Clinical Depression and You!

Imagine -if you will- a river. 

The river follows a certain path, winding its way through the land as it flows downstream. It adapts to reality and reacts to the topography in predictable patterns, behaving almost like a living, feeling creature... constantly in motion; ever-changing. Even when dizzying heights lead down waterfalls to extreme lows, the river always flows forward; never hesitating; never surrendering... forever focused. 

The rewards for such an iron-clad commitment to the laws of gravity are little to none; the river will never gain elevation in blatant disregard to the laws of physics; yet even so, the river never questions its role in life or adopts a defeatist attitude. It almost appears to understand a fundamental rule of life; that nothing ever exists in a permanent high... or low. The river takes life's hits in its stride, shrugs them off and moves on. Only such determination and strength of character could bind the titans to its will; through sheer tenacity, it has thoroughly earned the privilege to erode mountains of solid rock and make its mark on the immense; the immovable; the eternal.

The river is a good metaphor for what a healthy person's attitude in life should ideally be like; a persistent, relentless, unyielding drive towards a fixed goal... with an unshakable will to defeat life's challenges and still manage to keep going -even after a few hard punches- and an understanding that nothing lasts; neither the good times, nor the bad. 

Now imagine a pond. It is nothing more than some water that happened to have collected in a natural basin by no one's designs. It has no goal; no driving force; no soul; no life. It is temporary; monotonous; bereft of any semblance of purpose. Not only is it immune to currents and waves and winds; but it is also decidedly uninterested in them. It exists in an eternal state of limbo; not quite alive and yet not truly dead. It has no taste but for bland nothingness; no sound but for a boring monotone; no smell but for the stench of stagnation; no feel but for lukewarm numbness. 

The pond has chosen to face adversity in the most passive of ways; by not even trying. It knows it is temporary; it knows its existence makes no difference; and that nothing is in its power to change that.... and while it is ironically calming to simply exist with no self-imposed goals or obligations, it is a sad existence; unworthy of acknowledgment or remembrance.

That, in a nutshell, is the life of the clinically depressed.

This brings us to a very important distinction that must be made before I go on; there is a type of depression that everyone exhibits at some point in their lives, resulting from severe emotional trauma... it is a part of the "normal" five stages of grief, and while no one can question the destructive nature of that particular stage, it is -however- temporary. It is a response to a specific event, and it will run its course eventually... be it after a week or a month or even a year. It is therefore not a mental illness per se, but rather a low point in one's life.

And then there's clinical depression. 

Clinical depression is not when you're upset or sad for a few days for a specific reason; clinical depression is infinitely more intangible and harder to quantify or diagnose... it is a constant, nagging feeling at the back of your mind that never quite goes away, and the minute you think it's gone, it rears its ugly head when your defenses are down. If you've been crying for a few days in reaction to something -while I'm very sorry for whatever put you in that state- you should be grateful that you are still able to feel something that intensely. 

You want to know what clinical depression is? In the simplest of words -and without going into the typical day-to-day routine of a clinically depressed person- it is what happens after you stop crying... in other words, it is what happens after you stop caring altogether. 

Clinical depression is like a flat-line on a heart monitor; constant, unchanging, and often irreversible. It is not so much a stage you go through and move on as it is a constant companion; an unwelcome guest that sometimes briefly allows you to enjoy what feel like irregular, eerie, undeserved bouts of happiness... but who always, always, comes back. Nothing makes you sad, but nothing gives you joy, either. Clinically depressed people can sometimes feel happy, of course, however their threshold is significantly higher than it is for the mentally healthy, and they're usually very fleeting, temporary blips of emotion that quickly give way to a baseline of melancholy and dull, reasonless pain... and you don't want to know what the frequent low points are like. Even the joys and thrills of a new relationship only last for a few weeks, fading away to nothing before you've had a chance to enjoy them... and it's all downhill from there; as you try to explain to your partner why you don't seem as passionate, attentive or interested in them anymore.

People often mistake particularly long spells of unhappiness for clinical depression, but they are not comparable; for one is a mental illness and the other is a temporary feeling. The media has unfortunately not been the most informative of tutors, and clinical depression has sadly been mostly neglected and almost criminally misrepresented in popular culture. I've heard the words "clinical depression" being thrown around often recently, and personally I'm very firmly against that because it risks desensitizing the community to a very serious mental illness; in which case, people who actually need help are marginalized, overlooked or written off as drama queens. It is a term that should definitely not be uttered without serious prior thought.

To sum up; for a clinically depressed person, everything tastes bland and boring and they simply have no reason or will to live, even if they should appear -on the surface- to have everything in life. They have nothing to look forward to; nothing to get them out of bed; nothing to motivate them to put on their masks and face the world and no energy to perform even the simplest tasks. As a matter of fact, people who commit suicide due to depression are not often trying to escape momentary pain, but rather to break the endless cycle of nothingness... to finally stop feeling numb and outrun their demons and the voices in their heads.

The cherry on top is definitely the "advice" clinically depressed people often receive from uninformed loved ones, which -while very well-intentioned- can often kick the depression into even higher gear. "Get over it" or "you need God" or "you need to go out more" or "stop moping all the time and smile" are not what a depressed person needs to hear, because it makes them feel completely alienated, unheard and misunderstood... and odds are they've already tried all of these tips before. How they feel is not within their control; they cannot be blamed for their defective brain chemistry. What they need is someone who listens; who understands; who will patiently be there for them -for as long as it takes- and who provides emotional support, even if they do not particularly understand what it is they're going through. If one of your loved ones is depressed, don't stress them out and add to their worries by demanding their attention, as this is nothing short of emotional abuse. 

Long story short; keep an eye out for the signs and be supportive to others who suffer from depression, clinical or otherwise... and most importantly -while I don't personally believe in the effectiveness of therapy or anti-depressants- please do not hesitate to seek help if you felt that this article struck home, or if you find yourself pondering death more and more frequently. Although clinical depression is a chronic illness which might not be curable, it is ultimately a state of mind... and it is at least manageable as long as you know what signs to look for, and you put in constant effort to actively fight it every day.

I sincerely hope none of you could relate to any of this, but if you did and you need to feel heard, please don't hesitate to contact me. I've been there, I am there, and will likely always be there... so I know what you're going through, and I'm here to help.

I leave you with a link to another blog post I wrote in October 2017, with the hope that someone, somewhere will read it and realize that they're not alone:

http://insert-bondok-sarcasm-here.blogspot.com/2017/10/my-best-friend.html

Keep up the good fight... you're stronger than you know.