It was her own journey through depression that compelled Kairavi Bharat Ram to put into words the thoughts that one encounter on dark days, just to help those who are going through the same thing. It was three years ago that she wrote C is for Cat, D is for Depression (Scholastic; Rs 495) and it is now that the book has released, after the addition of wonderful illustrations by Priya Kuriyan. Written in rhyme, the book talks about the various roller-coaster of emotions that a person suffering from depression goes through.

It was in 12th grade that Kairavi started feeling low and demotivated and kept getting panic attacks to the point where she realised that she had to see someone about it. That there definitely was something wrong. “Nobody around me had really been through this for me to get clarity on what was happening to me. People’s understanding of things like this was so low, they wouldn’t understand. There was nothing visibly wrong with my life, I didn’t have divorced parents, and other such ‘problems’ that one is ‘allowed to be depressed about’ according to society,” said Kairavi.

There were two major reasons for the 22-year-old to write this book. One was to give words to people who are in a similar situation. “My therapist always used to make me imagine my problems as an external body. If you start disconnecting it from yourself, it gets easier to deal with it. I would talk to her in metaphors like drowning and endless tunnels and she would note them down for later, asking me if she can share them with her other patients,” says Kairavi, of the time she realised that helping people was the main agenda on her list.

However, the second motivator and a more important one, she believes, are the people around the person who is not doing okay. With powerful visuals, the main idea is to transport the friends, family, teachers and carers of children into their lives when they are suffering.

The book cover

It was her encounter with little kids at her therapist’s clinic that led her to realise that there is no age to this thing. “Just like we are teaching our kids about Covid-19 and teaching them ways to be safe and precautious, we should be having similar conversations about depression. It’s time we gave equal importance to mental and physical health,” added Kairavi. She is adamant that no kid is too young to get acquainted with mental health so any child who is willing to learn is a suitable audience for her book.

Kairavi took two gap years after school before she felt strong enough to move to London to get her college degree. Those two years were in complete isolation with the only form of solace coming from running a lifestyle page on Instagram. Her page has over 10,000 followers but she is trying to move her audience from there to a fresh new page. “When I made the page, my life was at its darkest and the persona I had created online was the exact opposite of me. Now, I want to continue blogging but I want to be a more authentic self. I want the world to know the reality behind curated images and I want to use my platform to share random thoughts that keep coming to me,” she added.

Now a third-year student at London College of Fashion, she is on an indefinite leave from campus, studying out of her Delhi NCR home. We can smell another book in the making already but Kairavi hasn’t given it a thought. As much as another book from the bright young girl would be welcome, we look forward to her blogging journey, as long as she continues to find newer channels to spread her message.