Aaron Gillies, or @TechnicallyRon, is one of Twitter’s most original and humorous voices, using his sense of humour to help himself and others tackle depression.
It seems that depression is an issue that people, but particularly men, still struggle to talk about. A recent YouGov survey discovered that one in eight men in the UK have been diagnosed with a mental health problem and 12 per cent of them say they do not have a friend they would discuss it with.
With this in mind, Aaron decided to start his @TechnicallyRon Twitter account to help others deal with their problems and share funny anecdotes about living with mental illness. His hilarious tweets about depression and the struggles of everyday life have been turned into a book called Life-abet: An A-Z of Modern Existence.
In an interview with metro.co.uk he said:
You have to take the piss out of depression, otherwise we are letting it win. I got diagnosed five years ago, but in all honesty I was probably suffering before that, but I just didn’t have the guts to admit it to myself. It’s one of those things that you try to put off, like going to the dentist or doing the washing up, but then it got to the point where I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
He admits that the Twitter thing began as a way to socialise, but it quickly became a way of discussing important issues, and with his unique brand of dark humour it allowed both him and other sufferers to cope and feel normal and to have a bloody good laugh while they were at it.
Awesome work sir, we wish you all the best.
