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 Dear Reader,

I'm not really sure what to write. I am depressed because of Seasonal Affective Disorder and the fact that the 'holiday season' brings a laundry list of depression triggers for me. Due to the depression, I feel like I am a fraud and that nothing I have ever done or ever will do is going to be good enough. A part of me says I should delete this post and just give up.

I, however, am not one to just give up on things. There's some core part of me that says I must push through the challenges before me and bend the universe to my will. It is exhausting to have that drive down deep inside. While it has allowed me to accomplish many things (like writing 2 books over the course of this month despite my depression), this drive to push forward is relentless and almost like a compulsion.

I have started my holiday crafting months late. At the same time the list of people I am crafting for is much shorter than it has been in past years. I'd be doing charity crafting but I have no where to donate the goods that I have made. They're just sitting in a laundry basket taking up space in the other room. Due to Covid-19, I have not been making the preemie hats and scarves for the homeless. It cut down on my yarn bill, but it doesn't leave me much to work with in my annual scrap yarn projects at the end of the year.

I feel like a fraud for so many reasons. I'm not holding rituals anymore because my kids get into things. I'm doing less magical work because I'm doing less rituals and because my kids get into things that I leave sitting out. As such, the brain weasels gnaw on me and tell me that I'm not a real witch because I'm not doing these witchy things. I'm doing less in the way of active devotional work for any of the deities because I have been so busy juggling the kids needs and trying desperately to keep the household running. I feel like I've been a bad priestess to Déa because I'm not out there working among the population doing things like volunteering at the local food pantry, simply because I don't have the time or the energy to do it. I feel like I have been a bad priestess to Déa because I haven't been writing spiritual works for her this year. I feel like I have been a bad priestess to Déa because my medical conditions prevent me from 'properly' celebrating the rite of Sacrifice. I've been spinning my wheels on trying to come up with alternatives that work for people like myself who are medically unable to have wine or bread (yay diabetes /sarcasm).

Depression makes this time of year really hard. It's part of the reason why I have a habit of going radio silent through most of the month of December. I feel like nothing I have to say is good enough and that my complaints about my struggles are something that no one wants to read. When the Werdé's Day came, I promised myself that I would be more open and transparent in my writing. I also promised that I would be more consistent. It's been a struggle. I'm going to put my damn fool stubbornness to work here and do my best to keep posting through the darkest months of the year. I can't promise it will be pretty or necessarily uplifting. But it will be honest and genuine.