REGISTERED USERS!

The database of roughly 4,000 interview excerpts used in creating Mauve is available by writing to us at  mauve@pentafolio.com. Be sure to indicate the theme you want and the file format you prefer.

WOW!

But when I did finally get the chance to view Mauve, it wasn’t my son I was thinking about. It was my own late teen years. A model student in elementary and early high school, my world came crashing in on me for no obvious reason when I was in my late teens. I was seriously depressed, dropped out of school, could find little purpose in getting up in the morning and cried with the least amount of provocation, in fact usually with no provocation. I was put on anti-depressants that I begrudgingly took for eight months, loathing every pill I swallowed. I contemplated suicide. My mother was saintly in her patience and understanding and helped me to the office of a psychologist once a week. My friends were baffled. Some could relate to what I seemed to be going through. Others were frightened to talk about it. I was depressed about nothing in particular and everything in general. In short, about all the things the teens in Mauve talk about.

I got over it. Went back to school. Traveled in Europe. Went on to become a responsible adult and was never plagued by that extent of depression again. Probably the getting through it was the biggest gift that came out of that frightening time. From it I learned about reaching the bottom and surfacing. I learned that certain diversions were extremely helpful. I learned that getting depressed was actually a pretty healthy response to much of what is unexplained and unjust in the world. I learned that working with all that blackness, I could actually turn my depression into creativity. I learned that pulling myself out of a difficult time was something I had the power to do. In short, I absorbed many of the messages that permeate Mauve.

The love and lack of judgement of caring parents probably made all the difference in the world in my case. But not all teens have that, and some who do have their own reasons for not wanting to see it at that time in their life. And parents can be filled with all the love and best of intentions but still not have the tools to help their kids through difficult emotional times. A resource like Mauve would have been like gold to me when I was going through adolescent depression. Maybe it would have spared me the anti-depressants. Certainly it would have reassured me that I was not alone and that there were a lot of resources out there to help me. I just needed to have them pointed out to me.

So, when I hear my son asking the Big Questions at only ten, I suspect we’re in for some even bigger and more difficult ones in the years to come. The box for Mauve sits in prominent display on a shelf in my office. Like a small insurance policy, its presence reassures me.

Anne Rochon Ford