How do we continue day to day in spite of ourselves?

How I escaped my seventh life round of depression.

Mental health, depression, addiction, alcoholism, fentanyl deaths, overdose, jail, and suicide…the quality live audio recording of Departing Darkness, a communal exposition of substance abuse held November 15, 2023 in Madison Wisconsin. Over 100 friends packed the room, and in excess of 250 joined the FB live-stream.

Without discussion, we sit amidst an opioid and fentanyl epidemic. National suicide rates have reached true crisis levels. Alas, addiction and poor mental health casts their anguish upon us all. Eager to transcend the torment, chiefly we lack the comprehension of where or how to begin. Realities of outpacing the suffering lingers as a far-off fantasy, and a wealth of us are convinced there is no way out. Join author Roger Ray Bird and a cast of Bright Sparks for a demystification of the self-destruction. Roger shares his personal experiences as a user and drug dealer in Baltimore, and reads from his new book Daddy, Why Were You A Drug Addict?

Leaving the shitty life behind, all of it.

Absorbing the pains of the world, myself included.

Stuck? Depressed? Needing change? Wanting a new life? Well then, how?

Here I get real. Hyper-F'ing real and bare all. I hold back nothing.

How hard is your life? Is what you have in your hands now the worst pain ever? Is it?

A deep, dark tale of verbal, emotional, physical, and sexual abuse. The joyous medicine of riding a bicycle.