In early 2006, when I was 17, I was admitted to a well-known psychiatric hospital in the UK, an institution most associated with models and footballers. I was neither. I was a schoolgirl who had suffered from either a chemical imbalance in the brain or a series of poor life decisions, depending on who you asked. For two months I was to live in a small pink room with immovable furniture, and attend every therapy on offer. I revised for my AS Levels in the communal lounge while people watched television or wept over the evening meal.
On my first day there, snow fell furiously across Derbyshire. My parents live on a big hill in a small village, and were snow-bound. Visiting hours inched around. I resigned myself to two hours of self-pity, listening to the hum of reunions from the surrounding rooms. But 30 minutes before the doors closed, in walked my friend, Ruth, who had got her driving licence just the month before. She was carrying a week’s supply of the worst gossip magazines of the late noughties and a craft kit for homemade cards. I would not spend the evening alone.
