The Elephant in The Room

I've been trying to do stuff every day. Let's just say that some days are more successful than others.

Unfortunately, just as I got into the swing of treating my depression, the holidays hit. This has meant no TAFE, the boys off at their dads, no school drop off or pick up, no dancing, no gym, and I'm also on leave from work.

I planned the holidays this way, because I'd intended to do work placement the whole time, but being unwell I just didn't have the energy, so that's been put off for a while.

The other problem with holidays, is that other people tend to do stuff, so while I'm at home, desperate for some sort of friendly human interaction beyond the empty greetings at the supermarket, everyone I know has been busy doing other things, with people who aren't me.

I can slowly feel myself turning into a hermit.

I have forced myself to go out. Do shopping, sort through my wardrobe, I even went to a party plan party last night, and bought myself a little something.

It doesn't fix it!

There is also a hell of a lot of stuff I have intended to do, that I just haven't been able to face.

A couple of weeks ago with the counsellor, just as we were wrapping up, she mentioned about how I should speak up and say what I want, that I don't have to say it's fine, or nevermind, or no that doesn't bother me at all, that I should say what I really want sometimes. That's something that I should do more.

Then the flood gates opened.

And out came the elephant in the room: That relationship.

All that time I couldn't speak up for my own needs, I gave chance after chance after chance, put up with some awful treatment. He had me convinced that if things wouldn't work with him, then they would never work with anyone else. He had me convinced that no one would love me the way he did. Had me convinced that all men other than him were bastards. I believed all of that. Never questioned it. Every time I ended it he managed to sneak back into my life, even if I was happy by myself.

I'm sure people who watched from the outside thought he was being unreasonable, that I didn't need that shit, and they told me so, but unless you're in it you don't understand. You don't know how much we love each other, how much we need each other, how I'm the only one who understands him, how lost he would be without me, how great things are when things are good.

OR

How difficult it is to leave an abusive relationship once you're entrenched, how he changes the way you see yourself, how he twists everything to be your own fault, how he charms his way back in, how he says it's only because he loves you so much, how he loves you more than anyone ever loved anyone else in the history of everything, even though he hurts you more than anyone ever has.

How you're only allowed to have your own opinion if it's the same as his opinion. How if you say what you really want, you'll be told it's wrong, or bad, or unreasonable. How everything becomes black and white, how he projects his own opinions and motivations on to everything you do, and how whataver you did was the wrong thing for the wrong reasons, no matter how many times you explain otherwise.

How when you're in a relationship where you can't do anything right, leaving is wrong too.

Even if it's what you really want.

We broke up 'for good' a year ago, but he snuck his way back in. Again.

I finally got him completely out of my life a few months or so ago, after a 'discussion' which involved him telling me I was, and I quote, fucked in the head for my beliefs, and how if I didn't stop talking that way he'd ring my dad to see what he had to say about me...

:-/ Words fail me.

Either way, after about four years of treading on eggshells and not speaking up for my own needs, I'm going to try to speak up more, try to say what I really want.

Try.

Convincing enough?

No more beating around the bush: No, I'm not OK.

There are so many euphemisms we use when describing depression.

I'm caught in the storm.
Fighting the black dog.
Stuck in a black hole.
In a bad spot.
Lost in a fog.
Not coping.
Being dragged underwater.
Swimming upstream.

There are many more.

Depression is like being in an emotionally (and sometimes physically) abusive relationship with your own thoughts.

It is well known that abuse is never solved through silence. These figures of speech don't really help.

So, no more beating around the bush.

I AM DEPRESSED. Not just feeling blue, but suffering from depression.

After being in recovery for so long, I am depressed again.

There, I said it. In plain English.

I am not well.

At all...

...and to be honest I am scared out of my wits, because it has hit me without warning, totally unexpectedly, and especially because I'm doing everything right compared to six years ago.

I am actively engaged in my childrens' lives, I have wonderful social support networks, I am studying to improve myself and improve my future prospects, I work so I feel useful, I have control over my own finances and am doing extremely well for someone living on centrelink payments, I am looking after my house, I have clean dishes AND clean clothes, I exercise every week for my physical health, I do dancing purely for myself, I'm aware of what is going on in the world around me, and I have only healthy nurturing relationships.

But still, here I am.

Monday was an exhausting, but empowering day:

On Monday I admitted there was a problem.

I've been amazed at the response since. It's so overwhelming the support I've received, and from people I didn't expect, too. People have also said how I seem so calm and in control, and doing so well. I'm the one that has it all sorted.

Inside, though, I feel like that same person six years ago. Sad, empty, pathetic, hopeless, unworthy.

Except that this time I am absolutely determined NOT to let it ruin my life, I WILL NOT let depression destroy my life like it did last time.

Partly because I've fought it before, and partly because I have so much more to lose this time.

Yes, to say I'm scared is an understatement.

I share this without hope or expectation from anyone who reads it. I simply want you to know, because silence never helped anyone. Speaking out is the only way.

What is Recovery?

I guess the first question should be "What is depression?" a good friend of mine who is all sorts of awesome came up with a pretty good description in her blog post entitled "Depression is Crazy, Stupid, Dumb"

For me, depression was just nothingness, blackness, darkness, emptiness.. and anger, possibly due to the pretend happiness, because "What have I got to be depressed about?"

I have spent six years in recovery. The first two years were a hard fight. One where you're already exhausted from having spent four years in the middle of that dark storm cloud, just trying to get up every day, where you're losing every single day. Every. Single. Day. Then you start on that slow road towards the light, and you can't do it without help. You need an army behind you, because no matter how much "you deserve to be happy" you CAN NOT DO IT... JUST CAN NOT!!

Eventually you can do things without help, but you keep fighting, because if you stop fighting, the dark cloud WILL come back. You probably think of yourself as 'better' but the undercurrent is that you're still swimming, just not as much against the current as across it.

You proclaim to the world how much better things are. And they are. Honestly. ANYTHING has to be better than the blackness.

But that dark cloud is still there. It's just way off on the horizon. So far off, sometimes you forget it was ever there, you forget how hopelessly awful things were when you were caught in that storm, and of course you forget what an amazing job you did fighting it.

Now, the problem is, when you forget about depression, that's when it can creep up on you. If you're facing it dead in the eyes every day and have beat it before, you know you can beat it again, and you can put in place all the things to do it again, and to keep it at bay, but what if you don't notice?

I know I am better, in that I am a better person for having fought depression and come through the other side, but sometimes I forget. There is no CURE. There are better times, times when the good stuff outweighs the bad stuff, or when the good stuff makes me forget the bad stuff. Sometimes I need the good stuff in order to pretend the bad stuff isn't there. I don't know to what extent the good days are just me pretending. Subconsciously maybe? Self preservation? Denial?

Certainly things have never got even remotely close to how they were over six years ago when I was admitted to a mental health unit. I think it's easy to disregard how close the cloud may be when you've been in such a bad place.

It's all relative isn't it? But is it good compared to 'depression', or is it bad compared to 'happiness'?

Am I being melodramatic when I have a bad day because it's not nearly as bad as it used to be? If so, what if that bad day turns into a bad week, or a bad most of a month? Surely that's 'bad'?

But I'm kidding myself, surely, if I expect to be happy every single day. So, I take a day off here and there, I try to do the things I do, try to exercise, try to sleep well but not too much, I try to be around people, and try not to succumb, but also have to try not to pretend everything is rosey.

My name is Alex.
Six years ago I was hospitalised due to depression.
I had spent four years fighting, and losing.
I spent another two years fighting really hard to recover, with professional support.
I spent the next four years in an abusive relationship, but still improved despite that. That was JUST ME! ON MY OWN!
I still have bad days, but mostly have good days.
Regardless of whether it is a good day or not, I still fight every single day.
Every. Single. Day.
And... I am awesome!