It recounts Matt's first mental breakdown when he was just 24 years old, living in Spain with his girlfriend Andrea. Matt Haig tries to convince readers that time can heal, that at the end of it all, there is light at the end of the tunnel, even if it can’t be seen.īreakdown Chapter 1: Falling Matt encourages to enjoy the little joys and moments of happiness that life brings, and tells that there are still opportunities to remain alive. Reasons to Stay Alive intends for readers to never lose sight of faith and support. Eventually, he learned to appreciate life and all the things we take for granted. He recounts how through reading and learning about depression from others who have suffered from it, by writing, and the encouragement from his family and his girlfriend Andrea, he was able to conquer the illness. Matt then goes on to narrate how he learned to examine himself, how he accepted and 'befriended' his depression, where instead of him being part of his depression, depression was a part of him, and he had control over it. After the near-suicide episode he spent the next three years battling his depression. He figured that to survive such tragedy would only bring more suffering and so those thoughts restrained him from him ending his life.įrom that point on, even though he was still very ill, in a very small part of him he found the strength to try and fight the illness, and not let himself be consumed by it. He tried to gather up the courage to end everything once and for all, but he was too afraid, thinking that if he survived he might remain paralyzed, trapped in his body forever. Standing on the edge of the cliff, he thought of all the people who loved him, and he thought of death. He got to the edge of a cliff, and was one step away from ending all his pain and suffering. He felt that living brought too much pain, and the only way not to feel the pain was to end his life. Everything he felt, everything he saw only made him more and more depressed. He was scared because he did not know what was going on inside his mind.Īfter three days with no sleep and food, he could no longer withstand the pain he was feeling. The impression of a dark cloud that poured endless rain over him made him feel 'caved in', with no way of escaping.
He was 24 at the time, and with little or no understanding of depression, or awareness of it. One day, in September of 1999, Matt Haig felt that his old self had died. The novel was reviewed by The Sunday Times, The Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, the Star Tribune, and the Toronto Star. It is Matt Haig’s first nonfiction piece and the first time he wrote about his illness publicly. It is based on his experiences of living with depression and anxiety disorder, which he suffered from the age of 24. Reasons to Stay Alive is a novel and memoir written by novelist Matt Haig, published on 5 March 2015.
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