My Gardening TherapyI have experienced bouts of depression and anxietysince I was a teenager. Having lived in apartmentsand rental houses and growing things in pots foryears before we moved into our current house and Igot my first proper garden in November 2007. I canhonestly say that gardening has proven to be thebest self-administered therapy around! As a friendsaid “Gardening can be really grounding”!

When we bought our house it had the traditionalMelbourne suburban back yard – couch grass as faras the eye can see and a big Hills Hoist in the middle(see the ‘Before’ pic – credit Brad Teal Real Estate). Over the past four years my family and I haveworked very hard and it now features a plentiful vegie patch (my domain), a pergola with grapewines over our north facing kitchen window, (my husband likes to think of this as his vineyard), amini orchard (apples, pears, apricot, nectarine, berries and mandarin), chickens (“the chickibabes”)and a succulent collection (thanks to my older son, who loves them). And there is still plenty ofdesignated play area for our kids, including a cubby, sand pit, trampoline and slide.

I h a v eg a i n e dimmensesatisfaction andpleasurefrom thegarden.I g l o ww i t hp r i d ew h e np e o p l evisit andcoo anda a h a tt h egarden.There isoften a degree of surprise when people look out of the window to view such a fertile and plentifulgarden in a moderately sized suburban backyard. More than one person has commented “it’s like alittle farm”.

I think that the trick to gardening as therapy is to be in the present – to smell the plants and feel thesoil. To notice the bugs and the moisture. To listen to what your garden is telling you about what itneeds and to respond without fear of failure. The hardest moments in gardening for me came when Iembarked on getting rid of the couch lawn without using chemicals. I look back on what surely musthave been months of digging. I would close my eyes and be haunted by the image of the hessian-likeweave of couch roots. Pulling up couch and hearing the snapping sound that means I haven’t got itall, is still a source of despair (as I now start to tackle our nature strip and front lawn). But it was allvery much worth it and through all that digging and sifting (and digging and sifting and digging andsifting) I learnt so much about the soil in different parts of the garden. If I find myself digging upweeds with resentment or watering the garden (from our rain water tank) on autopilot then I know Ineed to stop and slow down and be mindful.

There is always work to be done outside and if I find myself feeling heavy with depression or stuntedby anxiety then I know I need to get out there and get on with it. The garden needs me and rewardsme in such a tangible way. The garden is the one place that the black and white thinking that cancome with mental illness can actually be constructive. When it comes to human relationships blackand white thinking is rarely realistic or constructive and one can get tangled up in emotional knotstrying to make sense of things through a bout of depression. However a garden has clear needs andif one is not present enough to tend to them then it becomes obvious through the gardens response.Hiding in bed is not an option!

I also believe that there is a lot to be said for the healing properties of good old fashioned fresh airand exercise. Of course, the therapeutic side of gardening is actually really only one small part ofwhy I do it. I didn’t start digging up the couch because I thought it would help me – I wanted to growveg and teach my kids about nature and sustainability.

I hope to share more gardening stories with SGA on line in the future, but I just wanted to share thisaspect of it first.

Lucy

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