Painting Away Depression

Like many people who are lost when it comes to dealing with difficulties in their lives, sometimes it's as if I'm not even in control of my own life. It's these days where I change my hair. I started cutting my hair since I was 4 years old. When all other things around me seem to go awry, my hair is the only thing I can control, so I change it.

Naturally my hair is thick dark curly locks on the verge of a fro, sometimes it's very flat and frizzy - it depends on the weather really. The first time I dyed my hair was in High school. I had participated in a hair dressing traineeship and each week we were treated to different styles, eyebrow waxing, trims, colours etc. I got blonde foils. I felt terrific, I felt like a completely different person. From then on I often had bleached blonde hair throughout the rest of High School.

After school I changed my hair many times. I've had red, orange, blonde, green, blue, purple, pink and even white hair. I've had bob cuts, shaved hair, undercuts, piggy tails, pony tails, braids and afros.

Coming from a family where all the girls value their long beautiful hair it shocked everyone that I would quite often chop away at it. Everyone would ask why the change? Almost crying because everyone else has straight hair and I have the hair that apparently they all envy. They obviously don't know how many brush handles have broken off as I struggled to brush the knots out.

Sometimes tragedy comes into my life and how do I deal with it? I take a pair of scissors and have at it. Standing in front of my duchess mirror and with each snippet I make to my hair, each strand that falls to the ground takes with it all the worries I carried on my shoulders and I can start to breathe again.

A few years ago I started studying performing arts and it's very important to not make changes to your appearance when you're in the industry. I had to find a way to find that calmness and still feel in control, so I started to paint.

While I was studying it became a meditation to paint. I’d buy a cheap canvas from Lincraft that could easily be thrown away after I was done.

Here's the problem with that. I have daddy issues. For as long as I can remember I did that thing that kids do where they purposely fail at something to disappoint someone else. In my case it was art. I didn't apply myself. I purposely failed at artwork, drawing, painting etc. I just didn’t even try.

On my dad's side of the family everyone loves art and they are all very talented Indigenous Artists. So that wasn't going to be me.

My dad has never been a part of my life and I grew up not knowing him. For the purpose of this story I'll just call him 'Bob' because calling him my dad is giving me ownership over him, stating someone is mine. He is not.

All I knew about Bob was what everyone else told me. Strangers would even talk to me about him, I don't know why, it meant nothing to me, they knew him better than I did. My mum never really spoke of him and she would sound rather annoyed when I did.

This all became very confusing for a kid to take in. Here I was looking just like him and apparently acting just like him. How confusing to be told every day I looked like the person my mum had so much hate for. Why would I want to look like the person who made her so sad? What's worse, why would I want to act or do any thing relatable to him! It wasn’t enough that people told me every day of my life how much I looked like Bob. I resented him, I didn’t want to give them another reason to compare me to him.

But I started to love this painting thing and it was driving me nuts! One thing I hate more than people saying I am wrong about something, is people being right about something about me.

Since ending an abusive relationship recently and not being able to get any sleep because of the PTSD, I was lost once again. My hair had recently been cut and it was the middle of the night. I couldn't keep snipping away at what little hair remained on my head. When there was nothing but fear of the dark and tears on my pillow I started to paint.

Just being able to get things out of my head was a blessing. I started to create these painting late at night and in the early hours of the morning when I couldn't sleep. I turned the chaos into creativity.

I am painting away my depression, one haircut at a time.

I started to paint how I felt and it was black. It was sad. It was angry. It was lost. It was alone. But then as time went by the feelings changed and the colours changed to my favourite colours, Pink and Gold.

The chaos inside my mind splattered onto the canvas and I began to feel calm and happiness brought me to paint the platypus. I love platypus's, they're such beautiful creatures and seeing them on the canvas began to change something inside me.

My mind constantly boggles if I allow it the time to wander. In slumps of depression or worry and fear I choose Creativity. Create a story, create a song, create a picture, create happiness for others. It's amazing how you can fool other people into thinking you're happy just by giving them something to smile about.

I’m not a person who can talk to people about my problems, about my feelings, about the things inside my head. So anything that I create, whether I’m cooking or writing or painting that’s the only way I can express myself. On a good day I spend more time having conversations with myself or the characters I create rather than the humans I see outside.

Whenever there is a dramatic change in my life, there is a dramatic change in my hairstyle. Now there is also a painting to go along with it.