"Don't Be So Hard On Yourself"

When your own mind is your greatest enemy...

When other people's big moments are overshadowed by your own flaws...

When no one around you can take it anymore...

When you realize for the first time that you don't know if it is going to get better instead of worse...

When your brain is so fired up that you can't sleep....

When nothing you are trying seems to be working...

When your biggest struggle during the day is to get your thoughts under control...

When you're sick of explaining and excusing your fuck ups...

When you're sick of your body failing...

When the thing you hear the most is "don't be so hard on yourself"...

When you feel weird and freakish around "normal" people because you just can't get it together...

When the ones you love say they miss the old you, the joyful happy version...

When out of nowhere chemicals in your brain decide to take over and slam you into the ground...

When you feel completely alone...




This is where I am today. This is my low. I'll move along, I'll get through. I'm tired of mental illness.




I'm just so fucking tired of it.

A Happy Anniversary

Monday was the one year anniversary of the day Mr. Wonderful and I said "I do".  And I am so *relieved* to report that I was feeling so good, better than in months, that I was able to fully enjoy it and wrap myself up in the happy emotions of the day.

I've been on the anti-depressant medications for almost a month now. And while I'm just now getting to this point, I am so, so thankful that it is working. I feel happiness. I feel joy. I feel love.

There are side effects, the least favorable being the additional anxiety on top of my already highly anxious mind...but I will take a little teeth grinding in order to escape suicidal thoughts, self-harming, and laying on the shower floor wailing. All for no circumstantial reason...just that overwhelming feeling of doom and guilt and failure. I am so relieved to have that cloak lifted from over me that I could sing.

I'm 35 years old and have dealt with this on and off since I was a pre-teen, maybe younger. I don't think I fully understood this disease until this last horrible bout with it. I thought I was overly emotional, damaged from all I've been through, weak for wanting to just give up. I think this had to happen in the middle of the happiest year of my life thus far for me to fully realize how much of a physical disease this is.

My heart breaks for those who constantly struggle with this. I won't be taking myself off the medication this time around. It took me too long to wrap my head around not being able to control the depression with diet, exercise, and supplements. I'm so anti-medicine that I almost lost my own fight on principle. Stubborn as hell.

While I'm feeling the full range of emotions again, I am still pretty shellshocked after the trauma of it all. But a day at a time I am adding little things back in...in order of priority. One of these days I'll be back to my normal.

We spent our anniversary snuggled up on the couch with a bottle of wine we bought in Napa on our honeymoon, saved for a year just for the occasion. We listened to our wedding playlist, reminisced about the most perfect day ever, and how happy we are to be by each other's sides.  I'm so lucky to have that man as my partner in life.

Finally, reading this post I found through a CNN article, written by comedian Rob Delaney, was a turning point for me in realizing how much of a monster I was actually just up against. His description of his episode is almost word for word what I just encountered. And as he says:

 This episode drove home the knowledge that, like alchoholism, depression demands respect and attention. Whether it’s a “good” thing or a “bad” thing, I cannot pretend to know, but it exists and it can kill you dead.

Me

I feel like I can honestly say for the first time in almost 2 months that I am somewhat myself again.

It has not been easy, especially stepping back into my social life and working life. The thing about depression is that not everyone has been through it and so they don't really understand it. Maybe they've been sad before and depressed about their circumstances, but not as many have had their brain taken over by chemistry and hormones and just lost it for no real reason. And the thing about those people is that they tend to say and do the things that are super triggery. I'm in no way blaming them, it's just hard to know that you're going to face such a thing and then to actually do it.  Guilt rules my world when I'm depressed, and when you've disappeared for 2 months, you're going to have to deal with the guilt of being gone. Such a difficult, slippery slope to navigate.

But so far for the most part, I've been able to do it and handle it. And I'm glad I have, because I missed my friends and laughing and just the lightness of day to day mundane life.

The plan for me was to take it slow back into reality. I came out of this "episode" right as my kids were heading back to school. I spent my days last week running the three of them to buy school supplies and clothes, haircuts, doctor and dentist visits, school meetings and events, etc...all that mom stuff. As busy as we were, it felt so good to be able to concentrate fully on them for the entire week, and it also opened my eyes to how pulled thin I feel the majority of the time. I'm trying to run two businesses and be a stay at home mom, and I just don't think it's working. I loved the feeling of being helpful to them, spending time with them, talking to them, laughing with them, without worrying about all of the other things I should be doing.  I gave myself permission to just let those things go for a period.

I knew last weekend that this coming week would be a difficult one for me, considering what I've just gone through, and because it was going to be hard no matter what. My youngest, my baby girl, the one I was 8 months pregnant with when I first discovered that my first husband was cheating...started Kindergarten on Monday. I don't think either of us were ready. It snuck up on me, I guess like it did with the first two.

I've been dreading Kindergarten since her first day of Pre-K last year. Even with her in preschool, I've had her home two full days a week, and I saw her every morning and dropped her off at school, even when she spent the night with her dad. Now he drops her off at Elementary along with her big sister on his mornings, and I don't see her for almost a full 24 hours. And I struggle with my depressive thoughts of "Why did I have to get divorced and split my time with them?" "Why did I agree to this custody arrangement?" It's so hard not to get caught in that thought cycle. I feel like a bad mom even though I KNOW it was not my fault. And dammit, I just miss my kids.

Next week I plan to tackle my work again. All extra-curricular stuff is on hold until I find my footing again.

While the medication does seem to be helping, it's not perfect, and I have moments that still slip through. I'm sure that will be an ongoing thing that I will have to learn to deal with, and as long as it doesn't overwhelm me and suck me down the black hole that I was in the last 2 months, I should be ok.

My wonderful husband is getting me away this weekend, one last distraction while the kids are with their dad so I'm not sitting around being sad about it. My ex has decided lately to wage another war against me, luckily I've been able to laugh most of it off. I actually feel sorry for him, he seems to be stuck in a place of anger and hatred, all aimed at me. I'm removed enough to see it for what it is and as long as he's not threatening my time with them, it's all just sad.

Emerging

I'm slowly emerging back to life.

I remember very little detail of the past few weeks. I don't know if it's because I had to medicate myself so heavily just to be able to deal with the pain, or if I was just that detached or in my own head. I have pictures in my phone I don't remember taking. I have texts I don't remember sending. If I didn't have what I wrote here I would remember very little of how it felt. I don't know if that is my brain's way of protecting me or what, but it feels bizarre.

The anxiety effects of the anti-depressant seem to be getting better, although my jaw feels almost bruised from grinding my teeth. I'm starting to sleep again. My husband said he was glad to see my smile back this weekend. I have spent a lot of time with him and my puppy, alone. Luckily it was my kids' weekend at their dad's, and it was nice just to have the pressure off of being *needed* for a few days.

I admit that I'm still completely isolated, and feel awkward trying to come back from that. I don't want anyone to ask me where I've been and have to explain. I am so sensitive right now to anyone needing anything from me that I'm terrified to even reach back out. I don't want to go backwards. I don't want to be triggered back into the oblivion and guilt of the past few weeks. I need to get stronger and back to who I was. I need the medicine to take full effect. I need so many things right now so that I can have my life back.

But the steps are being taken, albeit small ones. I'm eating. I'm exercising. My kids are home and I'm tending to them. I left the house this weekend. I worked a little bit Friday. I had dinner with my best friend and our husbands that night, and could smile and even laugh.


I don't have much to say. There's a lot of empty space right now where the pain resided before. I'm sure that it will fill back up with the happy hum in the weeks and months to come, and just being able to say that says that I'm a million times better than I was before.

To my friends and those who left encouraging comments, thank you and I love you. To those suffering, hang in there. It does pass. Reach out if you have to. I'm scared to think of where I'd be right now without having done so.

Less Than Human

Stop the world, I wanna get off.

Sometimes, in my deepest and darkest moments, I wonder if depression is truly just a chemical imbalance, or if we as humans or maybe just Americans have made life so ridiculously difficult for ourselves that our brain chemistry cannot keep up and forces us to just stop.


I literally cannot make myself do....anything. The exercise is starting to go, too, which is just unheard of for me. I can't make myself eat. I have work piled up around me for miles. I have a new business I was getting off the ground that was doing really well that I've just....let fall apart. I can't face it. I cannot accurately describe the terror in my chest when I think of all the responsibilities that I face that I cannot make myself tackle. It's too much. Soccer forms and signups and school supplies and emergency paperwork and laundry and dishes and cooking and planning and keeping myself in shape and keeping my kids healthy and is my son depressed, too? and is my marriage starting to suffer? and there is too much crap in my house and so much work to do on my business that pays my bills and so much studying to do on the business I want to transition to so I'm happier and friends who are also suffering who probably need me right now and my ex husband wants to know if I'll start alternating holidays with him which I've NEVER done? and I'm letting my husband down by not getting my work done and making money and putting more pressure on him to pay our bills and this is definitely starting to wear on him too as well as everyone else in my life and there's ANOTHER soccer email coming in saying we need to fill out more forms and I haven't registered my baby for kindergarten yet even though it starts in a few weeks and they all need haircuts and backpacks and clothes....

and all I can do is try. I really, really try. I have every intention, every morning, of getting out of bed and just getting it done but my body seems to weigh a trillion tons right now, and making any contact with any person causes my chest to squeeze. I just want to stop feeling sad and anxious and worthless and I don't want one more person to ask one more thing of me.

I don't understand what has happened to me. I don't recognize myself. I was motivated and driven and happy. I'm just broken now. I'm less than human trying to become human again.

My husband took me to a doctor Monday and I shakily admitted to her that I have every single scary symptom of deep depression. I am a very proud person, and to sit there across from a stranger and my husband and admit that I am no longer in control of myself, and my thoughts, was humbling to say the least.

They started me on new medications which, as you can probably tell by the tone of this writing, are currently making me highly anxious. I hate feeling like a lab rat. I hate taking medication. I hate all of this. I need to accept it, I know.

I've also contacted a psychiatric program recommended by a good friend. I'm trying. I want to ask the world to forgive me but the world won't stop long enough to let me.

And it rages on.

I've been researching various treatments both holistic and medicinal. I have been able to keep up my exercise routine. I took a break from exercise, too. I adjusted my calorie intake when I discovered that my lack of appetite had translated into me eating half as many calories per day as I should. I've tried listing out the things that I am grateful for, I've made every attempt to participate in the activities that give me joy. My wonderful husband made an all out effort this weekend by taking me for a massage, to my favorite restaurant, out for coffee. I can't imagine how frustrating this must be for him.

The only time I feel any relief is for the 45 minutes that I am working out and am forced to think about what to do with my body instead of the racing thoughts, and for some reason, during hot showers.

Even sleep brings no relief as my nightmares and dreams have been just as cruel as my waking thoughts.

One thing I don't know that people understand about depression is how very physical it feels. Everything buzzes. My vision feels skewed and like I'm looking through thick plastic lenses. My arms and legs weigh a thousand pounds, and I have a cramping in my gut that has no origin but makes me want to cry.

Some days, it's anger and numbness that are the primary emotions. Other days, I just feel so raw that I could cry at just about anything.

If you've ever been depressed then maybe you will sympathize with the long journeys that your thoughts take, the deep wells they descend, the epiphanies about life that you think you have, that are never good. There are so many thoughts that hit me all at once in a millisecond.

When I had to make a list to remind myself of the things that I had to live for, when I found myself angry for having people in my life who would be hurt if I disappeared forever, somewhere deep inside my sanity spoke up. I thought about driving myself to the ER, but decided to just try and make it through the night, and here I am writing this.

I told my husband that I couldn't take the pain anymore. He is taking me to the doctor. I wrestled with feeling like he is just as sick of me as I am of myself, but the sane part of me texted that to my best friend and she gave me the right words, as she always does. He does love me. It's hard to even type that because I don't believe anyone loves me right now. But he does.

Not to be dramatic emo girl, but the song below is sometimes the only thing that gets me through. This, to me, is the musical translation of what I've been feeling the past month or more...not just the lyrics, but the entire sound.

 

 Say I'm okay
I'm bleeding fire
Eating nightmares

So tell me how to do away with love
I'm a maze
Can we say goodnight now?

Take this world away
And strangle it with wires for a lifetime

Make a pretty face and say I'm fine
I'm okay
Only in the nighttime

Take this world away
Strangle it with wires for a lifetime

Make a pretty face and say I'm fine
I'm okay
Only in the nighttime

Love was the only thing I ever needed, I ever needed

Love was the only thing I ever needed

Love was the only thing I ever needed, I ever needed

Rants of a Lunatic

I'm a cliche.

That's what I'm thinking right now. As I sit here in what must be the seventh or eighth day in my latest bout with depression.

The bouts that seem to be coming more and more often as I grow older. Or does it just feel that way.

It's humiliating to type. I hate. HATE. feeling out of control. I hate admitting my weaknesses.

I'm hoping that just writing it down this time will turn it around, and like so many times before, tomorrow I'll wake up and feel like my normal self. Stable and in control. Emotions in check with reality.

But right now, I'm coming out of a day of raw emotion and pain and into a day of mind numbing fog and isolation.

Frustrated beyond belief that I thought this was under control once with diet and exercise, and yet it reared it's ugly head. Frustrated again because after an extremely humiliating and weepy visit to my local clinic that up until now, only my husband and best friend knew about, I thought the medication they gave me was working.

Yet for the last week, I've felt less and less like talking. Or working. Or mothering. Or cleaning up. Or bothering to get dressed. And yesterday, emotion so raw and painful that it physically hurt. Every second was a battle to get through. Today is a fog of numbness, I imagine the brain's way of compensating for the rawness of yesterday.

"What is it? What are you thinking about that upsets you like this?" my husband asks helplessly. Do you have any idea how hard it is to explain depression to someone who has never really had it...there's nothing wrong, but EVERYTHING IS WRONG.

The racing thoughts. The problems that felt normal yesterday that feel completely insurmountable today. The overall feeling of doom and self-loathing. The endless spiral of "I am so fucked up" that makes you feel even more fucked up that makes you feel even more fucked up. The desperate mental searching for an end to the pain, anything to alleviate it, even a little.

And today I felt like crawling under the covers and telling everyone to fuck off. I hate myself like this. I hate me today. Somewhere on some level, the normal me is watching and is horrified at this version of herself. She feels sorry for everyone in her life. She is disgusted at herself for not being able to cook, work, and mother her children. Round and round and round we go.

But this is all I have today. I left my house today, and it took everything in my being to do it. Being self-employed is the greatest blessing and curse when you suffer from depression. I can hide if I need to, but really, I shouldn't be hiding. Every step I force myself to make is one step back to normalcy.

I'm trying to think of this as illness so I'm not so hard on myself and can deal accordingly. Then the guilt of all the illnesses I ALREADY BATTLE besides depression...the Meniere's, the anxiety, the autoimmune disorders...and the "I am so fucked up" starts again.

I feel guilt hitting the publish button on this post. I feel that everyone wants to hear about the happy hum and I should leave it at that. I'm a story somewhere in la la land that will cheer them up, and here I come along and fuck that up too with my negativity. SEE HOW THIS WORKS.

And then I choose not to hit publish for the 80th time since I've begun this blog. Except this time. Because I'm tired of isolation. I'm just. so. tired.

Please just let me wake up *me* tomorrow.