Submitted for KEXP’s Music Heals: Mental Health (http://blog.kexp.org/musicheals/)

I’ve struggled with depression and anxiety for the past ten years — or at least, that’s when I was first diagnosed. I’m sure I was depressed and anxious long before that. There are better days and worse ones, times when it seemed I had found the perfect formula for maintaining good mental health, and times when I felt everything crashing down around me. And there’s no question that music, and KEXP especially, has played a huge role in grounding me and getting me through the darker times.

I heard John say something on the air last week that really resonated with me — he said that discovering new music is what that drives him and keeps him going. I realized at that moment that I feel exactly the same way, and that is one of the biggest gifts KEXP has given me. A place where I literally discover something new every time I listen. There is something magical about the feeling I get when I hear a new song and it just hits me right in the gut, in the best possible way. Then I play the track again, and that feeling washes over me, and for those few minutes, I feel invincible. For the past few years I have been making mixes of the songs that are hitting me the most in that moment, the songs I am needing to hear, over and over again. I’m working on Volume 8 right now. And I can tell you that I discovered nearly all of those songs and artists through KEXP.

KEXP is a life line. Not only through the music, but through the people. The DJs, the staff, the volunteers you meet when you help out at a drive, and the other listeners writing in and requesting songs, all the people you know are out there, who make you feel like you are part of something bigger than you. Who make you feel less alone. Nearly everyday, I hear John say these words, or I see them in one of his Facebook posts: “You are not alone.” There is nothing more powerful when you are in the throes of depression, I think, than to see and hear those words. Over and over, until you believe them.

In April 2016, I flew out to Seattle from Cleveland for the grand opening of KEXP’s new home. (And really, what felt like my new home as well.) It was an amazing weekend of music and community, and on my last day in town, on a total whim, I got a tattoo of the KEXP logo on my ankle. I wanted to be able to look down at my ankle and have a reminder of how it felt that weekend, being part of this incredible community, and feeling like the best version of myself. As I write this now, I’m realizing that tattoo is really another reminder of that all-important fact that I’m never alone.

The first song on my newest mix is “Rise” by Briana Marela. I have been playing that song a lot lately, because I’m in the middle of the hardest, most painful time in my life. And I need to believe that I will rise from the ashes, that I am the strong person my dearest friends tell me I am. So I listen to that song, and I take in every single word, and I try to find even the smallest bit of hope and strength, and I hold on tight.

The last thing I want to say is thank you. Thank you for dedicating an entire day of programming to the issue of mental health — something that is not discussed out in the open nearly enough. Isolation is depression’s best friend — it thrives in the shadows and silence. So thank you for bringing it out into the light.

Sending my love to all of you in the KEXP community,

Sarah Otto