Sex Drive by Bella Ellwood-Clayton

Author:Bella Ellwood-Clayton
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: HEA024000, book
ISBN: 9781742696331
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 2012-03-01T05:00:00+00:00

7

Sexual zombies

The poem ‘Back’ by Jane Kenyon appears in the print edition of this book. For copyright reasons it cannot be reproduced here.

It is Saturday afternoon and the city is awash with the walking dead. Down the main street, in front of shopways, catching buses and limping in front of the hospital, come the half-living. They have torn hearts and bloody arms and skin as white as bone.

I push my pram, astonished, as hundreds of zombies pass by. It looks like the setting of a teen horror movie, but there are no cameras in sight.

I approach a young woman. She has dark hair, a masculine face, and is costumed as a mad scientist. I ask her what’s going on.

‘A zombie march,’ she intones, shrugging.

Back home, I flip open my laptop and Google ‘zombie march’. Wikipedia says they’re fairly common, part of an underground phenomenon in large, especially North American, cities. Alerted through word of mouth and cyber sites such as Facebook, youths gather together as mock monsters and traipse through the city, moaning and grunting for brains. Eventually they end up at a preordained drinking establishment. Apparently some zombie marches are put on as spoof political rallies, but most, it seems, are just orchestrated to be ‘anti’. Like tongue piercings.

It seems an insidious monster is creeping across the world and its pleasure lies in robbing us of our own. Once bitten, victims often experience disturbed sleep or appetite, low energy, poor concentration, and psychomotor agitation or retardation. Casualties also feel a loss of interest or pleasure, guilt and low spirits. Those so inflicted may turn to alcohol or narcotics to ease their pain. Intensity can range from mild to fatal.

The name of this monster is depression, and it affects both body and mind. This complex affliction changes how we think and feel, affecting our social behaviour, sense of wellbeing and overall drive. It can stop us taking care of ourselves and our responsibilities. And it can lead to the death of sex.

According to the World Health Organization, depression affects about 121 million people worldwide and is among the leading causes of disability globally.2 Depressive disorders are the most disabling illnesses in Australia and play major roles in premature death by suicide, injury and cardiovascular disease.3 Each year in the US over 17 million adults experience a period of clinical depression.4 In Britain, depression is estimated to affect as many as one in five people at some point during their lives; at any moment in Britain, 1.5 million people aged between 16 and 75 are suffering from depression, and 2.7 million from anxiety.5

The stats also tell us that if you haven’t experienced depression yourself, someone you care about probably has or will.

In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), major depression is diagnosed if at least five of the following criteria are present during the previous two-week period: depressed mood, nearly every day during most of the day; marked diminished interest or pleasure in almost all activities; significant weight

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