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“I start to think there really is no cure for depression, that happiness is an ongoing battle, and I wonder if it isn’t one I’ll have to fight for as long as I live. I wonder if it’s worth it.”
~Elizabeth Wurtzel~
Those of us who suffer and I DO mean suffer from a clinical depression, know that there’s no way of preparing for the fight adequately. Sure, you keep on taking medications like anti-depressants, vitamins, supplements, do the requisite exercise plan, but that doesn’t stop the immobilizing and crushing of the battle ahead. Everything is just about survival…and that’s where I am now, just surviving and waiting for the battle and notice I didn’t say war to end.
Some mistake sadness and grief for depression and while one can feel “depressed” when there’s sadness or grief involved, clinical depression takes you down, it holds you under the water as you try to come up, wrenching it’s cold and sadistic hands around your neck so you can come up for air. Just a moment to breathe. And everyone has different experiences of depression and depression isn’t ever the same foe when it comes back.
I’m not going to take my life, but I do wish I was dead so I didn’t have to experience the pain that just wrenches my whole body and mind. I can’t think straight, nothing makes me smile and Summer is the worst time of the year for me. Even more than the “holiday Winter blues” that also drag me down.
Summer brings up memories of the past where I was out of school, free, off to camp, having romances that I knew wouldn’t last but I was able to enjoy them none the less. As I grew older, Summer still meant freedom and now included travel, being outdoors, hiking, swimming in the ocean as I turned into a mermaid. My romances took on a different shade which still didn’t guarantee they would last, but I could still enjoy them.
Now, it’s like Summer is the time where I just hold my breath, feeling hopeless and so consumed by pain because really, isn’t Summer about youth? And it’s gone, just like that. George Bernard Shaw said that;
“Youth is wasted on the Young.”
I know that truth now and while I rationally I know that age doesn’t normally prevent one from experiencing new hills of discovery and freedom, depression robs that door from opening. My chemical imbalance becomes a hungry and vicious animal that just waits for a trigger to happen which shuts any door of experiencing a hope and faith that maybe, just maybe I’ll be able to have a Summer in the future that I’ll revel in. But not now, right now Summer is an unending season of sorrow and regret.
Tears run from my eyes burning me from the same salty waters of the ocean I once couldn’t get enough of, my heart has stopped dreaming and hoping for any type of joy or at least gratitude for living, my sleep torments me with nightmares that leave me exhausted in the morning and the days drag by and I wait….I wait for the temporary relief and strength to not win the war with Depression (that’s not going to happen) but to win the battle.
I haven’t been in a battle with Depression like the way I am now for a long time. I mean I’ll have Depression, pacing around me and I’ve been able to keep it at bay for the most part so that I don’t feel it’s ravages and bites. But now, I feel like I’m fighting for my life. I don’t even want to go into the triggers now on how Depression was let into my door because that would require concentration, introspection and the ability to let myself feel even more hopelessness and helplessness.
Usually, I isolate myself from everything and everyone when I’m at a place like this. But, I feel like the more I avoid blogging and you my friends, I’ll just give more ammunition to Depression and despite my weakness I AM a fighter. I haven’t learned the moves to bar Depression, but I’m not going to wave the white flag of peace or hope for a truce.
I don’t want to hear any existential bullshit that tries to make Depression seem like a teacher of wisdom or other similar nonsense. Those who preach and try to convince others that Depression can offer a certain horrible beauty, have never really known Depression the way so many of us do.
There is nothing beautiful or noble or righteous about Depression. Depression could care less about being a teacher or a redeeming companion. I even get a bit of anxiety writing this because when I’m feeling a little more balanced I actually start to believe that there IS a light in the darkness if I allow myself to know my own Depression more and so I feel like a hypocrite.
Maybe it’s that deep-rooted shame that was imposed on me and still is in my family that if I only did “this or that…”, “snapped out of it,” “worked harder to be happy and count my blessings…” yeah, like that really helps. And so I just avoid my family because they don’t have the same demon of Depression like I do and they make me feel more alone and unloved.
“Mysteriously and in ways that are totally remote from natural experience, the gray drizzle of horror induced by depression takes on the quality of physical pain.”
~William Styron~
It’s not they actually don’t love me, but they’re just so unconscious and uncomfortable with a mental illness that they’ll never experience that they try to make me feel better in a way that only leaves me feeling more alienated and fucked up.
It’s not just my family that is uncomfortable with Depression…I mean look at our society of shiny-happy people. I read that by 2012 the #1 illness that people will experience is a mood disorder. Whether they’ve always had Depression or it’s caused by some external factor, it doesn’t matter. Depression will try to claim more people than ever before which is why it’s SO important to become more aware and knowledgeable about this illness, this epidemic…
“One in six people suffer depression or a chronic anxiety disorder. These are not the worried well but those in severe mental pain with conditions crippling enough to prevent them living normal lives.”
~Polly Toynbee~
I know that I’m doing everything possible to stay well and keep my strength up. I also want to re-iterate that I won’t go up in flames and kill myself. I don’t self-cut or mutilate in any other way, I just sit here looking out at my back yard with the roses in full bloom, my apricot tree full of round, golden-peach fruits and I could care less.
All of you know how MUCH I love my “girls” my cats…but I can’t even smile and play with them right now. I stroke their fur and cry into it because I know they won’t make demands of me that are impossible to fill. Books are read and used like a life raft but even the magick of losing myself in them like I usually do isn’t working. Food is all colorless and tasteless and the one consistent safe shore in my life, my therapist is leaving for Europe for three weeks.
O.k. enough…I know this is a long post and if you’ve managed to read this much, than you’re a brave soul and still see something in me that I’ve lost sight of. If I’m not commenting on your blogs like I usually do or writing back to your emails, replying to any comments you leave for me here, please know I still care and you haven’t done anything wrong to make me want to turn away from any of you.
As I’ve said before, I’m in survival mode and every breath I take is spent in this battle with Depression. I can’t tell you when I’ll “be back” or guarantee any type of how I’ll respond to you. I had to write this post to you, so that you know I’m still here, I haven’t deserted you or my blog and I’m still trying to fight the “good” fight.
Sorry for the loose editing of this post, my rambling, and the unnecessary words that have managed to slip in here. I’m sick and right now this is the best I can offer.
“That’s the thing about depression: A human being can survive almost anything, as long as she sees the end in sight. But depression is so insidious, and it compounds daily, that it’s impossible to ever see the end. The fog is like a cage without a key.”
~Elizabeth Wurtzel~
I’ll leave you with a video from one of my favorite t.v. shows; “House” with one of my favorite songs in the background. The song is “As Tears Go By” by The Rolling Stones and pretty much explains where I’m at right now…
(Just click on the video)
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Torfthy7lCI[/youtube]
© 2011, Wendy S.. All rights reserved.
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I can’t pretend to know exactly how you feel and I won’t tell you to snap out of it (my gods, isn’t that annoying??). Just know I’m here when you’re ready. Sending heartfelt hugs across the pond, Lyn x
Thank you Lyn for always opening your heart and soul to me…Friends are the balm of the soul and make depression not so oppressive.
I’m real sorry you are in a bad patch – you shared in a few blog posts back they were mucking around with your meds hope they sort it out for you.
I’ve got two friends who have & are struggling with depression – I haven’t been able to understand them – your posts help me begin to understand.
You have a real gift of writing & if & when you feel up to it I sure would love to read what friends & family can do and say to help
Sending you healing thoughts and best wishes
Lots of love Leanne
Hi Leanne,
I will definitely write a post about how to help people who have a mood disorder. Your friends are very blessed to have a friend like you who cares so much and wants to be there for them. And thank you for the compliment on my writing, if I can either reach another person who suffers from depression or a friend like yourself who wants to understand a mood disorder in someone they care about, that means a lot to me. Kitties definitely help with any type of illness, don’t they? ; )
Practical matters first: does your therapist have a colleague who might see you in those three weeks? Next, when it gets really bad, feed yourself carbohydrates. Simple ones, if possible. Calories can be dealt with later.
Everything you said is true, and the only way out is fucking through. [Go look up The Communicatrix' blog entry about rolling the boulder up the hill. She's right, she's in tune, and she's funny.] There is a light at the end of the tunnel; that light may presently be out of sight around a curve, but it’s there. The fact that you cannot now see or believe it does not negate its existence.
If you can’t get happy, get mad. This black dog has taken the life of your soul; how dare it do that? Who told it it could sever your relationship to the gods, to the life they give us, and to your cats, for Loki’s sake?
Get angry. Stay angry. It has no right to do this to you, and even if, right now, you cannot fight it: that still does not confer upon the dog the right to seize your soul by the throat and choke its life out.
How dare it ask this change of you in this painful way?
You will get through this. The sun may not be shining for you today, but it will again. Even if it’s not possible to believe that, it’s true.
The sun is shining through, well actually it rained the other day and that made my spirits lift. Well, if the belief is true that depression that it is anger just repressed, than you’re absolutely right that claiming anger definitely kicks up the energy a notch. Funny, how so many of us, including myself have a hard time with anger. I’ll have to ponder on that more and maybe write a blog post about that. Thank you as always for leaving such amazingly insightful and caring comments.
Dearest Wendy, I am so sorry about how poorly you are feeling. I cannot say that I know how you feel but I want you to know that I sympathize with how you are feeling. If I knew of a way to help you, I would do so in a heartbeat. Know that you have friends who care. You are so warm and intelligent and giving and caring – and you have many talents which you show here. Know that I am here – if you need me.
xoxo Theresa
Theresa, knowing I have friends who care for me unconditionally makes my depression loosen it’s grasp on me a LOT. Thank you for your loving and supportive friendship and anyone who has any type of illness suffers in some degree, so I know you empathize.
As a fellow depression sufferer the only thing I can give is cyber (((hugs)), and make sure you get plenty of fluids and chocolate
Keep afloat till you reach the other side.
I have learnt to function by living a very quiet simple life, and having a head full of lockable filing cabinates to be able to shut away and not think about stuff that can make an episode worse.
not the best way to live as it is like ur numb most of the time, it’s the way I manage without having to take the pills yet again.
But it doesn’t stop the depression or the mania hitting. ((((HUGS))))
Oh chocolate of course! I get really upset if I don’t have a bittersweet stash of chocolate around. I’ve read that actually chocolate has some chemicals in it to produce dopamine, etc…which makes sense to me. I also forget to drink a lot of water when I’m feeling stuck, so thank you for the reminder. I like the metaphor of a filing cabinet. Kind of like a computer with all the files and then taking them out when you’re ready and able to deal with them. Good idea : )
I don’t know if this post by betty pilsberry will make you feel any better but it can’t make you hurt any more. and maybe knowing that others out there share your affliction will help.
http://kittyandmedesigns.blogspot.com/2011/06/coping-with-depression-antidepressants.html
What a great and well-written post! I’m going to have to round up blog posts by others who not only share their personal experiences with a mood disorder but also really helps those who don’t suffer from a mood disorder. Thanks so much, Flora for the link : )
No existential, spiritual crap from me, since depression and I are old friends. Very good friends. Or perhaps good enemies would be a better way to put it. And no, I don’t believe there is a “cure.” There’s only good management and remission, IMO.
Am *I* suicidal right now? Nope, but thoughts of death–mine, those I love (particularly my two remaining cats)–are with me daily and have been for endless years. Do I have hope for a better future for myself? Nope. I’m 47 and I figure this is it, have lived consciously with the meaninglessness and hopelessness of everything for a decade now. Can look back and trace depression into my childhood.
Do I want to come back and do this all over again? Hell no.
So I can relate. I can’t help you, other than to say someone out in cyber-space does get it. And sends you universal Light and Love, because that’s the best I can do.
Blessings and Peace.
-Kim
Kim, you took the words right out of my mouth. I get into major anxiety mode when I think of my girls passing. I have to really watch my thoughts on that and I’m also 47 and like you wisdom has come through the school of hard knocks but I know at the age of 20 there was no way I could look at the deeper side of depression and live with meaning and purpose. I really like how you said that. And yes, cyber friends and blessings heal so much. Thank you for the beautiful comment.
Depression is an old nemesis of mine as well, so there will be no ‘depression will teach you a lesson!’ or other bullshit from these fingers of mine.
I will say, that I feel somehow as if the shiny happy positivity police of the world make my depression (and quite possibly that of others)worse by adding some sort of guilt and feeling of being fucked up or broken for not being all smiles, rainbows, kittens and unicorn farts all of the time. Life is duality. The dark comes with the light and denying either is a good way to fuck yourself up.
Just know others out here, like myself, can relate. And that even during your darkest of days, our love and friendship will burn bright for you. xox
Thank you Fae Friend (I think of you as a fae kindred spirit, Danni : ) as always for your empathy and beautiful way of coming from your heart. And let’s banish all those shiny-happy people to their own island so we who actually have more depth than they do don’t have to see their blinding white alligator smiles…The Seelie Court wouldn’t be complete without the Unseelie, right? Oh you have me some great ideas for thinking about depression and the two Fae. Courts, thank you Danni!
Oh, sweet friend, I hate to hear that you are feeling so low. I understand a little of what you’re going through. My episodes never last long, just a couple of days at most (with one notable exception), but I get that you can feel it coming. It’s like a heavy, smothering fog creeping closer and bearing down and there isn’t a damn thing you can do to head it off. I’ve never been suicidal, either, but I’ve definitely had days where I’ve thought it wouldn’t be such a bad thing to not wake up in the morning. I’m here if you ever want to talk and know that I’m praying for the sunshine to return to your world. Love you, my friend. ((((hugs))))
Wendy,
I also hate how people who have obviously never had depression start to get all philosphical about how it makes me a better person, blah, blah, bullshit. Depression turns me into a monster and has left huge scars. Not only that it has devastated those around me.
But one thing I can say is that it has helped me regconise suffering. I can really identify and show empathy to those that are suffering for what ever reason. I know how much you must be suffering right now, having spent most of my life fighting to keep afloat.
I guess that there is not much I that I can say right now to comfort you. Just hold on, you will make it. Don’t be hard on yourself and rest. Don’t isolate it might be a pain in the butt hearing that but seriously it is the worst thing you can do.
This WILL pass. I will be thinking of you. X
Wendy, thanks for this post.
I have a little better understanding of how devastating Depression can be. I can only hope that you do will be able to find more highs than lows soon.I wish you all the best. I am at a loss as to what I can say, so I will leave you with a virtual HUG!!!!!!!!!!
Purrs from me and my kitties Tillie and Georgia
Hugs and best wishes to you while you are in the jaws of the Black Dog. You have many friends here on teh interwebz who are concerned and supportive of you.
Sweet girl, I am not going to be a freaking ray of sunshine here either. I would only be able to hold your hand and count your fingers right now. He who has so many crapass names is visiting me as well now ….Mr. D. If it weren’t for the fact that my grands would be affected if I just walked off onto an ice flow and was never seen again..I’d start the walk right now. I can’t do that to them but I sure would like to not dance with this devil anymore.
For me it’s like on of those awful enclosed tube waterslides. You can’t see anything and who knows when it will end and where you will be. I’m holding on and wondering why I am bothering, oh yeah GK and Ry
Depression is a part of who you are…you can’t very well change who you are (and why would you) so how you “snap out of it”? Something, people with less empathy, just can’t understand. But that said…you’ve been in this place before and you know that you are strong enough to win the battle again. There is light ahead…and even if you can’t see it or remember it…all you have to do is look at the darkness and know that it can not exist without the light. Things only exist in a balance…not necessarily well balanced in each of us(unfortunately)…but within the Mother Earth herself.
Take the time you need to win this battle and let the unconditional love of your girls wipe away your pain as their soft fur wipes away your tears.
~~Hugs from Melissa, Milo & Piper
I am sorry to hear that you are having a rough time Wendy.
I have some idea what you are going through, although I have only been there a couple of times and thank goodness managed to pull myself through it somehow. For me it was a heaviness that weighs me down and daytime was the worst time. One of the best descriptions I have seen for how I felt is in the Power of One by Bryce Courtenay: “The loneliness birds flew into my heart and laid large stone eggs.”
Get Well Soon! <3
Thank you Helen for your support and blessings. That quote by Bryce. C is beautiful! It’s hard to think of the beauty as you know when one is depressed even if it’s not the clinical type but my spirituality like yours is what gets me through. I read a Buddhist story once where some demon, I think it was the God of Illusion was trying to incite anger with Buddha and was saying that if people were really following the Buddhist path, why were they suffering still? And that clearly Buddha wasn’t the enlightened one if he could let this happen. And with the compassionate heart that some of us connect with Buddha, he replied to the demon “It is when they’re feeling the darkest, that they know me more and it as that time, I can touch their heart the most.” In my darkest depths, I feel that love and compassion from my Wiccan path, the Buddhist path and most of all from friends like yourself who reach out to me.
I think depression can only be cured with a loving family and with supporting friends around you, that will make you feel better and remind you that there’s something worth living for.
John recently posted..Easy Apple Cake
John, I completely agree with you in that having a loving and supportive health system is essential to moving through depression. And if we don’t have the biological family there for us, we create our tribe in other ways. Thanks for the comment : )
You know I am here for you girl! I think I found a secret…you have a therapist and i don’t and I have a goofball mutt that is funny and playful and you don’t, so MAYBE if you get a goofball mutt, and I get a therapist it will fill in the missing piece for each of us! My husband is one of those annoying people who make comments about how I could make myself feel better if I wanted to. (my son does also, but at least he says he gets WHY I have depression)
anyway… check this out, it is in support of you!
http://piecesoffatesusan.blogspot.com/2011/07/in-support-of-friend-and-my-own.html
ANY OF WENDY’S OTHER FRIENDS, you are also welcome to read my post above.
love n hugs,
Susan
Sue, you always make me laugh…I thought your post about your own experience of depression and the facts was amazing and I wrote a reply to someone who left a comment here that I’m going to round up a bunch of blog posts that really stood our for me. And someday I will have a goofy mutt. I miss having a dog but know that until I get more stabilized that it just wouldn’t be fair to have a dog, but I’m working towards it. I’ll also write a post about how to find a good therapist. But animal friends are some of the best ways to heal, aren’t they? : ) Hugs back to you my friend.
Wendy, I’m so sorry for what you are going through. Each person’s depression is unique so I won’t say “I’ve been there” because I haven’t. I’ve experienced my own depression and no one has been there either. I’ve had a mood disorder since my teens and even though I’m on meds, depression, mania, and mixed state still follow me.
I wish for you that the Sun will shine on this horrible fog that has enompassed you pressing you into the depths.
Peace and love.
Thank you Dark Mother for your wisdom and support. I know that YOU know the roller coaster of having Bipolar Disorder and it’s so essential to have people who get us, isn’t it? You’ve gone through a lot this year I know with your sister and how you manage to maintain a sense of humour about live, inspires me…I love dark “black” humour like you do and if we don’t learn to laugh, than we’ll go crazy…Oh wait a minute, we don’t have to worry about going crazy, because we’re already there ; )
When one is circling that black hole, the frequent advice (unasked for) is the dreaded “Get out among people. You will feel soooo much better.” Said in a chirpy voice. Well, when I’m in pain and hurt all over that makes me feel soooo much worse. I hope you are able to crawl out into the sun sometime soon. Gentle skritches to your girls – such good company. They never give unwanted advice.
I’m such a natural introvert anyway that my friends and even my family are starting to get that “just get out there” doesn’t help. I hated it when I was a little girl and my mother used to say, “Oh go play with the neighborhood children, Wendy. You need to make friends.” Sigh, and coming from a family of extroverts with a few exceptions I know that in order to take care of myself, I don’t spend a lot of time with them. Books, our furbabies, nature and friends who we know either from the blogosphere or in our outer world helps me to get through the depression much quicker. Thanks for the comment and scritches to my girls, they’re off playing in the sun as I write this…
I’ve suffered with depression on and off for years, it’s so debilitating isn’t it
I hope you get sorted eventually xx
Thank you for the empathy and understanding. And debilitating is a face of depression that always weighs me down because I “should myself” into being more “productive, etc..” when I just need to be nurturing to myself and be in the moment. I think we who battle depression get those horrible, perky answers from those who just don’t get it and it’s frustrating, isn’t it?
Wendy….BIG Hug…Depression and I are well acquainted..years of it…in that dark hole..I was relieved when it was diagnosed because I thought I had really gone crazy..
And you are right…depression does not teach you anything except that you don’t want to go there again…I’m always on guard…not for the depressed day or two that all of us experience, but the DAY when IT might grab hold of me and pull me down into the rabbit hole again.
I am sooo sorry this is life for you…How can I support you?
xoxoxo
julie
Julie, you are truly a healer. By you saying “how can I support you” I know you get it…Leanne left a comment asking me how we can help others when they have depression and your asking IS I believe the most important piece to help others. I’m blessed to have made incredible friends like yourself and others who I feel closer to than the people in my every day to day life. Today is a good day and I won the battle against depression for now. Thank you so much for being incredibly caring and I’ll try to email you, that’s really odd, but I know there’s so many technical glitches, sigh in the internet world.