hide my head i want to drown my sorrow { no tomorrow, no tomorrow }

i am not strong enough.

my entire body aches & throbs as if it’s been crushed by a steamroller. moving hurts. breathing hurts.

i can barely stay awake, because sleep is all my body & weary, weary soul can handle right now.

and yet i feel guilty. guilty for my pain. guilty for my inability to cope. guilty that i am not strong enough to make it though the day…because i, i am one of the “lucky ones”. i read as cis-gendered and white. i live in the { relative } safety of a liberal city in a liberal state.  i am employed. i have benefits.

still, i fear for my life. i fear for my friend’s lives. i fear for the future we are creating. i fear for my nephew, for my friends’ children…i fear for all women. i fear for all people of color. i fear for people who love the same gender as they are. i fear for all marriages. i fear for trans*folk. i fear for all people of “non-christian” faith.  i fear for immigrants. i fear for all of us with mental health issues. i fear for all “disabled” folk. i fear for all of us who LOVE FIERCELY. i fear. i fear. i fear.

I AM NOT STRONG ENOUGH

little victories

i just got back from a 2-mile walk. i realize that may not sound terribly impressive, but to me, it’s a fairly big deal. in my life, i want to be more active. i want to be fit and healthy. i want to live a long life with my awesome spousal unit. depression gets in the way. A LOT!

in therapy yesterday, we danced around the ideas of: 1. giving myself permission { whether it’s permission to practice self-care OR permission to be as i am, in that moment, without judgement } and 2. to celebrate/revel in/ be proud of little victories { REALLY DIFFICULT CONCEPTS FOR ME}

the universe must really want me to take those lessons to heart, because not only did i share { in solidarity } this with a co-worker, but one of my “regular sites” featured this post on how “tracking positivity” can help with depression.  so here i am, celebrating my little victory with the universe.

an amazing mentor { and friend  AND founder of The Women’s Intelligence Project } shared an enlightening piece Centering Wellness: Reimagining Justice, Care and Change Making Professions. the author, jardana peacock,  is speaking specifically about fields of work when she stares:

“we must see our work as trauma work.

We often experience that trauma as overwhelm, anxiety and stress. Compound that with personal trauma(s) and we are headed toward breakdown and burnout.

Without an emphasis on wellness, folks will continue to suffer exponentially from burnout, anxiety, and spiritual malaise….

The truth is trauma never goes away. Trauma will always exist in our world and in our bodies. Self-care/Community-care, wellness and spiritual practices will, however, provide a container of healing.”

this is what i am attempting to do: practice self-care. i want to heal.

diving deeper

i know i write a lot about depression. it’s inevitable, given that it is part of my life. and, unfortunately, it happens to be a part of the lives of many of those i love and hold dear.  my last 2 posts were literally just giant passages from the book i’ve been reading { the noonday demon: an atlas of depression by andrew solomon } that i basically wanted to “bookmark” for reference later. this post is more of a reflection on a short passage i encountered a couple of days ago, and have been mulling over ever since.

“Children of depressed mothers may suffer not only depression but also attention deficit disorder, separation anxiety, and conduct disorder. They do badly in social and academic situations, even if they are intelligent and have some attractive qualities of personality. They have unusually high levels of physical complaints- allergies, asthma, frequent colds, severe headaches, stomach aches- and complain of feeling unsafe. They are often paranoid,” {pgs. 181-182}.

this excerpt is not only talking about  the child in their youth, but also within the greater context of becoming a depressed adult. and it describes CHILD ME to a tee:

nuggets of wisdom 2: “the noonday demon”

i had suspected that this book would be full of juicy, thought-provoking wisdom, and so far, i have not been disappointed.

from page 133:

Most people cannot emerge from really serious depression just by fighting; a real serious depression has to be treated, or it had to pass. But while you are being treated or waiting for it to pass, you have to keep up the fighting. To take medication as part of the battle is to battle fiercely, and to refuse it would be as ludicrously self-destructive as entering a modern war on horseback. It is not weak to take medications; it does not mean that you can’t cope with your personal life; it is courageous. { emphasis mine } Nor is it weak to seek help from a wise therapist. Faith in God and any form of faith in yourself are great. You must take your therapies, all kinds, with you into the struggle. You cannot wait to be cured.

nuggets of wisdom: “the noonday demon”

this is part one of a new “series” of posts– quotes or passages from books i am reading that i don’t want to forget.

i’m currently reading The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression { by Andrew Solomon }. it is part memoir, part scientific research, part sociological & culturally-anthropological analogy. only 42 pages in and i’m gaining so much insight on myself, and on how humanity deals { or doesn’t deal } with depression.

anyways, here is the passage i wish to share, from page 17:

It is not pleasant to experience decay, to find yourself exposed to the ravages of an almost daily rain, and to know that you are turning into something feeble, that more and more of you will blow off with the first strong wind, making you less and less. Some people accumulate more emotional rust than others. Depression starts out insipid, fogs the days into a dull color, weakens ordinary actions until their clear shapes are obscured by the effort they require, leaves you tired and bored and self-obsessed– but you can get through all that. Not happily, perhaps, but you can get through.

help me { i’m an } adult!!!

it may have reached meme status, but–I’M DONE ADULTING!!! i’m truly at a loss as to how i’m supposed to get decent sleep, eat well/healthy, practice self-care, work, do laundry, pay bills, pay back your student loan, save money for the future, have something that resembles a social life…and NOT end up in a frothy attack of sheer anxiety.

today, 2 bills and my student loan payment were/are due. have i paid them yet? nope. what have i done with my day? stuff that ACTUALLY brings me joy. something i rarely do.

look, i know the reality is that *no one* has their shit together, but why does it feel so much like i’m failing??? like everyone else has at least ONE thing figured out in their life. that everyone else has mastered at least ONE aspect of adulting.

i want to get in shape- mentally & physically.

i want to eat nourishing, healthy foods.

i want a direction in which to take my life: career or otherwise.

i want to not be so damn sleepy all the time.

i want to have friends i do things with, and not like i’m some lonely hermit because i also want to stay at home.

i want to feel like i belong somewhere.

i want to not have raging panic attacks.

mostly, i want to go back and be a kid again, so the only worries i have are trivial.

 

“guest post”: depression

it’s no secret that many of us battle day-in-day-out with various forms and degrees of depression. i have been thinking a lot, recently, of my own on going battle with the disease that lies { as i prefer to call it }. instead of giving you all the long, drawn out history, i’m going to attempt to condense it all into brief tidbits, and then allow the “guest posts” { aka other bloggers/webcomics  i will gladly give full credit to } to speak their truths in a more enjoyable way.

my mother claims i always battled the “dark and morose” feelings and was an emotional rollercoaster even at the tender age of 4. in my own recollection, the onslaught of the disease that lies began my senior year of high school, and manifested itself as crazy, brutal, epic panic attacks of doom! { registered trademark } that sent me home on a semi-regular basis. i was overwhelmed with the thought of dying–and not in the suicidal way– no no, i was CONVINCED that i was about to die, any second. driving home from school, i would chant mantras of “please let me live until my parents come home so i can tell them i love them” or “please don’t let me die, because then my car will careen out of control and take innocent people with me”….it was horrible, and followed me through several states and into my early college career. the anxiety difused, but never fully went away { every once in a blue moon, i still get an epic attack }, instead turning into a constant monologue of self-deprecation and doubt.

this general “depression” was made worse by a year of non-voluntary, semi-confinement { also known as teaching english in a foreign country } wear my nearest native-english speaking neighbour was a 20 minute drive away, i didn’t have a car for the first 4 months, and said person was a misogynist chode. matters were made worse by the committee of elderly “gentlemen” who were my direct supervisors and made me feel like shit about myself for not being the MALE TEACHER they had requested. so enduring a year of this, on top of recovering from major anxiety, and plagued with all sorts of other demons, has left me more broken than i would be…which is unfortunate in that, besides the suckitude of making me feel isolated and unworthy and alone, that year abroad was actually quite an amazing experience. had i been placed somewhere more central, or with less old-fashioned, misogynist bosses, i’d be way better adapted.

SIGH. which brings me to the “guest” part of this post….because all these amazing people are going through similar feelings that i deal with at least on a weekly basis.

the admirable wil wheaton from his blog/mini-empire wilwheaton.net : an excerpt:   I haven’t ever felt suicidal, but I do have Depression and Anxiety. I suffered for no good reason for decades, until I couldn’t reconcile my awesome life with feeling terrible all the time. Talking therapy wasn’t ever enough for me, and I was very resistant to medication, because I believed (and continue to believe) that we are an over-medicated culture.

another incredible person the bloggess { aka jenny larson } updates often on her struggles, so i’m including not one, but TWO links…this one is about depression greeting cards and brings awareness to national mental health awareness week.  this one is more introspective, and really brings home the message that **depression lies**—When depression sufferers fight, recover and go into remission we seldom even know, simply because so many suffer in the dark…ashamed to admit something they see as a personal weakness…afraid that people will worry, and more afraid that they won’t.  We find ourselves unable to do anything but cling to the couch and force ourselves to breathe.

finally, for those of you who are more visual, i give you “adventures in depression” by the fabulous webcomic artist/site hyberbole and a half…this is just part one of her journey, which is concluded in her most recent post “depression: part two”, where she so aptly describes what suffering from the disease that lies is really like: At first, I’d try to explain that it’s not really negativity or sadness anymore, it’s more just this detached, meaningless fog where you can’t feel anything about anything — even the things you love, even fun things — and you’re horribly bored and lonely, but since you’ve lost your ability to connect with any of the things that would normally make you feel less bored and lonely, you’re stuck in the boring, lonely, meaningless void without anything to distract you from how boring, lonely, and meaningless it is.

with that, i leave you with this panel from hyperbole and a half