depression: how it affected me

• I cried a lot.  A lot.  I would cry getting ready for work, on the way to work, when I got to work….. you get the idea.  When I cried, I cried for my dad.  I kept saying, ‘I miss my dad! I miss my dad!’  Undoubtedly I did; but I was also crying for the safety of my childhood, when I was happy, and when parents could fix everything.
• I lost my mind.  I would start a sentence and get confused, and forget what I had begun to say.  I would walk around the house aimlessly, not remembering what I was searching for.  For the first time in my life, I couldn’t read books; they confused me too much.
• I felt physically sick in my stomach.  This was the anxiety manifesting itself.
• I would be driving, and lose chunks of time/space.  I would ‘wake up’ on the highway, not knowing how I’d got to where I was.  (And half the time, not remembering where I was going.)
• I lost my confidence.  I started asking SO, ‘Do you love me?’ because I couldn’t understand how anybody could possibly love such a walking disaster.
• I lost my ability to feel.  When I was at my worst, suicide was a decent option, and I didn’t feel anything – not love, not hate, not concern, not anything.  I was numb.
• I couldn’t work.  On the days I did make it to the office, I would spend the whole time shifting papers around my desk, hoping nobody would notice I wasn’t doing anything substantial.  I just couldn’t concentrate long enough to accomplish anything.
• My idea of recreation was sleeping.
• My personal hygiene suffered.  I would go days without having a shower or brushing my teeth.  The thought of washing my hair was overwhelming; at one point I went a month without washing it.  (To give you an idea, I normally shower twice a day.)
• On the rare occasions I did see my friends, I couldn’t follow the general conversation.  It went too quickly, and my brain just heard noise; it didn’t translate.  I would sit there, smiling or looking sombre, depending on what I saw on my friends’ faces, so they wouldn’t guess I didn’t understand what was being said.
• I forgot words.  When I was trying to speak, I wouldn’t be able to remember the right words for things.  This led to a lot of discussions with SO along the lines of, ‘Um, don’t forget the thing you need for um, later, you know, when you um, you know what I mean……’, followed by tears of frustration.
• I walked around in a permanent fog, that prevented me from feeling or absorbing things.
• I had no motivation to do anything at all.  When I wasn’t working, on bad days, I would lie on the bed, mind blank, bladder full, and just not able to crawl the few metres to the en suite toilet.

hypothetical

Here’s a philosophical question for you: If your brother marries a PITA, but you never hear him complain, does his unhappiness really exist??

My brother has been dating a pain in the arse for the same time that I’ve been with SO.  (This is a coincidence.)  She is shallow and annoying.  I don’t like her, none of the family like her, and his friends have carefully refrained from passing comment – that is, they don’t like her either.  Anyhow, being your typical engineer (introvert, poor socialisation skills with respect to women, etc) she’s his only significant relationship.  He seems to think that if he marries her, that he will be happy.

The thing that made me think of all this was today’s Dilbert comic (for fear of violating copyright, blahblahblah, I’m not going to reproduce it here).  To me, it encapsulates their relationship.  Sad but true.

Onto other matters…. I’ve picked up a headcold.  It gave me a shock, actually – the stuff that’s normally wrong with my head is brain-centred, rather than sinus- and throat-related.  It’s been a while since I’ve been physically sick.  It makes a change, I must say.  At least it’s easily fixed with lots of codeine and pseudoephidrene.  Bring on the druuuuugs!!

We were at M and J’s wedding BBQ today.  I went out this morning and got their present – a large platter, two nibblies bowls and some salad hands.  I got a text from M this evening saying how much they liked them, which is great.  We were only there for a couple of hours, as I was feeling pretty ordinary once the edge wore off the drugs.  SO was arguing with me before we left, saying that I shouldn’t be going as I was sick.  I cracked the poopies with him and told him that hell would freeze over before I missed today.  He got the message.

Anyhow, it was good.  M was in good form, she was actually enjoying herself, which made me happy to see.  L and her husband weren’t looking so good.  I noticed that they stayed away from all the kids, and that when kids were passed around, she didn’t have a hold.  She was also very subdued.  I sat next to her and talked to her for a while.  She seemed to chirp up a bit then, which was good.  She did say that she was spending all her time in bed.  I really hope that she will be okay.  I’d hate for this to trigger depression, in either her or her husband. Poor love, he’s also really struggling.