Please welcome first-time contributor M, a 20-year-old student from Finland who has been suffering from various mental health challenges over the past eight years. She has been diagnosed with depression, generalized anxiety disorder, fear of social situations, and recurrent PTSD. The truth of her condition, however, still remains unclear. And yet, she carries on, trying to understand a world that feels so hard to handle, and how she fits into it. And she creates, sometimes using her camera and other times writing into the night.
About this photo: “This photo, taken when I was only 15, is one of my first shots that made me realize that I can, and perhaps should, photograph.
I have always loved the nighttime, the slight breeze and crispy air that makes you feel suddenly very aware of the world, time and your feelings. And this particular fall in 2009 I remember standing on the peer of our summer cottage, waiting for the sky to turn to black. But instead, it kept on lighting up and glimmering, as if the sunny skies were fighting back the night, light the darkness and the Yin the Yang. I remember wondering how a battle could be that beautiful.”
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