Saved by cake: How baking can help you to deal with mental health issues
Let us be honest: Cakes are literally the best thing on the planet. But did you know that cakes can be so much.
more than just a tasty sin on your plate? In some cases, cakes can actually have a significant impact on your mental health - and change things for the better. I know what you all must be thinking right now: SHOW ME HOW IT'S DONE!
Alright, alright, lean back. Luckily, you can find a perfect example of this "unconventional treatment" for mental illness in the book «Saved by Cake» by Marian Keyes. Keyes is considered to be one of the most successful Irish novelists of all time - and she delivers an extremely honest book on her battle with depression, revealing how baking helped her to deal with it. The author herself went through a very dark period of her life, in which she «couldn't sleep ... couldn't breathe ... couldn't eat ... couldn't read», and by the time that she came to the end of a sentence, she'd «forgotten the start». One day, she decided to bake a cake for a friend - and that's when she realized that baking could me much more that a simple distraction for the demons that had befallen her mind. « Whatever was going on with me, I had to wait it out. I had to find ways of passing the time until I was restored to myself again. So I baked a cake - a chocolate cheesecake, as it happens. And I enjoyed making it so much that I baked another. And another», she described the process in an interview. So she baked, and she wrote her recipes down, and little by little the depression started to lift, along with her sponges. The publication was received with positive criticism, praising Keyes honest and witty writing. Media also lauded her creative approach to the topics of depression and anxiety in such an accessible and «fun» way, serving a book that will «put a smile on your face and make you happy». Whether you are baking novice or an expert - Give this book a shot. You will not be disappointed. And if you don't want to spend the money: Christmas is almost here!
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