Now that I'm getting better (definitely nowhere near the end, but somewhere near the middle, rather than at the start) I'm starting to reassess my position in the treatment spectrum. I feel really strange telling my psychologist all of the things I have told her. I don't have any skeletons or things that I would feel super ashamed of should they wind up on the front page of a newspaper but it makes me feel quite vulnerable having told her the things that I have so far. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.
I still feel clear but today it feels a little bit manic. I feel precarious, like tomorrow I might awake and feel bad again. I don't not feel bad now - I just feel an absence of emotion. That's not entirely true, I don't feel numb. But I feel as though I could watch a comedy and not laugh, watch a tragedy and not cry, listen to a friend mope and not feel concerned. I feel...
I don't feel. It's like I process the emotions mentally and the output is the same.
I was thinking, today, about how I don't feel connected to a life source that guides my journey. When I went to England I was full of it, relying entirely upon this instinct that informed all of the choices I made. I felt earthed, as though my decisions had been made for me and my path was pre-ordained. Nothing particularly magical happened on my trip except that I felt hopeful and stripped away of most worry, anxiety, fear, conjecture...
When I was in Brecon or somewhere in Wales, I stayed up for hours talking to this middle-aged guy from England who'd just completed a mountain run. The weather was atrocious and he struck me as a cross between an indie kid who'd never quite grown up and Marcus' dippy father in the film About A Boy. Harmless. We chatted about different things and I tried to put into words the luck and good fortune that I felt to be able to travel to the opposite side of the world for a holiday. Hang out. Do my own thing. He made no sign that he'd understood this needful quest that I was on and said he was going to 'have a wee' which I've never heard an adult say in formal conversation.
The point I think my therapist is trying to make to me at the moment is that nothing is pre-ordained, nothing is set in stone, nothing is certain or eventual. I can hope and wish and pray for the perseverance to write a novel, the talent to write a good one and the luck to get it published but it will take a lot of perseverance, talent and luck to achieve this. In the meantime my heart might be pulled somewhere else.
She asked me if I would be happy with the kind of existence I've currently got - a basic one, where my basic needs are met, my thoughts are moderate, my dreams forgotten. I said of course, it didn't seem so bad, and besides, I'm happy at the moment.
She said of course I'm happy, it doesn't hurt where I am, and where I was before was hurting me.
I guess I'm just ordinary. But maybe there's no need for a 'just' in front of the ordinary.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
On the escalator, going up
I had this incredible weekend.
On Friday night I had Christmas drinks with two of my best friends whom I've had since high school. We had a box of bon bons which we opened all of: we each wore multiple hats and told the awful jokes and became protective of our hard won trinkets. We hung out with my dogs and told stories and compared our anti-depressant dreams (well one of my friends and I did, while the other I'm sure was thinking 'How did my two best friends turn into such crazy people?'). Anti-depressant dreams are extremely screwed up. Last week I dreamed that I'd been knocked into the ocean by two boys who were riding a couch down a slope into it. I was fine but my iPhone was broken. A couple of nights ago my dream had Marvel heroes in it.
On Saturday night, I hung out with two of my best friends. They're going to do guest posts on this blog as they too have depression or something like it. It's so liberating to hang out with people who understand what I'm going through and who can immediately relate to many topics that I bring up. I saw my lovely boyfriend on Sunday and while in Canberra on Monday, I ran into one of my Canberra friends randomly and saw another for lunch at an incredible chocolate cafe.
It was on Monday morning, however, that things seemed not so right. My past four months have been distinguisable by this foggy haze that's sat on the top of my mind. It's connected, somehow, to my internal monologue that listens intently to what's going on in my body, providing commentary on my interactions with others ('She seemed mad when she said that. I made her mad' or 'Why did she sigh so angrily? Is she angry? Why is she always angry near me?'). But this Monday morning the fog had lifted. I stopped feeling completely numb. I don't know why.
I've been on anti-depressants for about four months now so maybe they finally kicked in. It could be that I faced some demons this past weekend so they were lifted from my depression base (the thing that I draw from to continue my bad feelings). You would think I'd be happy. But I freaked out. I thought, 'I can't be cured. I've just started a blog. I've settled in at home again. If I'm cured this means there's nothing stopping me from moving back to Sydney and I don't want that.' Basically it seems as though I feel like I have no control in my life and my depression was removing anything that needed action. I stopped answering the phone, going out, reading my emails, checking my facebook. If I'm cured, it means I have no excuses anymore.
Obviously I'm not cured. Obviously if my anti-depressants have chosen to kick in (a few days before Christmas - what serendipitous timing!) they have done so without the issues I've been working on being properly solved. But I need to solve those issues, otherwise there's more of a chance of my depression kicking back in again.
I chatted to some people about it (I'm yet to see my counsellor) and I thought maybe I shifted from Severe depression to Mild depression. Or maybe it's just the Christmas cheer and I'll go back to feeling terrible in the New Year. I'm comfortable in my sadness, it removes responsibility from me and I've had to look after myself for the past three and a half years.
In the past when I've felt happy it's been a volatile feeling - as though I'm at the top of a rollercoaster that's about to plunge, or riding a wave that might throw me off. I don't feel that volatility now.
I will definitely keep posting on this blog - if I didn't need anti-depressants, I wouldn't be on them. Which means I'm probably still depressed. It's important for me to be depressed because it creates a point of difference and gives me a genuine excuse for screwing things up. It's heartening to think, 'Well if I'd realised at the start of first year that I was depressed, maybe I could have received help and made better uni grades during the rest of my degree.' I just don't know.
On Friday night I had Christmas drinks with two of my best friends whom I've had since high school. We had a box of bon bons which we opened all of: we each wore multiple hats and told the awful jokes and became protective of our hard won trinkets. We hung out with my dogs and told stories and compared our anti-depressant dreams (well one of my friends and I did, while the other I'm sure was thinking 'How did my two best friends turn into such crazy people?'). Anti-depressant dreams are extremely screwed up. Last week I dreamed that I'd been knocked into the ocean by two boys who were riding a couch down a slope into it. I was fine but my iPhone was broken. A couple of nights ago my dream had Marvel heroes in it.
On Saturday night, I hung out with two of my best friends. They're going to do guest posts on this blog as they too have depression or something like it. It's so liberating to hang out with people who understand what I'm going through and who can immediately relate to many topics that I bring up. I saw my lovely boyfriend on Sunday and while in Canberra on Monday, I ran into one of my Canberra friends randomly and saw another for lunch at an incredible chocolate cafe.
It was on Monday morning, however, that things seemed not so right. My past four months have been distinguisable by this foggy haze that's sat on the top of my mind. It's connected, somehow, to my internal monologue that listens intently to what's going on in my body, providing commentary on my interactions with others ('She seemed mad when she said that. I made her mad' or 'Why did she sigh so angrily? Is she angry? Why is she always angry near me?'). But this Monday morning the fog had lifted. I stopped feeling completely numb. I don't know why.
I've been on anti-depressants for about four months now so maybe they finally kicked in. It could be that I faced some demons this past weekend so they were lifted from my depression base (the thing that I draw from to continue my bad feelings). You would think I'd be happy. But I freaked out. I thought, 'I can't be cured. I've just started a blog. I've settled in at home again. If I'm cured this means there's nothing stopping me from moving back to Sydney and I don't want that.' Basically it seems as though I feel like I have no control in my life and my depression was removing anything that needed action. I stopped answering the phone, going out, reading my emails, checking my facebook. If I'm cured, it means I have no excuses anymore.
Obviously I'm not cured. Obviously if my anti-depressants have chosen to kick in (a few days before Christmas - what serendipitous timing!) they have done so without the issues I've been working on being properly solved. But I need to solve those issues, otherwise there's more of a chance of my depression kicking back in again.
I chatted to some people about it (I'm yet to see my counsellor) and I thought maybe I shifted from Severe depression to Mild depression. Or maybe it's just the Christmas cheer and I'll go back to feeling terrible in the New Year. I'm comfortable in my sadness, it removes responsibility from me and I've had to look after myself for the past three and a half years.
In the past when I've felt happy it's been a volatile feeling - as though I'm at the top of a rollercoaster that's about to plunge, or riding a wave that might throw me off. I don't feel that volatility now.
I will definitely keep posting on this blog - if I didn't need anti-depressants, I wouldn't be on them. Which means I'm probably still depressed. It's important for me to be depressed because it creates a point of difference and gives me a genuine excuse for screwing things up. It's heartening to think, 'Well if I'd realised at the start of first year that I was depressed, maybe I could have received help and made better uni grades during the rest of my degree.' I just don't know.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
The Beginning
First things first, I guess.
I had an idyllic childhood, intact family, coastal holidays and good school marks. I had a good group of friends and received everything, material or not, that I wanted. I was raised with a good sense of Catholic morality; if you do good, you'll be rewarded, ergo, if you do bad you'll be punished. So it stood to reason that my friend who suffered domestic violence must have brought it on herself. Obviously this type of thinking is flawed.
I moved to Sydney for University where I lost my footing and became depressed, but didn't recognise it for what it was. I've since hypothesised that a lot of people who feel like we do don't know they're depressed or that they can get help. They feel that it's some type of moral failing. I felt guilty, that first time around. Who am I, who has had all this privilege and a duty to make something of it, to be ordinary? I sought no treatment at that time and gradually climbed my way into a place where the good at least equalled the bad.
But I ran from the experience. I was petrified that I would end up back there; I teared up thinking about it and became angry that nobody had asked me, "Do you think you might be depressed? Do you think that's why you can't stop crying or get out of bed?"
It's hard to see a friend suffering. Telling someone that you think they need help seems like a blunt, offensive thing to do. But asking someone, "Do you think you might be depressed?" names the symptoms a person has, tells that person "I recognise you're not happy and I'm not going to compound it by telling you to 'Cheer Up' ".
There's a lot more to my story but it's more recent and as such I'm less able to be objective about it. To tackle my newest bout of depression I've been taking 150 mg of Effexor XR and seeing a counsellor. For a while, I couldn't write, but my therapist suggested that I use one of my five strengths (more on those later), being articulate, to be happier again. Hence, this blog.
To be honest I don't want to get better because once I'm better I have no excuses. I know this is an unhealthy mindset and once I am healthy I'll be less scared. Until then, there's the Effexor monsters in my dreams and the invisible sunglasses I seem to continually wear, that darken all of my experiences. It's not a life I would choose nor recommend.
I had an idyllic childhood, intact family, coastal holidays and good school marks. I had a good group of friends and received everything, material or not, that I wanted. I was raised with a good sense of Catholic morality; if you do good, you'll be rewarded, ergo, if you do bad you'll be punished. So it stood to reason that my friend who suffered domestic violence must have brought it on herself. Obviously this type of thinking is flawed.
I moved to Sydney for University where I lost my footing and became depressed, but didn't recognise it for what it was. I've since hypothesised that a lot of people who feel like we do don't know they're depressed or that they can get help. They feel that it's some type of moral failing. I felt guilty, that first time around. Who am I, who has had all this privilege and a duty to make something of it, to be ordinary? I sought no treatment at that time and gradually climbed my way into a place where the good at least equalled the bad.
But I ran from the experience. I was petrified that I would end up back there; I teared up thinking about it and became angry that nobody had asked me, "Do you think you might be depressed? Do you think that's why you can't stop crying or get out of bed?"
It's hard to see a friend suffering. Telling someone that you think they need help seems like a blunt, offensive thing to do. But asking someone, "Do you think you might be depressed?" names the symptoms a person has, tells that person "I recognise you're not happy and I'm not going to compound it by telling you to 'Cheer Up' ".
There's a lot more to my story but it's more recent and as such I'm less able to be objective about it. To tackle my newest bout of depression I've been taking 150 mg of Effexor XR and seeing a counsellor. For a while, I couldn't write, but my therapist suggested that I use one of my five strengths (more on those later), being articulate, to be happier again. Hence, this blog.
To be honest I don't want to get better because once I'm better I have no excuses. I know this is an unhealthy mindset and once I am healthy I'll be less scared. Until then, there's the Effexor monsters in my dreams and the invisible sunglasses I seem to continually wear, that darken all of my experiences. It's not a life I would choose nor recommend.
Monday, December 14, 2009
Anonymous Army
One of my dogs is spending the day today at the vet. He has a ruptured anal gland - probably as a result of me feeding him too much gingerbread. He loves gingerbread and it makes me happy to make him happy. My other dog, a four month old puppy, is spending the day at home moping around because it's the first day she's spent without him. She doesn't know what to do when there's no older dog to pounce at or bite on the bottom. I know how she feels.
The depressed state is one where there are hints and clues that point to your former existence. Maybe your friends still keep in touch with you, maybe you manage to do something productive like get out of bed or make dinner, maybe you listen to a song or spy a photograph that bordered your life when you were 'happy'. My puppy is the same; she knows there's something wrong, our other dog's not here, but her life looks much the same. And if you spied her for the first time today you'd be none the wiser.
This blog aims to keep a record of my depression in the hopes that somebody like me will find it and realise they're not alone. It will feature guest posts from people who are like me and are either going through similar treatment plans (anti-depressants and therapy) or choosing to work things out their own way, maybe through diet, prayer or exercise. We're the anonymous army: there are fuckloads of us, but we don't talk for fear of recrimination. We see public personalities suffer from depression and become reduced to being spokespeople for a disease that hits too close to home for any of us to properly focus on. We suffer when people call anti-depressants 'happy pills', when we realise that phrases like 'You're crazy' or 'You're mental' said in jest punch us in the throat. We never thought we'd get here but here we are.
I aim to keep on top of mental health developments in the news while reviewing the resources I have at my disposal and writing about anything I think is relevant. Should you stumble upon this blog and wish to contribute please contact me. Let's not go through this journey alone.
AnonEd
The depressed state is one where there are hints and clues that point to your former existence. Maybe your friends still keep in touch with you, maybe you manage to do something productive like get out of bed or make dinner, maybe you listen to a song or spy a photograph that bordered your life when you were 'happy'. My puppy is the same; she knows there's something wrong, our other dog's not here, but her life looks much the same. And if you spied her for the first time today you'd be none the wiser.
This blog aims to keep a record of my depression in the hopes that somebody like me will find it and realise they're not alone. It will feature guest posts from people who are like me and are either going through similar treatment plans (anti-depressants and therapy) or choosing to work things out their own way, maybe through diet, prayer or exercise. We're the anonymous army: there are fuckloads of us, but we don't talk for fear of recrimination. We see public personalities suffer from depression and become reduced to being spokespeople for a disease that hits too close to home for any of us to properly focus on. We suffer when people call anti-depressants 'happy pills', when we realise that phrases like 'You're crazy' or 'You're mental' said in jest punch us in the throat. We never thought we'd get here but here we are.
I aim to keep on top of mental health developments in the news while reviewing the resources I have at my disposal and writing about anything I think is relevant. Should you stumble upon this blog and wish to contribute please contact me. Let's not go through this journey alone.
AnonEd
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