John Duthie, 41, TV director

My worst episode was when I was about 30 and my mother had just died. I drank solidly for 18 months, living in a very small one-bed flat throwing empty bottles at the wall, stubbing cigarettes out on my hand. Occasionally I had suicidal thoughts but I’m too much of a coward.

I guess I have what could be called an obsessive depressive syndrome. I expect self-obsession is the root of it all - an inability to see anything beyond your own universe. People say 'snap out of it,' but if you could then you would. Since trying to snap out of it doesn’t work you might as well indulge it. It’s far better to embrace it and live it when you know it’s going to pass.

I don’t mind telling people that I’ve had problems. Perhaps my reckless attitude comes from the fact that when you’ve lost everything and there’s not much further you can go, you don’t mind what people think of you.

It doesn’t hit me these days as much as it used to. Now I suffer more from a general apathy - a kind of “what’s the point” kind of attitude to life. I’ve reached a stage in my career where I feel I should have done better. Even a one million pound poker win didn’t make me feel any different. I suspect you have to have a spiritual belief to make you truly happy - a spiritual surrender of some kind.

FACT: Worldwide, depression is now the leading cause of disability. (World Health Organisation, 2001)