by Asato Kitamura
November 13, 2024
Despite anxiety and depression, I was fortunate enough to overcome my traumas by learning how to repurpose them as inspiration. Today, fashion and fine art allow me to offer the world both a physical and mental embrace.
I wish my breakthrough moment wasn’t when I thought "I'd pay good money if I could feel better." I am cheap, so the path became clearer once cost was no longer a concern. After I decided to get help for my depression, one challenge was telling a receptionist why I wanted therapy. I had never told anyone I felt depressed.
Depression can affect anyone — men, women, and children — at any point in their lives. And its debilitating effects show up in many different ways. Doug Duncan tells us how depression changed his life.
had told me several years ago that everything would get better, I would have nodded while screaming disbelief inside my head. I thought things simply could not get better, that I'd be forever feel imprisoned in a dark room.
Nothing could have been worse for me than being a teenager in high school — until I became a teenager in high school with depression. 
