First Person, Singular: “This Last Month”

Thanks so much to Susan S. for sharing this chronicle of a recent bout of depression. It’s such a perfect articulation of what it feels like to be depressed. Susan, we all hope you’re feeling better.

This last month has been impossible. Sure, I’ve weathered more, harder, depressions, but this one seems unique. I cannot stop sleeping, and nothing makes me want to wake. I have no reason not to, it takes me away to a kinder, gentler place where I dream a million dreams and hang out with friends, long dead. In my dreams, I am model tall and thin, with legs like a Rockettes. In my dreams I am beautiful, I can get the attention of any man I wanted.

Now I know I am dreaming.

A dream I haven’t had since childhood repeats. I’m flying. Flying over cities, flying over the ocean, but not landing.

My lithium seems to be working; I am not suicidal this time. This time it’s different. I am too depressed to dress, so I stay in my pajamas or sweats for days on end. My hair isn’t washed; I don’t have the energy to wash it. It gets adjusted daily in its scrunchie, but that’s about it. I’m too afraid to go outside, even to collect my mail. It lies in the mailbox adjacent to my door, all I have to do is open the door and stretch my arms. But I cannot. It’s too much. Overwhelming.

I went to the store two days ago because I needed cat litter. I came back home ASAP. Talking to the checker was too difficult, even walking a few blocks was overwhelming. I have forgotten how to drive. And when I figured out how to start the car, I couldn’t recall where the store was.

Everything is overwhelming. A daily call to my parents is overwhelming. Trying to read a book is overwhelming.

I cannot seem to write or read.

For the first time in my adult life I feel adrift, cast away from everything. Rudderless, anchorless. There is no rhyme or reason. I’m not working. The money I saved up is almost gone, and I cannot in good conscience go cannibalize my 401k and IRA. I haven’t worked in two years, I’m frightened. I know I need something to bring money in, I just don’t want to spend the next 10 years of my life working in a job where I was overqualified, underappreciated, and bored sick. I don’t want to be in a place where I cycle down, or hear voices that aren’t there, or get paranoid where I think my co-orkers want to kill me like Rasputin.

This morning at 5 a. .my eyes opened as the sun was rising. I could hear birds outside. My cat was bouncing on my chest, wanting me to wake so we could listen to the birds together. I moved to the couch, she jumped on the windowsill and meowed at them, as the sun rose. It was the highlight of my day. Simple pleasure. The cat gets the simplest pleasure out of watching birds outside, and seeing squirrels scamper.

I wish I were like her. I get no pleasure from anything anymore. I feel like I am living death. I’m too blue to even think about suicide, but nothing, not even chocolate is cheering me. I don’t have the strength to lift my arms, as I grab the pillows behind my back and neck and try to re arrange them.

I hear voices. To counteract them, I listen to my iPod, listening to various talk shows and books on tape to hear another voice cancel out my voice. Right now I am listening to Anthony Bourdain talk about food. It’s not even making me salivate.

Last night I dreamt I was flying. This time, I flew around NYC, circling the Chrysler Building. I flew into a window in a brownstone, where I saw myself sleeping in bed, only this time there was a man and my cat in there with me. Maybe there is hope for me. But right now, all I can feel is overwhelming sadness and ahenodonia.

[Photo by Kessiye]

liz | 12:30 PM | Uncategorized