Photo taken by contributor Carrie Hilgert, a 36-year-old photographer and portrait artist from Northeast Kansas. After venturing into digital photography, she became interested in documenting her life with self portraits. This became particularly helpful when her life started to fall apart due to depression. All her other creative outlets left her, but she could always process her very dark feelings with self portraits. While she is doing much better now, she maintains compassion for those going through these hard things and hopes that her photography can give an honest insight into something that makes most people feel very isolated and alone.
About this photo: “I took this at the end of 2011. This was one of the hardest years of my life. I felt trapped and often like I was struggling to keep from drowning.”
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Broken Light Collective 
A very powerful image.
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I have yet to try self portrait photography but I certainly feel and relate to your struggle. This past year has been that way for me. One health problem after the other along with major Depressive Disorder, Body Dystymic Disorder and General Anxiety Disorder…oh and the fall will be upon us any time now with Seasonal Affective Disorder. I do use all sorts of paper art (scrapbooking, card making, art journaling etc) to help in the healing process and to get through the day. And of course prayer. Hope that the rest of the year and forward will be better for us both!
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yes, go a head
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This image, coupled with the capture, perfectly conveys those feelings. Trapped. The way so many of us feel at some season of our life, a feeling that lasts indefinitely for some.
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