, some people bully just because they are wrong, and that's it."
What do you think makes someone more likely to become a bullied person - is it completely random, or are there things that can make someone more susceptible than others? "It could be anything really. You could be small, tall, thin, fat, white, black鈥 it doesn't matter really. Anyone can become a victim. If you fight back you get bullied. If you tell your teacher you get bullied. If you tell your parent you get bullied. It can feel like there's no way out.鈥 You've talked about being aged eleven and trying to hang yourself. You obviously faced major challenges as you were growing up through your teens. But can you take me to the point where you arrived this summer, when you tried commit suicide again? "The way I look at it, it happened like this. My best friend, my Granddad, died six years ago. He died on Christmas day. Pretty much as soon as he died we moved out of the place where I had lived all my life to a place where I didn't know anybody or anything. I didn't know what to do or where to go. My room was my cell. "I joined college, but in my head I was like a raging bull. I couldn't concentrate on the education. It was all becoming a problem. I got kicked out of college, but didn't really care." Why did things get so bad again this year? | "Some people think it's just like when you are feeling down and sad. But I can remember days when I was in the supermarket and I couldn鈥檛 walk." | | Chris Reilly |
"I don't know what it was. I had a girlfriend for two years and she was the only person I had ever been able to talk to or trust or show some love to. So when we split after two years I just felt like again I had lost everything and that did my head in. Then my dad's best mate died as well that same week. At his funeral I knew I had hit rock bottom. "But depression is not when you feel sad. Depression is when your head tells you that you can't handle it and you can't take anymore. Death becomes like the only way out. It's like one big broken limb waiting to be fixed." Was it a conscious decision that you made? Did you rationalise it in your head? Or was it something you did almost without knowing? "I didn't know at all what I was doing. It just felt like that was the only option. Death was the only option in life. I couldn't see anything else. No tomorrow, no future. It's not that you want to die, it's more like that's simply the only option. It's a mental illness, you can't control it.鈥 What does that kind of depression feel like? "Some people think it's just like when you are feeling down and sad in your house. But I can remember days when I was in the supermarket and I couldn't walk. I had to push a trolley to keep myself up. Or I'd hug my dad, which is something I have never done much in my life. I'd sit there for days just crying. I couldn't eat, couldn't sleep. The feeling inside of you takes over your life. The way you look, the way you look at life. You just don't see a future.鈥 If you don't mind talking about it, what happened exactly the night you tried to kill yourself? "I was in town, and I don't know why, but just didn't feel right at all. It was like there was a devil inside me. I knew that I just wanted to die. I thought that I knew that I would die. I tried to fight the pain. I sat on a bench for about an hour. When I got home I thought 'this is it'. I didn't really know I was doing it to be honest.鈥 How did you try and kill yourself? "I overdosed on sleeping tablets. I can remember it clearly. You can feel yourself dying. And it felt nice, which is weird. When you take one pill when you feel so depressed it feels nice. So you take another and another and another鈥 it's horrible. "I remember I knew I had about twenty minutes. So I just sat there. I remember saying goodbye to my mate on the internet - even though I wasn't aware of doing it at the time - now I remember everything. I remember saying bye to people. I even got my suicide letter spell checked. Did you think about the people you were leaving behind? "Well in your head death's the only option - you don't think about family or you or the fact that you're about to die. It's unexplainable. In your head it's just that that's the only way. I didn't feel anything at all. I just wanted to go. I couldn't be bothered with life anymore. "I sat there crying for about 10 minutes. It's like you body's got three layers - I felt my body shut down on one layer, so I lay down on my bed. Then a few minutes later I felt it shut down another layer. It was like someone just cut me in half. At this point my mum walked in the house and shouted me to see if was going to the gym. I tried to shout but I couldn't. The tablets make your mouth go completely dry. I couldn't talk or move so I just threw myself off the bed. She came in and saw me and called the ambulance. If she hadn't have came back I am sure I would have been dead. "I didn't regret what I had done, but I didn't want my mum to see me to see me in that state. I knew it would be painful for her, so maybe that makes me selfish, I don't know. But that's the point of depression; you just don't see it. "I remember just lying there. My brother arrived. The ambulance came. They sat me in the back and I remember I still couldn't talk or walk or anything. I kept on asking the ambulance staff if I was going to die, and they kept on telling me 'No, you're ok, you're going to be ok'. I remember telling my mum to be brave and not to cry and stuff. I remember just waving to my brother, and I thought that was it. "The tablets knocked me out for a while, and then I had to see a psychiatrist. They discussed sectioning me, but decided against it.鈥 It's a massive thing to recover from. What's the last six months been like for you? "It's been lonely. I've had days where I can't walk, days where I can't talk, days where friends have asked me to go out but I just can't be bothered - I've felt scared, worthless, lonely, sad鈥 I've been on medication and to see counsellors." 鈥淪omehow I have forced myself to come out on top. I don鈥檛 know how I have done it. Loads of people have asked. I feel completely gifted; like it is something I have been given. I have gone from wanting to die to wanting to live for every moment. The gift of life is amazing, and I aim to make a difference. I take each day as it comes and help others to follow the same patterns. The mind is very powerful, and we can only try to control it once illness sinks in. I think I give hope to other people suffering with depression.鈥 A major part of your life over the last few months has been the website that you have set up. Tell me about it. "My Space is a website that allows you to share your story or your music with other people. People can message you and talk to you, contact you, all sorts. I set my page up on the 6th of September last year, and since then I have recorded a couple of audio tracks about the way I felt. 鈥淭he success of the whole My Space page has been astronomical. I have come out on top, and been in touch with literally thousands of people. Lots of people message me, sometimes telling me when they are down. They say my voice, my story, helps them.鈥 So it's about telling your story and trying to inspire others through spoken word? "I just try my best to speak about depression honestly. And I know that for once in my life I am really being myself. For the people who don't like it I just don't care. But the people who do like it seem to be really inspired. I've been a member on the My Space site for a few months now, and I've already had 41,000 plays of my tracks. I've had about two thousand messages from people who have read the lyrics and heard the performances who have told me that I have really inspired them. It's amazing really." 鈥淚 am also working on my own official site and an online magazine. To me it's all about helping other people and sharing experiences.鈥 I know you said that when you were younger it was the loneliness and feeling of isolation that was a major part of the depression. Do you feel that what you are doing is helping to break that cycle for other people? "Yeah. It's all in the mind, depression. You can fight it. It's seems unbelievable at the time but you just have to believe you can. You have to listen to other people who have been there. When I was depressed I thought I was the only person in the world who was depressed. But the reality is that millions of people are affected by it. It's just an illness like any other. "I just want to carry on helping and inspiring as many people as I can. But if I can help just one person with my lyrics then I will have been a success. It's what I want to do with my life." | 
