The fact that I can talk about my depression, the fact that I can put the energy into describing it, means that something is shifting within me, thankfully. But I’m still not in the clear yet. I’ve spent a number of my spare minutes this morning searching for advice on coping with my depression so that my work doesn’t suffer, my home doesn’t go to pieces, and my marriage doesn’t crumble simply under the weight of my unhappiness. Depression doesn’t just require strength from the depressed - it requires tremendous amounts of strength from loved ones, and one of the fears that circulates through a depressed person’s head goes something like this:

“My unhappiness is bringing him down. I want to be happy so that he can be happy! But I can’t, I’m a terrible wife/friend/mother/coworker. I wouldn’t be surprised if he just gave up, it must be extremely frustrating to always be with this miserable person who doesn’t feel better no matter what he does to try and cheer me up. I need him so much! I want hugs! I want love! But how long is he going to put up with me before it’s just too much? When he leaves me, then I really will be alone, and there’s nothing I can do about it….”

And so on. It’s stupid, and it’s self-defeating, and when you’re trapped inside your own pain, it’s incredibly difficult to break the cycle and see things for what they are. It’s hard to trust anyone, whether they deserve that trust or not, when the voice inside you says “He/she will leave me” and they say “I will always be there for you.” The voice inside feels more real, more solid, than anything outside. But it’s vital for people to tell a depressed person that they love them. Always and often. Even if said depressed person can’t entirely believe you, that reaching out and touching is one small way to help keep the demon off guard, and to prevent it from taking over completely.

In my internet surfing, I found this blog post and was greatly comforted by it. To read other people’s thoughts on and experiences with depression means that I am not alone. Other people have been in the dark, bleak place where I am right now, and have made it through to the other side.

Here are some excerpts that I found particularly poignant.

I, on the other hand, wasn’t sick at all last winter. I was just failing and flailing. In fact, I would have liked to have been sick – confined to bed with some mysterious, painless illness that would have let me sleep for a long time and see no one. I thought about that a lot. And I thought about crawling under my desk at work, or into my wardrobe at home. The dark, the hidden, and the confined were the only inviting spaces left. Under my desk, I wouldn’t have to worry about leaking tears, or looking people in the eye, or inspiring my clients to greatness.

….

I felt like I would break, but only kind words cracked me. Luckily, when you’re depressed, you can throw human kindness off the scent: that frowning, sighing slump dries up the cheerful greetings and sends friends away. It must be like being very old, or very ugly. Without the respite of an illness or a convent, I crawled through day after day in which I was an unfit employee, girlfriend, daughter, sister, and friend. My mind plunged into pointless, terrifying rants that came packaged as reality, revealed at last. Life is ugly. No one will help. No one could help. Help with what?

Like rheumatoid arthritis, depression turns your own body against itself. It chews not on your cartilage, but on your brain cells and your sense of reality. It’s as seductive as a wife-beater, shutting out other voices to turn itself into your only friend. The only one who tells the truth about the bleakness of the world. All your energy goes towards getting through whatever stands in your way–struggling, slogging, pushing, through work and small talk and getting food–whatever it is you have to get through until you can be alone again with the voice who can be trusted.

Fortunately, psychopharmacology seems to be working fairly well for me, with the exception of the last few days, and I am looking forward to next week where I am almost certain I will be feeling a mere shadow of the bleak, fatiguing despair that I felt yesterday. I don’t expect to feel miraculously cured or for my troubles to magically vanish, but I do expect to be able to move forward with some of the more routine aspects of life, and get on with being alive instead of just barely coping.