I want to say thank you to all my friends who reached out to me after yesterday's blog. As I mentioned when I have these leaky-depression days, they thankfully for me usually only last one day.
I'm not sure if it's because I finally caved and got onto anti-depressants, or if it's the soul-work I have done over the last 10 years, or the faith in the God/Universe that I personally know. All I know is that my depression-days thankfully do not last.
Before I went onto my anti-depressant medications, it took everything I had just to get out of bed. Every morning I would wake up either extremely angry or sad. Not for any specific reason. My husband and I hadn't fought the night before. I didn't currently have any more pressure from work, finance, personal than the next person. But there the mood would be there, awakening with me.
I know some of this anger and sadness stems from my childhood. Now, before I go any further, I want to say that I have been blessed to be able to forgive my mother and father, and myself, and know that what I went thru was what I went thru. I am not casting blame upon anyone. What happened, happened. But, it did and sometimes still does, impact my today.
My mother, as I memtioned before, was a paranoid pyschophrenic, and my entire childhood I never knew which mother I was coming home to. Was it the cookie-baking, happy mom? The maudlin drunk mom? Or was it the comatose on the sofa mom? Maybe it was the terrifyingly angry mom. That one was the scariest mom.....that mom ended up in the nuthouse a couple of times, both for trying to smother me, and going after my father with a carving knife. I never knew as I was walking home from school which mom would greet me at the door.
The easiest one was the comatose mom. At least the comatose one was calm, in a sense, and I could do what I needed to do. Normally that would be helping make dinner, making sure I got my homework done, doing the yardwork chores I was assigned, tidying up the house. As a child, I didn't understand why my mother drank herself into oblivion, why she wasn't always 'there', why she saw Nazis everywhere. All I knew is that I had to walk around very carefully and try to be as invisible as possible when she was in one of her 'moods'.
So, when my doctor first tried to prescribe anti-depressants to me, my first terrifying thought is, I am NOT my mother! I'm not crazy! I don't need these things! And so for many years I suffered needlessly, using up vast stores of energy and emotional time every day just to put the happy face on. Then I thankfully started to listen, and a new doctor challenged me with this: She said to me, "if you had diabetes, would you take your insulin if it was prescribed?" And I said yes, of course I would. "Well", she said, "you have a chemical imbalance in your brain, and I am essentially prescribing insulin for your diabetes. Take the anti-depressants. All they are going to do is bring you up to a level playing field, so that you can go about your day. You can start when most people start their day, and use your energy for living, not just surviving."
And after I thought about it, I could see her point of view, and started taking a relatively low-dose prescription.
What a difference for me personally! For the first time in my life most days I was able to wake up in neutral, and have at least a chance to decide what kind of a day it was going to be. I could finally start working on myself, finally start facing the fears and pain inside of me. It was truly an eye-opening and refreshing experience.
So when the leaky-depression days happen, and the sadness or anger oozes out past my medications, I have learned that as Scarlett O'Hara is famous for saying "After all, tomorrow IS another day!".... and I lick my wounds, nurture my inner child, love her despite herself, and move forward. And I have learned to reach out to friends and accept the love they reflect back at me.
So again, to all my friends who sent love and healing and prayers and hugs my way, thank you. It is your support that makes my journey not only possible, but worthwhile and beautiful.
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