Kate Simonet Chooses Happiness for Life

As a high school senior at Park Center a decade ago, Kate Simonet seem to have it all. The-three sport athlete was a captain in cross country, basketball, and track and field, was an honor roll student and had a supportive and loving family.

But Kate says on the inside she was struggling. She kept a battle with depression largely hidden from her friends and family until a breakdown in the spring of her senior year.

“I believed that if I could excel (in sports and academics) and look happy on the outside, then I could make myself happy on the inside. And that’s not how it works,” Kate said.

Simonet loved the competition of running and so continued her distance career at Winona State University. She suffered a second of what she describes as a “psychotic break” during her sophomore year and was diagnosed with a bi-polar disorder.

But she persevered. And now ten years after her first battles with depression, she wants to tell her story. Kate self-published her book Out of the Darkness last month. Her message is one of hope and she believes that by telling her story she can help other people, especially high school students, who may be experiencing some of the same feelings. You can follow her on Instagram and Facebook.

Kate is now 27 and a project manager for a software development company and lives in Maple Grove.