MISS STRESSO DEPRESSO

“Do you want to try it?”

I looked at him looking at me. I felt that there wasn’t any option. The truth was, I had been waiting for something to reflect the chaos in my head. I’d been struggling for a long time but hadn’t yet acted out. I’d been trying to prevent that bad thing from happening, but now it had arrived. I regretted the words before they even came out but, at the same time, saying yes was the only thing in my world that made sense. Just this one time, instead of fighting against the current, I could finally float out to sea.

Shantii-Rose received her first journal when she was twelve. It allowed her to freely express the way she felt, and what she thought – without judgment. It was the only way to make sense of her mother’s suicide attempts and the events that followed. She titled every diary entry “Miss Stresso Depresso” In this memoir, Shantii-Rose shares her journey from being a confused child, to a depressed adolescent, to a young adult immersed in sex and drugs. Now in recovery, Shantii-Rose has reached the milestone of seven years clean. She tells her story in her own words, with raw honesty and keen observation. But she also finds humour as she looks back and makes sense of her journey.