I suppose it's time I admit that I'm in therapy. Depression runs in the family (actually, it gallops), and there was only so much that medication could do for me. After about six months on it, I felt it was doing more harm than good. From a psychiatrist post of view, that would mean it's time to try a different medication, since that one wasn't working the way that it should. Different medications in the anti-depressant family are composed different ways and do different little chemical changes within the brain. Finding the right medication means you have to mess around with what you're changing and see when you've hit the right chemical balance.
I, however, made a choice after accidentally going off medication. Long story short I got sick and didn't take them for a few days because, well.... eating wasn't working out. Anyway, I should have gone back on them, but I hadn't been feeling like me for a few months.... like I only had access to part of my personality, and that the medication had limited me as a person and made me sort of a two-dimensional character rather than a full three-dimensional character. So I didn't resume taking them. Instead, I made the conscious choice to tackle the deeper issues that my depression feeds on.
Let's get a few things straight here. First of all, I have a history of depression, as do several people in my family. Statistics show that once you've had depression once, you are over 50% likely to get depression again. Having a second span of depression increases your chances to about 80%, and three or more cases of depression pretty much solidifies the fact that you're going to have it for the rest of your life. Many mental illnesses are hereditary. One in five women will be diagnosed with depression at some point in their life, so it's not as uncommon as people truly believe it to be. Moving to a new place often brings up issues we have formerly dealt with and forces us to deal with them again. Los Angeles in particular is especially good at digging up the dead.
That I suffer is not weakness. It's a combination of a lot of things, many of which are out of my control. Getting help isn't weak--quite the opposite really, as the hardest things for me to admit in my life are that I need help on any of the big things. That I can't fight this battle on my own has been really hard for me to face.
Now that that's all sorted, I can actually get into what I wanted to say in the first place.
There are parts of my personality that have been developed over time, parts that I'm now aware of thanks to therapy, and they're not good parts. But as they are ingrained into me, I can't just turn them off. I keep walls up. Letting someone into my life, truly trusting them and letting them in on the secrets of who I am, is one of the single most painful things I can imagine, so I very rarely even allow someone a chance. My ability to trust was severely damaged as a child.
I think the core issue was finally hit, the sun around which all these issues and character flaws surround. I'll explain things this way.... think of our solar system, our planets and such. The sun is the core, then there are the inner planets, then the band of asteroids, then the outer planets. My depression is like the solar system, and I've been slowly working my way inwards to find out what fuels everything.
At my core, the issue that hurts the most, is the simplest one. I'm so very alone, and that loneliness is excruciatingly painful.
I don't know how to not be alone.
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Now to something far less heavy.
My last entry was about this hope that I have, about the fact that I truly feel that God has someone for me, and that when the time is right, it'll be fireworks.
Lately all these notifications on facebook are showing that people are getting married, engaged, entering into relationships, all sorts of stuff. And then I'll see people upset about being single. I've heard that being single during the holidays is rough. Maybe if I was five years older, I might understand that, but I'm still rather young, and I've had it both ways, and to be honest, I don't know that there's a whole lot of difference.
With that in mind, juxtaposed with this solid hope I have, I find myself quite glad in my singleness. I feel almost like I have something that they don't--they may have a relationship, but I have hope and the promise of something amazing. I'm not rushing something, I'm not forcing anything, I'm certainly not settling for anyone.
For as stressed out and emotionally fried as I am, I at least have that. I have my singleness, which right now, is far better than any relationship.
Also, not related to the whole singleness thing, something that makes me feel less lonely.
Monday night was Disney night at a friend's apartment, and well.... Graham walked me home at 5am when the last of us decided we should call it a night. It was a long and lovely night, and I felt happy to just be there. I wasn't alone, I wasn't forgotten, I wasn't excluded or on the outside looking in. I belonged. I mattered. It was wonderful. Days like that (or nights, I guess?) give me hope, that amidst everything, despite how lonely I feel at the very core of my being, maybe I'm not alone after all.
My last entry was about this hope that I have, about the fact that I truly feel that God has someone for me, and that when the time is right, it'll be fireworks.
Lately all these notifications on facebook are showing that people are getting married, engaged, entering into relationships, all sorts of stuff. And then I'll see people upset about being single. I've heard that being single during the holidays is rough. Maybe if I was five years older, I might understand that, but I'm still rather young, and I've had it both ways, and to be honest, I don't know that there's a whole lot of difference.
With that in mind, juxtaposed with this solid hope I have, I find myself quite glad in my singleness. I feel almost like I have something that they don't--they may have a relationship, but I have hope and the promise of something amazing. I'm not rushing something, I'm not forcing anything, I'm certainly not settling for anyone.
For as stressed out and emotionally fried as I am, I at least have that. I have my singleness, which right now, is far better than any relationship.
Also, not related to the whole singleness thing, something that makes me feel less lonely.
Monday night was Disney night at a friend's apartment, and well.... Graham walked me home at 5am when the last of us decided we should call it a night. It was a long and lovely night, and I felt happy to just be there. I wasn't alone, I wasn't forgotten, I wasn't excluded or on the outside looking in. I belonged. I mattered. It was wonderful. Days like that (or nights, I guess?) give me hope, that amidst everything, despite how lonely I feel at the very core of my being, maybe I'm not alone after all.
