Sheldon woman uses fight with depression to inspire book

Dec 18 2010 by Diane Parkes, Birmingham Mail

ANGELA Butler has battled with depression for years but when she felt the latest bout looming she decided to face it head on – and write a book.

The 34-year-old put pen paper and in less than a month had written Unleash Your Inner Goddess which has just been published.

And she says writing the book was a response to her own search for answers.

“I have had depression on and off since I was about 18,” she says. “I tried counselling and anti-depressants but none of them really helped me.”

Two years ago Angela, who had been teaching English in Italy, felt the black veil of depression falling again. Giving up her job to return to her parents’ house in Sheldon and facing the end of a long term relationship, she feared her future was bleak.

“It is hard to describe it now but I got so low that I ended up just not wanting to go out or do anything,” she says. “I didn’t want to carry on living and normal life just didn’t seem to exist for me.”

However in some ways facing a low point also helped Angela to turn her life around.

“I just reached a point where I knew I didn’t want to be like this,” she says. “I realised that I needed to make a lot of changes to my life. I was always taking the role of victim and I needed to change that. I wanted a clean slate.

“The more I thought about it the more I realised I had always been a victim and the only person who could change that way of thinking was me. I realised that life will never be easy but it is how you respond to it that matters.”