DEPRESSIONZ, I HAS SOME
Jun. 21st, 2013 04:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gemsybobsyI started writing this at the beginning of last week because I thought getting back into writing my journal would help a bit. Hmmm, we'll see! I am having a tough time mentally. DO NOT WANT! I have had depression and anxiety problems on and off since I was 17; it's something I can live and deal with and I've always stayed as positive as I can about it. I know when it's going to kick off and I take a break, see my doctor and look after myself. I have been taking antidepressants on and off all those years; the last type I had for 7 years continuously, and I am now at a point where I am a bit more emotionally settled so I have been gradually coming off them. My own decision, and made with my doctor's advice. So, yay me! It's all positive!!! This is a massive step though because, biologically, my brain has been relying on the pills for YEARS so it's going to screw up my brain chemistry for a while and make me feel like shite. And that 'shite' is a bit like depression itself and I'm scared it's going to come back.
It's always bugged me that you can publicly complain about headaches and earaches and norovirus and even poo problems and menstrual cramps, but if you mention a feeling brought on by a mental illness you're just 'being miserable' or 'feeling a bit down'... or, generally, you get the feeling that it's a taboo subject and something you should keep to yourself. And of course, it is an illness, not just me having a 'touch of the blues' or 'being down about myself'. I joke about 'being a bit emo today' because it's funny to me (i.e. a massive understatement) and I do like to make light of everything because, really, life is fucking hilarious. But this depression thing is NOT just me being 'sad about stuff' or even being 'sad for no reason'. It is actually my brain being an actual, physical twat, and conjuring up thoughts that really aren't part of my character, and if I dwell on them it makes me cry and panic, and that is what makes me sad. And everyone KNOWS that I would prefer to laugh and have fun. We all do. 'Depressed' is an emotion that everyone feels from time to time. 'Depression' is an illness that I just happen to have.
It's NOT my personality type.
I'm ridiculously silly, I laugh at everything including myself, I'm overly self-conscious at times and I'm sociable but introverted to the point of possibly having 'secret schizoid' tendencies. I'm NOT a miserable, negative or completely insular person. So when I talk about something I'm feeling, I'm usually worried about what my brain is doing and I'm turning to my friends. I would never go into detail about the thoughts themselves, because ew, but... yeah. I'm seeking attention, but not in that LOOK AT ME! sort of way. It's more like, 'O guise, plz halp, my brain's being a bellend.'
I have always hated people who use their illnesses/life situations as an excuse to be a c*nt. Having depression doesn't give me 'points' that I can use to claim I'm sadder and worse-off than everyone else. Equally, non-depression-suffering people don't get more points than me because they can cope with daily life better than me. I'm sick of feeling guilty because I'm moaning on Facebook about being ugly while some bloke on the telly can smile after a freak meteor wiped out his entire life. 'You should think yourself lucky,' my loved ones will say. That is not how it works. Depression makes you have horrible thoughts and it makes you emotionally unsteady. Too emotional, or too detached. One day I can laugh at my car being written off, the next day I can have a panic attack because I splodged my mascara. There aren't any winners.
Which brings me to this. You can't 'inspire' somebody with depression to think about other people who have similar and/or worse lives than us in the hope that it will help us to 'get over ourselves'. IT WILL NEVER HELP. When the hell did a dollop of guilt ever help anyone?! We all KNOW that there's no reason for us to be emotionally buggered up. It defies logic. I don't know how to explain my brain. So if I'm visibly tired, sad or deflated and people ask what's up, I can only keep to sociable conversation and relate my emo-ness to 'daily struggles', and therefore come out with 'light-hearted' things like, 'Oh, my brain says I fail at life so I'm crying because I couldn't brush my fringe straight, and I have to go to work and I have no money, and I hate all the things.' Then in return I get things like:
'But nobody likes going to work. But we all have to do it!' (brilliant)
'Oh, but we all feel like that from time to time. I felt sad all day yesterday for instance but I got over it.' (well done)
'It could be worse; look on the bright side.' (ooh I'd never thought of that but I will start doing so as of... now)
'At least you've got a roof over your head, eh? The western world, eh? Kids today, eh? Have everything on a plate and they still whinge' (... helpful)
'Doesn't it make you feel lucky that you're not in the middle of that warzone/you're not that child with cancer/that man who's lost his wife/have all your limbs/are not dead?' (oh, thank you. Thank you so damn much for now i have seen the light and the error of my ways, I will tell my brain to only produce rays of sunshine from now on)
DON'T YOU SEE
NO
NO NO NOPE
NO IT DOESN'T MAKE ME FEEL LUCKY
IT MAKES ME FEEL BAD
BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD
SO STOP SAYING IT
just clearing that up
It's always bugged me that you can publicly complain about headaches and earaches and norovirus and even poo problems and menstrual cramps, but if you mention a feeling brought on by a mental illness you're just 'being miserable' or 'feeling a bit down'... or, generally, you get the feeling that it's a taboo subject and something you should keep to yourself. And of course, it is an illness, not just me having a 'touch of the blues' or 'being down about myself'. I joke about 'being a bit emo today' because it's funny to me (i.e. a massive understatement) and I do like to make light of everything because, really, life is fucking hilarious. But this depression thing is NOT just me being 'sad about stuff' or even being 'sad for no reason'. It is actually my brain being an actual, physical twat, and conjuring up thoughts that really aren't part of my character, and if I dwell on them it makes me cry and panic, and that is what makes me sad. And everyone KNOWS that I would prefer to laugh and have fun. We all do. 'Depressed' is an emotion that everyone feels from time to time. 'Depression' is an illness that I just happen to have.
It's NOT my personality type.
I'm ridiculously silly, I laugh at everything including myself, I'm overly self-conscious at times and I'm sociable but introverted to the point of possibly having 'secret schizoid' tendencies. I'm NOT a miserable, negative or completely insular person. So when I talk about something I'm feeling, I'm usually worried about what my brain is doing and I'm turning to my friends. I would never go into detail about the thoughts themselves, because ew, but... yeah. I'm seeking attention, but not in that LOOK AT ME! sort of way. It's more like, 'O guise, plz halp, my brain's being a bellend.'
I have always hated people who use their illnesses/life situations as an excuse to be a c*nt. Having depression doesn't give me 'points' that I can use to claim I'm sadder and worse-off than everyone else. Equally, non-depression-suffering people don't get more points than me because they can cope with daily life better than me. I'm sick of feeling guilty because I'm moaning on Facebook about being ugly while some bloke on the telly can smile after a freak meteor wiped out his entire life. 'You should think yourself lucky,' my loved ones will say. That is not how it works. Depression makes you have horrible thoughts and it makes you emotionally unsteady. Too emotional, or too detached. One day I can laugh at my car being written off, the next day I can have a panic attack because I splodged my mascara. There aren't any winners.
Which brings me to this. You can't 'inspire' somebody with depression to think about other people who have similar and/or worse lives than us in the hope that it will help us to 'get over ourselves'. IT WILL NEVER HELP. When the hell did a dollop of guilt ever help anyone?! We all KNOW that there's no reason for us to be emotionally buggered up. It defies logic. I don't know how to explain my brain. So if I'm visibly tired, sad or deflated and people ask what's up, I can only keep to sociable conversation and relate my emo-ness to 'daily struggles', and therefore come out with 'light-hearted' things like, 'Oh, my brain says I fail at life so I'm crying because I couldn't brush my fringe straight, and I have to go to work and I have no money, and I hate all the things.' Then in return I get things like:
'But nobody likes going to work. But we all have to do it!' (brilliant)
'Oh, but we all feel like that from time to time. I felt sad all day yesterday for instance but I got over it.' (well done)
'It could be worse; look on the bright side.' (ooh I'd never thought of that but I will start doing so as of... now)
'At least you've got a roof over your head, eh? The western world, eh? Kids today, eh? Have everything on a plate and they still whinge' (... helpful)
'Doesn't it make you feel lucky that you're not in the middle of that warzone/you're not that child with cancer/that man who's lost his wife/have all your limbs/are not dead?' (oh, thank you. Thank you so damn much for now i have seen the light and the error of my ways, I will tell my brain to only produce rays of sunshine from now on)
DON'T YOU SEE
NO
NO NO NOPE
NO IT DOESN'T MAKE ME FEEL LUCKY
IT MAKES ME FEEL BAD
BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD BAD
SO STOP SAYING IT
just clearing that up
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no subject
Date: 2013-06-21 05:40 pm (UTC)Like, yeah I've had a tough time at work recently but my brain is sensitive to this sort of thing and makes me go to extremes. I had a bit of a wobble last week where I genuinely had the urge to walk out into traffic on the main road outside my work to see what happens. Of course I know what would happen - but my brain rationalised it as "hey, it's better than getting up to go to work and be shouted at by everyone for the next 40 years!" - and WAT that's not a "normal" thought process, but it felt totally normal to think that way to me at that moment in time. I can't explain it.
And to make matters worse a lot of people try to blame the pill. I only started taking the pill at 23 and have been having epic dark/intrusive thought binges for at least ten years before that...when guess what, it got blamed on the fact I was a teenager. You can't win!
There's so much more I could say but I just wanted to say you're not alone in this and the Internet, or a certain part of it, seems to have attracted a bunch olf us who suffer things similar to varying degrees so you know you can safely vent here and nobody will yell at you: but birds are dying!
Yeah we're privileged to live in the west where we have so much more stuff than a lot of people in the world, but stuff doesn't automatically make your brain happy or your problems irrelevant.
Tl:dr you're awesome and stuff so people can stfu.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-22 06:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-22 04:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-10-09 07:29 pm (UTC)That Lady
Date: 2013-06-24 07:19 pm (UTC)