Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Have you gone mental (VIII)

Days when depression is primary are dark days. I feel like a failure, a loser, and like I'll never recover from my illness. I had such days over the last weekend. I awakened in anxiety and in the ensuing hours depression overcame me. It is hard to define depression. That's why we tend to describe it.

My depression involves feelings that I want to die: "suicidality". Not a lethal suicidality but feeling like I want to die more than I want to live. As those of you know who have experienced this, it is at once terrifying and a source of relief. This may sound totally irrational... except to those who have experienced it.

The dark days. . . the dark night of the soul, perpetrated by an unseen force. Depression seems to have a mind of its own. It goes where it wants to go and does what it wants to do. It comes upon me like a thick, dark, cloud, with no light on the horizon. All is darkness. All is pain. All the affirmations in the book will not
even put a dent in it. Medication seems like the solution. It is not. It merely masks the emotion. Yet most of us depessed individuals take them. I, in fact, I am on one antidepessant, two mood stabilizers, and one anti-anxiety meditation.

The ultimate solution is probably living life, doing the next thing that needs to be done, and continuuing the basic principles I have learned. As I do these healthy activities, over a few days, the cloud begins to lift a little and some semblance of "normalcy" returns. Decisions are more easily made, isolation abates, and suicidality decreases.

At this point anxiety begins to rears its ugly head. As Tom Petty sang, I don't know which is worse.

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