I sat in the car, with my baby asleep in the backseat. I couldn't tell how long the engine had been off. I didn't have the energy to unbuckle my seatbelt. Instead, I sucked listlessly at the end of my Starbucks green tea frappe.
"You shouldn't be sitting here," I told myself.
"I don't have anything else to do."
True enough. I was sitting alone in an unfamiliar state with my hosts at work and my husband in the throes of his second Bar exam. With Piper sleeping in the back, there was nothing calling me to push past my lethargy.
My mind wandered over the events of the last few months, aimlessly pulling memories of other times I had been in this place - the desperate feeling that was too much to take, followed by the urge to just shut everything out, just go... to... sleep...
No more pain. No more. I can't do anymore.
Then, "Odd, that the conviction I've been feeling over the last few days is about God being good."
I hate that thought. That He is good. I have to love Him then. I can't love Him. Look at me. I can't even move.
__________________
In the last few months, I've been living at the edge of sanity. I know I am not insane, because I know where I am, and I know what is real. But what is real is so much...
I can feel myself shutting down, shutting out. I panic easily, but I can't cry.
I feel paralyzed.
But I am not paralyzed. I don't have the benefit of a hospital bed and nurses to wait on me and care for the things in my life that need to be taken care of because I can't do it myself.
I wouldn't wish it anyway.
Living like this, sometimes, I can only do the next thing. I don't have a choice about the act I put up for others - reality is all I have, mess or no mess.
I reach for hope - I know I need Him or I'll never get out of here. I'm beyond believing that depression itself is a sin. I've thought about getting counseling - but I can't bear the idea of someone picking me apart to give me a new "lease on life," or of talking to someone who really doesn't care about me beyond a quick fix.
There is no quick fix.
I've thought about support groups - but sitting around in a group of people with a "Hi, I'm Kelly, and I'm depressed" mentality freaks me out. Geez. It's not who I am.
I've thought about medication a hundred times - but I can't justify it. I don't have a peace about it. It doesn't address the root cause anyway.
I'm scared that the only answer is Him. My only hope is something that is not seen. It is not explainable or provable.
__________________
I think about faith as I stare blankly out the windshield of the car. Faith is the gift of God, not something I can manufacture or strengthen. It is His.
James says that faith without works is dead.
So... maybe my "work" is stepping along the edge of reason and insanity and doing the next thing because God is enabling me to believe that He is God. Because He wants me to believe that He is good.
Nothing glamorous.
I'm not angry anymore, I realize. I'm just tired. So tired.
A car pulls into the driveway behind me. I move, climbing out of the car as if I had just gotten back.
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"I would have lost heart, if I had not believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living."
6 comments:
Kelly,
You don't know me, I showed up here because I read Heidi's blog. I am a life-long sufferer of depression. In my teens and twenties I was hospitalized three times for it and lost track of how many times I tried to commit suicide. So I can't say "I know what you're going through" but I CAN say "I've been through some similar things myself."
That said, I want to discuss a few things you said. Not to convince you you're wrong, but to hopefully give a different perspective.
"I've thought about getting counseling - but I can't bear the idea of someone picking me apart to give me a new "lease on life," or of talking to someone who really doesn't care about me beyond a quick fix."
Be careful rejecting this out of hand. Most counselors are a waste of time, but a good one, a really gifted one, can change your life. And it doesn't have to be a long, drawn out process. In fact, many are trained in "quick therapy", which doesn't heal you but does give you tools to get beyond a crisis point and deal with things you describe while you DO work on the long-term healing. The issue is finding a gifted therapist. I was lucky - I had one I knew was gifted because she was the therapist of someone I knew. And after listening to me talk just a few times she gave me a couple of quiet but huge "slaps upside the head" that changed my entire perspective about some of the things I had wrestled with. I didn't get better over night, but I DID feel like I was on the road to getting better, and just that helped.
There is no quick fix.
"I've thought about support groups - but sitting around in a group of people with a "Hi, I'm Kelly, and I'm depressed" mentality freaks me out. Geez. It's not who I am."
And yet you blog the same things to the whole world. :-) I, too, don't feel attracted to such groups, but after a few "crises" they were helpful, if only for the short time it took me to get out of crisis mode.
"I've thought about medication a hundred times - but I can't justify it. I don't have a peace about it. It doesn't address the root cause anyway."
Have you read Brant's post on meds? I would recommend it. I have only taken meds for short periods of time, but they have helped. I would argue with one point - you say they "don't address the root cause anyway". Well, my understanding is most depression is at least partially genetically and brain-chemical based, and in those cases while meds don't CURE, they DO address "the root cause". I am not saying go jump on the med bandwagon on my say so. I am saying don't rule it out of hand.
"I'm scared that the only answer is Him. My only hope is something that is not seen. It is not explainable or provable."
And I would agree. Just remember that God put you on the planet at a time and place where things like therapists, groups and meds exist. And yet you rule them all out of the question. You know what I feel like when I am depressed? Like there are no answers. I rule everything that could help out because THAT IS WHAT DEPRESSION DOES TO US. It saps us of the will to take the steps to get better.
So yes, pray and lean on God and your family and your friends and even we people out here in blogspace. All good. Surround yourself with support. But don't rule out all the other options we are lucky enough to have available to us in this time and place. Don't let the depression keep you from acting. Because what you don't want to do is let it get worse and then end up in crisis mode. That sucks. I know. The hole is deep enough without digging it deeper.
One more thing I commented to Heidi the other day. Depression is a medical condition, not who you are. So you should no more say "I am depressed" than "I am the flu". Try to think of it as "I have a depression". That helps put the focus where it belongs - on getting well.
If you need further discussion in private, I am jim dot lehmer at gmail dot com.
God's peace and healing to you.
Jim
As far as the whole "root cause" thing goes, I think that it depends on the individual and the circumstance. I think some depression is purely circumstantial - something crappy happened, and our emotions are affected. The earliest depression I had was that sort.
But I also believe that there is a mind/body connection. How we FEEL affects what happens in our body, and what happens in our body affects how we feel emotionally.
In some cases, medication CAN address the root cause of the depression - if the root cause is a deficiency in neurotransmitters or a hormonal imbalance. In other cases, medications can give someone the ability to DEAL with the emotional root causes. This happened with a very dear friend of mine - he used antidepressants for a short time while he worked through the "stuff" causing the depression, then weaned off as his whole health improved.
For other friends, they have used antidepressants, never dealt with the emotional side, suffered side effects of medication, and are still depressed.
From a holistic health standpoint, I think there are better options than typical antidepressant meds. But that's just me - I try not to put synthetic meds in my mouth if I can help it. Natural amino acids BOOST neurotransmitters (rather than inhibiting their reuptake the way antidepressant meds do) and are without the side effects. In fact there are sophisticated tests now that can be run to determine WHICH neurotransmitters are low, how low, and which amino acids would deal with those causes. Things such as tryptophan, SAM-e, GAMA, 5-HTP, all can go a long way in healing a person's underlying deficiencies. I know that without my tryptophan at night and SAM-e in the morning, my anxiety would be out the roof and everything would appear to be a LOT worse than it actually is.
Another good friend of mine spent years on antidepressants, with wicked side effects, and then discovered the book "What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Depression" by Michael Schachter, which is a guide to amino-acid treatment for depression. She went to see him in NY, and with his help, weaned off of antidepressants, uses amino acids, lost 70 lbs, and is now one of the happiest people I know.
The physical side of things is HUGE and must be addressed, even if the root cause was an emotional/circumstantial thing that came first, because we are whole beings and what happens in the soul may show up not just in our brain chemistry but in the health of our organs, our digestion, and so forth.
Maybe I should have just written a post about this... :-P
Heidi,
1) I hope I didn't come across pushing meds for meds' sake. I agree, they can sometimes push aside dealing with the root issue.
2) Your points about the amino acids just reinforces one of my points - God placed us in this time and place and with the knowledge and techniques and technology to be able to have such things at our disposal. Maybe it's actually a sin not to make use of them, or at least some of them. So instead of "meds" substitute "amino acids" when I wrote my original post, and I still stand by it.
3) Yes, you should blog about it. :-)
Jim - no, I didn't think you were "pushing meds." I was just adding my own perspective on the use of meds/amino acids. Knowing Kelly I think a lot of her problems with meds stem are related only to the synthetic antidepressant meds with all the nasty side effects...I know she has used amino acids and other various nutritional supplements to support whole-body (and mind) health. I was just putting the info out there for anyone else interested...and yeah I'll probably write a post about this whole physical thing.
Kell - I forgot to mention that I REALLY liked your post. I like seeing you be so real, and working through your thoughts and feelings with us. It's like I felt after reading your "Honest" post on your other blog - like I knew you just a bit better, a bit deeper. Can't wait til you're home. :)
Jim, I appreciate you comments. I was very much writing in the moment when I composed this post, and I didn't realize that I might be trampling on toes of people who have gone to counseling or support groups or taken meds. A dear friend of mine has been taking depression meds for years, just to function, and I'm okay with that.
From where I sit, I don't have those options. I'm breastfeeding and my depression is largely hormonal at the moment. If I could find a counselor who would do what you said, I'd try it - but we don't have money right now for counseling.
My goal in writing is to share my own experience and what is happening in my heart - so I appreciate other perspectives. Thanks for being willing to share my experience.
Heidi, thanks for your help on this one. :-) I was wiped.
Kelly,
I've never had to breast feed, so that is not something I've had to factor in. :-)
And luckily all three therapy options I've only had to use briefly.
I hope you can find something that works for you. And this blog can certainly be part of a "group". Anyway, I wasn't trying to say "You're wrong!" I just felt moved to make sure all the "I can'ts" and "I don't feel like its" weren't the depression talking.
Take care.
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