“Hello. My name is Edward and I hate myself. Don’t worry, it’s nothing you’ve said or done. I always have done. I always will. I am a hateful person. The fact that other people don’t seem to hate me just makes me hate myself more. Self-loathing is my most loyal lifetime companion.
Sometimes it’s a good thing. Keeps you on the straight and narrow. Makes you respectful and mindful of other people’s feelings. Sometimes it’s the grit in the oyster that makes a pearl. Sometimes it makes me funny, because there’s only so much hatred of yourself you can contain before you have to start radiating it outwards. The other option is that you just let it destroy you. I’m not about to do that. I hate myself too much to let myself off lightly.
I have suffered with depression pretty much my entire adult life, and been treated and medicated for it for much of that time. The current drug that I am on, Sertraline, is very good in many ways. It tackles the anxiety which made me completely unable to function in any way. It’s made me more friendly and open as a result. In short, it’s given me all the tools I need to go the final few yards.
The final few yards are always the hardest, though. My cancerous self-loathing is so malign and insistent that it chewed CBT up and spat it out. It’s not something which wants to be reasoned with by my conscious self.
A lot of people have noted how cutesy, happy and child-friendly my art is. This surprises many people who know me who maybe expect a screaming black hole of darkness. All I can say is, that’s just the way it emerges. Pretty much all of it comes from my subconscious and based on what LOOKS RIGHT to me. I’m not a talented enough artist to make anything do my specific bidding, so it is what it is. I think if you look at a lot of my work again though, and just scratch the surface just right, you can see glimpses of the horrors.
I don’t want to come across like Brian Topp from Spaced, painting fear, terror and loathing. But I know that it must be in there. My art offers me hope too, though, because there’s also much in the way of happiness, positivity and humanity on display as well and that means that that must be in there too.
At the moment, though, I still hate myself. And, for the record, I hate this picture. How do you do?”
If you would like to see more of Edward’s work, please click here.
