The Bitch. (Did that catch your attention?)

Go ahead and take your shoes off for this one.  Normally I don’t ask people to take their shoes off when the come in the house, but this one seems like it needs to be walked towards in feet with just warm socks on them.  Curl up on my couch with a cup of coffee, or a cup of creamer, or a cup of tea… whichever suits you.  I will have a small cup of coffee… with possibly a shot of whiskey in it.  That’s a Thing that people drink I think.

Depression.

There.  I said it. I broke the ice.  I got it out there for you to taste and sample before I serve you the whole dish. 

It’s a scary thing.  It’s a dark thing.  And basically, it’s a Bitch.  And it’s something that I walk the line on, going back and forth in unexpected and ever-changing patterns.

If you know me personally, perhaps your eyebrow is raising a little.  Or maybe you are putting together pieces and understanding is blossoming in your head.  I honestly don’t know how people will take this.  But let’s just go ahead and keep going.

I had lunch with my ever-kind, ever-patient husband today.  After a comfortable silence, I asked him if he ever gets stuck… if he ever gets caught up with depressing thoughts that he can’t shake.  He looked at me as I tried to avoid his glace, and then we went there.  Apparently it’s not as normal as I had thought.  Or perhaps it IS, and people just don’t talk about it because they don’t see it for what it is, or decide that if they don’t mention it when they are feeling right in the head that it may just not happen again. 

Or maybe being depressed is different than depression.  Maybe being depressed is just Depression’s little cousin, who isn’t as mean but is still super awkward when you invite him over for dinner.  Mostly because you don’t invite him. He just shows up.  And he doesn’t even bring a bottle of wine.

Being depressed can look like a lot of different things.  It can look like your kids, but just the worst version of them.  The kind that you see when you are too tired and too busy, and too ashamed of the multiple fails that happened too quickly is succession.  Or it can look like your husband, but the worst version, the one that you made up in your head that you keep disappointing or you keep feeling suffocated by, even though Real Him is just trying to figure out what is going on with his silent wife.  It can look like your friends, but the worst versions of themselves.  The versions that have decided that distance is too hard of a obstacle to overcome and have moved on, even though the real versions are There and Present and still love you.  Or it can look like a twisted version of yourself, the version who knows your dark secrets and relishes in the power they hold over you.  

The only factor that doesn’t change is that all of those things sit right in front of you.  Nose to nose.  So there is no room for you to lean over and see the Blessings just behind them.  And so you start to sink, and the further down you go, the less you can see, aside from that terrible version of whatever is haunting you at the present moment.  You don’t realize that the storm has passed and there are rainbows all around you (or perhaps that’s not right… you DO realize it, but you can’t look away).  A small part of your brain that is still lucid is banging on the door and screaming about how the storm has passed and all you have to do is lift your chin, but you can’t.  That horrible thing has you nose to nose and you cannot look away.  And then that part of your brain that was trying in vain to break down your door gets swallowed up as well, and then there is silence.  Silence and that thing, pressed up against your nose.  And then it starts to whisper…. Terrible lies that in any other setting would be laughable and easy to brush off,  but because you are knee deep already, they are the only thing you hear.  And they make complete sense to you broken heart and your broken brain.  And you nod and cry and decide that there really is no way out of this. 

Like I said, depression is a Bitch.  And I have a feeling that more people ride the line than we realize.  And I have a feeling that it’s hard to talk about because hey, I have a great life.  That’s pretty selfish of me to be depressed.  There are a whole bunch of people who have way more right than me to be sad.  I should just suck it up and be happy, damn it.  You should continue to make people laugh and hug it out and be ok, even though you are still reeling on the inside from your intense shifts in moods.  And it’s even more confusing because you aren’t faking your happy emotions, so how can you trip and fall into that hole again so quickly?  It doesn’t make sense so therefore it isn’t valid.  It isn’t worth bothering people with.  Because you have a great life.

So where do we go from here?  What do we do with this?  I don’t know.  And I think that’s ok.  I am not writing this because I have a solution, I am writing this because I think more of us NEED a solution than we like to admit.  And maybe if we were all just a little more open with each other about our broken bits, we would come to that solution much more quickly.  Maybe if I knew you were cracked as well, I would be more open about  my own hurt, and perhaps just the sharing of the Thing in and of itself would be the balm we need.  Maybe it’s just the simple recognition that you are valid and you know that people everywhere have trouble seeing that from time to time is what we need.  Maybe it’s the sharing of it so when your People see the signs they can take you by the shoulders and go nose to nose with you until you see past that terrible old hag. 

I don’t pretend to know what will help.  And my palms are sweaty at the thought of it, but perhaps the posting of this will be the first step to taking the power from that intruder of my joy.  So here goes nothing.