I’ve
accidentally fallen back into an old, toxic relationship. Same old story really
– as much as I try to move on and become like one of those healthy people, it
keeps sucking me back in until I can’t remember life without it.
I’m
talking about depression – that strange, overused word that almost everyone has
experienced these days. Depression is my abusive husband who I can seemingly
never escape from.
Some
people seem to be predisposed to certain conditions, and I suspect it is so
with me and depression, as it’s been present in my existence, on and off, since
late single digits of age. I’m under no false illusions, though, that what I
experience is anything other than a mild manifestation of what, for some, can
be the dominating, debilitating monster that consumes their lives.
I’ve
never attempted to end my life. I’ve never even thought about ending my life
(other than dramatic entries in my fourteen year old self’s diary: “I love _____ so
MUCH and he doesn’t even know that I EXIST!!! There’s nothing else for it, I’m
going to HAVE to kill myself!” I was over it and onto someone else within a
week).
I’ve
never been fired from a job, or sectioned. I’ve never been so blue that I can’t
get showered and dressed . . . eventually.
Mostly
it manifests itself in an exhausting inertia.
The
alarm goes off, a good night’s sleep has been had, yet the thought of getting
up seems so pointless that I can barely find the energy to raise my arms. All I
can think is that all over the city people are going about their morning
routines like hamsters in wheels, performing the same old choreography as every
other day. If I get up, what will happen? I will sleepwalk through my day, but
what then?
What
has changed? What is all this for?
Why
are people so interested in the trivial minutiae that make up their lives? I
envy them, yet all I can feel is the absurdity of caring so much about work
promotions, dinner parties, which shoes to buy – how little these things that
make up our day to day lives actually matter in the grand scheme of things. I
just want to sleep. To take a break from this troubling consciousness and stop
fighting myself.
But
I don’t have that option. I need to work to live. I get through this phase by
‘bribing’ myself to get up: ‘Just get up and read your book, you don’t have to
get dressed’ . . . ‘Just get showered
and get dressed, you don’t have to leave the house’ . . . . ‘If you go to the
train station, you can buy yourself a coffee and some chocolate, you don’t need
to go into work’. . . . . ‘Just go into the office and get through the morning
. . . . Just do one task then you can stop . . . . Just go straight home, you
don’t need to socialise after work . . . . . Just make some dinner, then you
can go to sleep’. Every day chopped up into tiny sections, the concept of
getting through a whole twelve hours utterly incomprehensible.
Depression
isolates you. Moreover, it makes isolation appealing. To be amongst people is
to summon a monumental willpower in disguising your true state of mind. To
arrange your face in the correct approximation of ‘happy’ or ‘excited’ and
engage in conversation, when really you feel like an ice sculpture slowly
melting away, your sharp features eroding into a pool of water on the floor.
Attempt
to climb inside the home movie of friends gathered together that’s playing before
you, but instead find yourself stuck watching it from a distance. Laugh a
little too loudly. React a little too slowly.
Self
admonishments to ‘snap out of it’ ‘pull yourself together’ and ‘count your
blessings’ don’t change anything. You know how lucky you are. How blessed you
are compared to people with real problems. Yet nothing seems to touch you.
Certain
activities help soothe your fractured self – baking, drawing, walking, praying.
Quiet repetitive activities that restore order to the bat cave of your head. But,
ironically, depression zaps the motivation to do the very things that will help
you.
Praying
. . . God . . . Jesus. Shouldn’t belief
in Jesus banish the blues? Shouldn’t his perfect love cast out all fear?
One
day it will. I know that one day, at the end of my life, however long or short
that may be, His love will be all
encompassing, and these phases of melancholia nothing more than a dim half
memory. Through Jesus I know that the markers of success the world values are
not really important overall, which helps heal the frustration at this thing
interrupting my life without respect for my schedule or plans.
But
until then, I carry on.
I
treat myself kindly.
I
draw.
I
walk.
I
write.
I
heal.
Thanks. I've never suffered from depression but this gives me an idea of how punishing it is. However, maybe you want to up the bribes a bit... throw some Cosmo's and Krispy Kremes in that routine.
ReplyDeleteHaha! Yeah, maybe I should aim a bit higher with my bribes!
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