This is where I have been lately…in my own head. While I struggle to find peace, I am reminded through my own failures at work that whatever I do — I have to do it right to fulfill expectations around me if I am to survive. I have responsibilities to do a job, to keep a house, to care for my pets, to pay my bills, and to make the best out of my circumstances. No matter how unfulfilled or sad you feel inside, on the outside your life continues with others witnessing and mirroring your movements until your time on earth is up. Depression is not just a state of mind. It is a truly debilitating challenge to live life in a socially acceptable manner while battling your inner demons.
It’s never easy to feel you are failing to cope or failing those around you in life and don’t know why. I have a hard time giving myself allowances to make a mistake. I forgive others with ease, but rarely forgive myself for my shortcomings. Everyone tries to help with suggestions like, “maybe you need an antidepressant,” “…meditation helped me,” “I pray every day,” “have you tried acupuncture?” Thanks, and…yes, yes, yes, uh…no.” Lying on a table while someone punctures my skin with needles is not my idea of relaxation and coping. There is no one magic tool to cope with life. For us with real depression issues, medication only dulls the symptoms but coping is still a daily struggle.
Most people I know with a depressive disorders are sensitive, caring, and somewhat anxious. It is not that I am unhappy all the time, it is that every emotion I experience outside of happiness is heightened. Some people have extreme emotional responses to circumstances others cope with readily. I respond much differently to a room crowded with people, a small elevator, to a flat tire, and to other daily stresses of life. Coping is a problem when you are incredibly sensitive to people and events. I actually can physically feel others pain when they cry and have learned to pull away from people in order to try and keep my composure while caring. Perhaps nursing was my way of controlling my own feeling of sadness by focusing on the more acute needs of others. I had night terrors as a child that kept me awake for hours about people needing help, but I couldn’t help them. I always dream in color, with solid shapes but overwhelming disorienting feeling of uncontrolled momentum through zero gravity space. I rarely awaken rested, and often feel like I have been working insolvable algebra problems all night. Call it extra-sensory perception or heightened subconsciousness, depressive disorder, or borderline insanity, but any way you slice it, it’s a pain in the butt. Everyone’s struggle with depression is unique to them. I have learned a lot of people in the medical field have a depressive disorder.
Along with this strange individualized depression I struggle with, I have always had premonitions that physically effect me. Now many people who have had deja-vu and dismiss it as just a coincidence know that if something occurs over and over and over, may not just be coincidence. This is where I am at because premonitions that result in real events have happened to me at least a dozen times in my life. Some events were more tragic than others.
The week before my dad died, I started having really bad dreams. The night before he and my mom left on their 53rd anniversary trip, I was awake for several hours with a stomach ache. I had horrible anxiety and fear when I did sleep that night. They had taken the same trip many times and it was never a problem. Somehow, I had a horrible feeling this trip would be a very bad idea. I visited my dad and mom the night before they left. They seemed fine and ready to leave the next day. I still was sure this was a really bad idea. The next day at work, I received a phone call from my sister. My sister never called me at the doctor’s office. “It’s dad…oh God…mom’s okay…but dad…he’s dead. It was his heart…” I don’t remember what else she said. I apparently became incoherent and don’t remember my coworkers helping me to the next room where I was sobbing uncontrollably. I don’t remember much about that day. I do remember my brother crying, calling people. I remember calling my aunt. I remember my mom looking shocked but coping better than the rest of us. I remember a discussion with my brother that day.
“I knew this would happen.” I said.
“I had a dream last night.” He said.
“So did I” I said.
“Was it about this?” He asked.
“Yes.” I said.
“Did you have a stomach ache too?” He asked.
“I had diarrhea for an hour.” I said.
“Damn.” He said.
“Yeah.” I said as we cried together.
I have always had premonitions. Even as a kid, deja vu happened to me more times than I can count. When I lived in Columbus, Indiana I had a friend who lived across town. We were very close friends since we were 18 years old. Both in our thirties and with kids who played together, we were talking almost daily. It had been a week since we last spoke. I was taking my daughter to a movie that evening and suddenly had a horrible gut pain. I became absolutely struck with anxiety and thought of Tracy. I saw her face and I heard her say my name. I started driving to her house. Five minutes later and fifteen minutes from her house I got a call from her husband. She was sick with a high fever and had been vomiting violently for over an hour. She was talking incoherently and he didn’t know what to do. I told him to call an ambulance immediately. I got to her and she was absolutely confused at what was going on. She was very very sick. The next day she was at a major hospital with an infection on her brain. She survived, but it was touch and go for a while.
This was only one of many many times I had a premonition that resulted in an event surrounding a family or friend. Is it a sixth sense or does it have to do with this depressive disorder? Is it a malfunction of my brain or a gift? Can a gift create both joy and sadness or is it just a matter of perspective? These are all questions I ponder at night when I am not sleeping because I know the dreams are waiting. Because I lie in bed awake until midnight or two am, I don’t really wake up completely until after 10 am daily. I sometimes don’t even remember driving to work in the morning. I am forgetful and have a poor memory. Routines and list making help me to function normally rather than just remind me of things not to forget.
What is functioning normally anyway? Doesn’t everyone have days they are depressed? Well, yes everyone does have bad days. The difference is that a person with a depressive disorder cannot be brought out of their “funk” with happy people or distractions of going out and having fun. A person with depression knows how to mask how they feel well so they can be perceived as “normal” in public. I don’t go out unless I have to go because I generally am exhausted by going out. It’s a lot of work mentally and physically to always appear to others that “life is great” when you don’t feel that way inside. I have days when I am feeling happy, but often in that day, stresses get me down quickly. By the end of the day I am completely exhausted and feel mentally drained. “Exercise, you will feel much better.” I do that, come home, and can still lie down and be awake all night, then the cycle begins again.
When people with depressive disorders are asked by someone in passing, “Hi, how are you today?” We laugh inside and stoically answer the standard, “Oh fine…and you?” while smiling a painted happy face. What we are screaming inside is…”I want to go home, crawl under my covers and sleep for the next ten years, but other than that…”
As a faithful person, I do find happiness in prayer, reading the bible, and singing along with good southern gospel music. However, truly fulfilled with awe inspiring completion? Nope. I am told by many believers, “You have to submit to Jesus and accept him completely into your life in order to receive fulfillment.” Hmm. I have with all my being tried again and again to be open and thought I was…but apparently, not. I feel pretty good about my life for a little bit, things go well, then the decent begins. It usually begins with hearing the burdens of others, empathizing with their needs, and doing what I can to offer comfort. Then comes stressors of a bad day, the dreams all night every night for a week, and ends with me balled up in bed after work on Friday, crying uncontrollably.
Finding a happy place is sometimes as allusive as an eight hour peaceful sleep. I make it through today by accepting that..”it is what it is.” Your life is in constant motion and riding the waves without a paddle when you have depression. At least that is my experience with it. I do have days when I feel happy. I have days when I don’t feel much at all and just exist. The days in between are filled with existing and coping with life’s stuff.
I hear the garage door open and rush to the kitchen to begin a fast supper. “How are you today?” My husband asks.
“Oh fine, and you?” I say smiling
sherrystruthtofiction 