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Monday, October 27, 2014

%$#&, I'm Depressed

Wow. Those are not words I thought I would ever say.

During my life, I've been around a lot of people who struggle with depression. I've been in relationships with them in various capacities: lover, partner, friend, family member, colleague, etc. Sometimes the depression was spoken and/or diagnosed, sometimes it was not. Sometimes the depression was masquerading as alcoholism. Sometimes it seemed like it was the other way around (I'm not entirely sure how depression and alcoholism are related, but it seems pretty clear that they are – they have far too much in common to be otherwise. A Google search for "Which comes first, depression or alcoholism", pulls up 1.2 million hits, so I'm not alone in seeing that there are connections).

I have never been very tolerant of other people's depression. It hurt me. It scared me. Especially when I was a child and adolescent. People with depression often behave in ways that I will simply categorize here as "not very nice". Mired in darkness themselves, they do and say things that are, well, dark. In order to protect myself, I adopted a stance of contempt and self-righteousness. I labelled people with depression as "drama queens", "bullies", "weaklings", "a$$holes". I decided that I was better than them and that I would never be like that

But wait, %&*#!—

The trouble is that depression is contagious. (A Google search pulls up more than 800,000 hits for "Is Depression Contagious?"). From my first relationship with a depressed person, it was already too late. I could fight it and I could struggle to heal. And I did. I went to therapy for years and I worked out a lot of things. But I had a big block: I would never accept that I experienced depression. Depression was always an SEP (Somebody Else's Problem). 

Eventually, there had to be a day of reckoning. In order to heal the wounds that depression has inflicted on me and the depression I've internalized, I would have to accept that depression is in me too.  
 
It happened last week. That's when I realized that I'm currently depressed. This revelation came to me at the start of my yoga class last Monday, when for no apparent reason, I began to cry. (Which reminded me of being in a yoga class years ago in which someone burst out crying and proceeded to spend most of the class having a breakdown in the middle of the room. I remember being in a silent rage about it. Didn't she have the decency to leave the room? Didn't she know that the rest of us were trying to relax? Yes, when I say I approached depression from a place of judgment and intolerance, that the kind of thing I'm talking about.)

I managed not to disrupt class last Monday. I was able to keep my tears quiet and eventually I got them under control. I feel grateful that I managed to not make a scene by leaving or by sobbing all over everybody else's yoga. But bursting into tears in a public place, even if few people noticed, forced me to admit to myself that I've been experiencing a lot of unprovoked crying lately. And a number of other tell-tale signs. 

I'm depressed? What was my first clue?

  1. okay, the unprovoked crying thing is a major giveaway
  2. excessive irrational irritability
  3. a tendency to go back to bed in the middle of the day and stay there for a suspiciously long time
  4. difficulty sleeping at night (tossing and turning or waking up at two, three or four a.m. and not being able to get back to sleep)
  5. things that used to be pleasurable for me currently are not
  6. I started writing my first blog post about depression eight days ago and every day until today, I've tried and failed to hit the "Publish" button. 
  7. I feel listless and am having trouble getting motivated to do things (for instance, I'm moving at the end of the week and I haven't really packed anything yet)
  8. I have periods of feeling totally numb and/or not present (aka: zombie mode) 
  9. random pain: tummy aches, ear aches, headaches
  10. feeling removed from my normal appreciation of the beauty of the world (For instance, I drove past the LaHave River valley last night as the sun was setting and it was gloriously wrapped in autumn colours. Normally, such a sight would fill me with wonder and awe. Last night, I thought, "That's pretty" and I didn't feel anything.)
  11. an inability to suppress or deny the dark thoughts that I used to be able to suppress and deny
  12. I hear things coming out of my mouth that I wasn't thinking and don't mean (or wasn't consciously thinking and wish I didn't mean)
  13. the future feels like something to hide or run away from, not something to make plans for or embrace
  14. the dirty laundry is shin deep and I don't want to do anything about it
  15. I can smell something rotting in my fridge and I'm not the least bit interested in looking for it and throwing it out
  16. I can smell something rotting in my car and I'm not the least bit interested in looking for it and throwing it out (I mean, seriously, my car has fruit flies and it looks like the only thing that's going to change that is a good hard frost)
Saturday was our last West Dublin Community Market of 2014 and not one, but two people made a point of saying to me (with kindness and concern) that they were glad to see me looking better – that at the last market two weeks ago they had been worried about me. And you know what – I'm not even really able to remember that market two weeks ago. Obviously, I was in zombie mode and didn't even know it. But it was apparent to others.
 
I know I'm not out of the woods yet, but I'll take it as a good sign that two smart and perceptive people think I'm "looking better" than I was two weeks ago. And my ability to push the "Publish" button seems to be returning, so I take that as a good sign, too. 
 

What now?

I take hope from simply being aware of what's going on. Given that I've been refusing to admit to any kind of depression for most of my life, I'm a bit surprised at how quickly I've been able to accept what's happening now. Obviously, something in me has grown and softened. I'm not angry at myself for being depressed. I'm feeling humbled, but not humiliated. I'm making some plans for how I'm going to work this through. And I know I have resources to turn to if those plans aren't enough.
 
I expect I'll have a lot of things to say about this experience. There will be more blog posts. Even if it takes me a while to hit the "Publish" button, I'll get them up here eventually. 
 
NOTE: by a happy(?) coincidence, Canadian singer-songwriter Amelia Curran distributed a wonderful video about depression last week. As I'm struggling to make sense of where I'm at, I have found it to be good company. It points out that 100% of Canadians are affected by the impacts of mental illness through themselves, a family member or loved one. Given that all of us have some experience with depression, it's kind of shocking that we don't often talk about it and its impacts. I am lucky to have a few dear family members and friends with whom I can talk and/or exchange letters about depression. I didn't feel much like talking this past week, though, and this video was a wonderful, safe-feeling way to be reminded that I am not alone. I encourage you to watch Amelia Curran's video at the thisvideo.ca website (or simply click play below). 




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