Recognizing something and changing something are not the same thing

I’ve discussed my depression before with regards to events in my life that contributed to my depression, I mentioned that I was going through a depression in one of tam’s recent posts (an awesome post and discussion by the way) but this will still be a first for me.  I am going to describe some of what goes on in my mind and my heart when I am in a depression.  Please be gentle.

A deep well of sadness has erupted inside me.  There is no real connection between my feelings and what is happening to me.  For no reason at all I feel as though I’m about to burst into tears.  At random times throughout the day I’ll feel my heart constrict and next thing I know I’m blinking away tears.

Am I depressed?  Yes

Do I have the big “D” Depression?  Yup, never officially diagnosed but for this I don’t need a doctor to tell me what I already know and given my familial history it’s not a shock.  I can pretty much trace the rises and dips of my moods, a continuing roller coaster of ups and downs with the occassional corkscrew.  I can pretty much predict how it will go – on the upswing it’s fairly normal, my responses are normal, my reactions to people are normal, things are blessedly normal then I hit the top.  And I have to work at holding on to myself.  My heart hammers away with ecstasy and I feel as though my soul will leak through my skin in white-hot joy.  I walk around with my hands clenched for fear that I’ll float away.  I feel like Johnny Depp’s character Captain Jack Sparrow – touched or fay, if you prefer.  Then *boom* I hit the bottom.  Anger, sadness, deep depression, exhaustion, lack of interest or passion, at it’s worst, thoughts of death-dying.  Everything is cause for despair, panic and rage.  Nothing can go right, I have small moments of faux peace – sort of a surface quiet, a peace which is dark in a bad way and hurts deep down in my soul.  It tears me.

Sometimes the ups and downs are gentle.  And sometimes it’s like scaling and then leaping off of a pyramid without climbing equipment or a parachute.  I prefer the gentle ups and downs.  Those I can handle.  It’s the others that damage my soul, my friendships and my relationships with my family.  I know I should probably have some chemical “help” but I’m more scared of that.  I went on anti-depressants once – n.g. (no good), if I can help it I will never do that again.  It made me feel like an alien in human skin, I would find myself staring at my hand trying to convince myself that it did in fact belong to me.  But worse than that it actually caused me to have suicidal thoughts – I spent a whole day keeping myself from leaping into traffic.  I stopped taking them after that.

It’s not always so bad.  Most of the time I do okay it’s just sometimes it goes beyond my ability to control.  I have times where I recognize a certain turn of my thoughts or my emotions and I can stop it from going down that road.  Sometimes, sickeningly, I don’t want to stop it.  I’ve had moments where I realize the road my thoughts are leading me down and I can hear His warning or His attempt to knock me out of it and my response is “Leave me alone,” “I can’t help it,” or “I’m aware, thank you.”  Why?  Because sometimes I don’t want help, I don’t want to feel normal – I want to wallow in anger or self-pity and not be responsible.  I hate that about me and have been working at putting a stop to this behavior.  I don’t talk about feeling convicted on things much, mostly because it isn’t the language I want to use, but on this I can tell you that when I allow myself this course of action I feel convicted.  I know it’s wrong and I know that He knows that I know it’s wrong.

Then there are the times I can’t control it, it spirals away from me and all I can do is hang on.  I have moments that tip me off, I see it happen and I think to myself “here we go.”  I can’t get the bag of cereal open so I explode into a rage and scream curse words and punch walls, I drop my mac&cheese on the floor and suddenly I feel like the universe is against me and I want to dissolve into tears, I’m driving in traffic and I make it through the yellow light just in time and suddenly I feel invincible and untouchable and drunk-giddy, I wake up and experience a moment of disorientation and suddenly I feel one step removed from the world for the rest of the day, I get a rude customer at work and suddenly I’d love nothing better than to go home and sleep for several days.  I don’t like it.

Now it’s true that I’ve used the gentler ups and downs as creative outlets.  I’ve given my characters some of my rage and despair or I’ve used those feelings to charge the language I use to describe them and their surroundings.  And yes, sometimes I allow myself a bit of melancholia in pursuit of my writing, but again it’s something that I exert great control and caution over.  I know when it’s enough and I know how to shake myself out of those small moments of melancholia.

It’s when it comes on unexpectedly, without warning, with no external stimuli and with no control that I am afraid and desire to feel normal or some semblance of normalcy.  I don’t like the way I react to things or the way I treat people or the direction my thoughts go.  It isn’t pleasant.  Frankly, it terrifies me deeply.

The depression is the worst.  The anger explodes like a flash but doesn’t last, the ecstasy vibrates like a tuning fork and eventually settles down but the depression hammers down relentlessly taking all that I have, all that I am until there’s nothing left but me bleeding on the floor, gasping for air and pleading for it to stop.  In moments like that I know how easy it would be for me to take my life in my hands.  But I have made promises to certain people to not do that and I hold myself to keep those promises forever.  No matter what happens I can’t break those promises.

I am such a mass of contradictions.

And a mess of emotions.

But I try – to maintain equilibrium, control and if I can’t do that then I just maintain.  And try to hold on to some emotion because the only times I’ve seriously considered suicide are the times when I felt hollow and numb.  “I’d rather feel pain than nothing at all.” ~ Three Days Grace “Pain.”

Moving Day

This post is dedicated to anyone who has recently moved, anyone who is planning to move in the near future and anyone who has moved enough times to know what I’m talking about.

 

All your possessions now sit in non-descript boxes that are virtually indistinguishable from one another.  Everything you love and own looks exactly the same.  The house that holds your memories of the last couple of years now holds nothig but echoes of emptiness.  The house contains no signs of inhabitance anymore.  You imagine little faces peeping in to marvel at an unoccupied house.  Where it once was cluttered it now breathes freeley the cold air wafting in through the open door.  Friends, family and strangers traipse in and out carrying boxes, bookcases, couches and a piano to the U-Hauls, trucks and cars.  And it doesn’t seem to matter that it is a hot summer day outside a coldness still pervades the house and your soul.  The red on your cheeks from tears cried and tears held back looks as though it’ll never fade or be washed away.  The empty house feels so pristine that you want to grab some of the dirt blowing around outside and throw it around.  But at the same time you want it to stay clean forever.  You think maybe someone else will find their happily-ever-after in this house, but you wonder why it couldn’t have been you.  You look at the empty walls and remember each and every picture that hung on them.  You check in the kitchen cupboards to make sure nothing important was forgotten and the memories of countless meals cooked, good times had and fights fought come to you.  You walk through the rooms double-checking that it’s all empty and memories of sleepovers, imaginary games, video games, laughs and homework sessions dance before your eyes.  You know there’s life where you are moving to but it won’t be the same.  And all the positive little things you tell yourself won’t erase that fact.  All you can do is pray that God will help you and ask Him the question you never get answered, why?  You walk out to your car, arms and back sore from the hugs, cheeks chapped from tears cried, face muscles strained from putting on a brave face for loved ones and heart heavy from moving…again.