NOT RIGHT IN MY HEAD
People think that depression is all in the head. People are idiots. Depression seeps through every pore of your body and leeches into every aspect of your life. It is an insidious, gut wrenching experience.
Depression is not all in the head
I had sepsis once. It wasn’t at all fun. It is hard to describe to anyone who’s never been in that dark place, but let me give it a red hot try.
I had a hysterectomy when I was 38. I had it because my life was filled with blood and gore in a fairly literal sense. I was bleeding to death. So a nice kind surgeon agreed to remove the offending part of my body. But apparently while he was in there fiddling around with my bits, something got a little nick in it because a couple of weeks later I couldn’t stand up without falling over. It turns out I had an internal bleed that had been slowly fermenting since I’d been stitched up. I had a pelvic hematoma that had become septic.
I was really fucking sick
But I wasn’t in physical pain. I didn’t have unmanageable nausea. I was just systemically really unwell. I was so fatigued I simply could not function. I was so weak I could not stand properly. Apparently I was a nasty pasty colour. Eating, drinking and sleeping felt impossible. I couldn’t shower or do any kind of basic functions on my own.
I was watching the world happen around me but I couldn’t participate. It was like I was behind a veil, weighted down with a cloak made of big heavy grey stones and I could see but I could barely move.
Depression feels just like sepsis
Fortunately once you’re diagnosed with infected internal bleeding the medical fraternity steps in quickly and fixes things. I had a second operation where they drained the hematoma, stitched up the bleeding vessel, pumped me full of IV antibiotics and a few days later I was on the road to recovery.
Depression is not cured so easily. It is a physical manifestation of a psychological malady. Many people experience a lessening of the debilitating effects by taking antidepressants. They are life saving medications and should never be underestimated.
For me, sadness and grief are felt in my heart. My chest feels that pain, but depression is systemic. My whole body becomes heavy, the world is a different, faded colour. And basic functions are too difficult to manage. The energy force that normally buzzes through my body, making it possible for me to participate in life, is gone.
The things you take for granted disappear. Bed making. Cleaning. Cooking. Pottering around. Reading. Showering. Socialising. Teeth brushing. Walking. Writing. Working. Those things pretty much make up my every day life. And when I’ve been through major depressive episodes, the chest-crushing sadness is also there, but the every day is what disappears.
Depression is a chemical imbalance in the brain so it makes sense that it has a physical impact. Just as other chemical imbalances can cause diseases such as diabetes or hyperthyroidism where everyone understands the physical repercussions.
So too depression
It is coursing through the veins and causing a fatigue that is unmanageable. A heaviness that is hard to overcome. It is in your whole body and is so much more than sadness or grief. It never lifts. There is no lightness. There is only pretending, to make other people happy, until after a time that too becomes impossible.
I am intolerant to most antidepressants but am very fortunate because I now have mood stabilisers that even out my imbalances and I no longer drown in the bottomless oily sludge of despair that is a major depressive episode. But I can still get quite low. It happens a couple of times a year. It is like a shadow of major depression. And I’m in that shadow now.
Life feels harder and while I can still manage the basics of showering and bed making and working, I am only managing the basics at the moment. I wrote myself a most impressive to-do list for this weekend – and I confess to being very partial to a great to-do list. But after having spent three hours lying on the couch staring at my television that wasn’t even turned on, I can finally acknowledge that I am not going to tick all my boxes this weekend. I should add write blog post to the list.
But I have learned, everything passes
The most joyous moments I ever knew are now history. They left me with a golden, glittery cascade of memories that I can just catch a glimpse of when I try very hard.
And the most crippling moments of my life, that were filled with a blackness I thought could never end, also passed me by. So whatever I’m feeling in this moment, however fatigued and worn out I feel after doing a load of washing, well…. this too shall pass. All things do.
