The Weight I Grew Up With · The Bipolar Bear

The Weight I Grew Up With

From my earliest memories, depression has been my constant companion.

At four or five years old, standing in my school playground in a blue parka and corrective shoes for my club foot, I first felt it — that heavy, soggy duvet of doom settling over me.

This wasn’t sadness.

It was something deeper. Physical. Painful.

And it never really left.

I lived on the periphery. Never quite belonging anywhere.

As the eldest child, I didn’t have an older sibling to smooth my way into groups. My parents didn’t have friends with kids who could say, “He’s alright, let him join in.” Even my cousins lived too far away to offer that simple lifeline.

I learned early what it felt like to be outside.

Because of my fused club foot — shorter than the other — I walked differently. Awkwardly. Clumsily.

I felt constantly watched. Judged. Whispered about.

Whether people actually were staring almost didn’t matter — it felt real.

So I adapted.

I became the clown.

I hurt myself. Embarrassed myself. Made myself ridiculous for laughs from people I didn’t even like or respect.

The deal I made was simple:

Humiliation in exchange for belonging.

“As long as I’m part of something,” I told myself, “the cost doesn’t matter.”

Looking back, that realisation still leaves a hollow ache in my chest — what I was willing to trade just to avoid being alone.

All of this played out in Ebbw Vale in the mid-80s through the 90s.