Arcana Mentis Secrets of the mind, kept by one’s own hand

If you’re low

A plain path for a low mood. Read the limits before the links. They are the point of the page.

You may be near seventy, getting through a grey afternoon, a long grief, or a morning that will not start. You may be younger, and unsure about a medicine a clinician has already placed in your keeping. Either way, this house will not take that decision from you. Feeling a little clearer after a page is not a medical plan. Feeling worse is a reason to seek a person, not a reason to handle it alone.

What follows is a map of pages that already exist. One of them is enough. You do not have to be articulate, and you do not have to be hopeful, to use it.

  1. 1. The depression room

    The longer essay is depression. It is education beside care, not a substitute for care. It says again that a medical review has not been done. Read it when you want the fuller voice. Do not read it as a clinician, because it is not one.

  2. 2. If this is your week

    Choose the circumstance that you recognize. Leave the others for another day.

    • Widowhood — grief after a spouse. Not a diagnosis, and not a timetable for feeling better.
    • Rainy Sundays — a long grey afternoon, and a low mood without drama.
    • Questioning the medicine — for writing questions to take to your clinician. It is not permission to change, skip, or stop a dose. The page will not decide your care.

  3. 3. The medicine answers, in short

    The house FAQ answers this in ordinary words: should you stop an antidepressant because reading helped? No. Are the depression and loneliness pages medical advice? No. They have not been medically reviewed. The depression FAQ answers the same limits for this room only. If you are in crisis in the United States, call or text 988 (https://988lifeline.org/).

  1. 4. The shop, only after that

    Only if you still want to look: the shop is a closed door. The catalog is a preview of pieces that may be written later. Nothing is for sale. There is no checkout. A low mood is not a reason to buy anything, and nothing here is offered as care.

  2. 5. Two words worth keeping

    The glossary defines depression, on this site and adjunct to care. Adjunct means beside professional help. It never means instead of it, and it never means a reason to stop a prescribed medicine without your clinician.

If you are not safe, leave this page and call or text 988 in the United States (https://988lifeline.org/). The other paths, including loneliness, are on If you’re new here. None of them replaces a clinician.