Getting On the Same Page: Depression

Though depression is becoming less stigmatized these days, the average person still doesn't have an adequate picture of what it actually looks like. In an effort to bring forth an accurate description of depression, I did what any red blooded American would do...I googled "depression definition".  The FIRST thing that came up was EXACTLY what I was hoping to find.

de·pres·sion  (/diˈpreSHən/)

Noun Severe despondency and dejection, accompanied by feelings of hopelessness and inadequacy. A condition of mental disturbance, typically with lack of energy and difficulty in maintaining concentration or interest in life.

Synonyms dejection - hollow Let me break up the definition and give you a peek into the window of what it looks like when I am in depression. severe despondency and dejection - I can't snap out of it . I am so consumed with all that is going on in my brain that I disconnect from the people that I love.   Nothing anyone does or says can make me feel better.  I can be with 10 friends and still feel all alone.  I just want to sleep and be allowed to escape to my dreams.   hopelessness- To be hopeless, for me, means to mentally resign to the "fact" that nothing is ever going to get better.  I will never feel happiness or joy again.  No one can help me and no one can love me.  I even assume God is mad at me because I can't keep it together.  While He loves me (in theory), he's not happy with me.   inadequacy-  Nothing I do is right.  I don't know myself well enough to avoid these failures.  I should have made different choices.  Even when I make good choices they blow up in my face. I will never be any good to anyone (for very long, at least).  I don't deserve these kids, this husband, these friends.  I just take and take from them and have nothing to offer in return and their patience is growing thin.   mental disturbance- A break from thinking about the present.  I usually obsess about past mistakes and failures.  I can't get my brain to focus on thinking about NOW.  I become forgetful and confused.  I am easily irritated because my mind is functioning on overdrive.  I have a low tolerance for my children and their antics and yell at them a lot because my threshold for stress is insanely low.    lack of energy -  This is different from laziness or relaxation.  It is thinking I can't pull myself off of the couch to get a glass of water, even though I am extremely thirsty.  I decide between brushing my teeth and washing my face before bed because I don't have the energy to do both.  I sit and hold my bladder for 30 extra minutes because I don't have the energy to get up and walk to the bathroom.   difficulty in maintaining concentration -  There is a whole 'nother world playing itself out in my mind.  I am usually obsessively replaying a failure or a time when I said or did something embarrassing or even a lesson I could have taught better (from 10 years ago).  I can't shut it off.  I end up just forgetting if I added salt to my casserole.  I'm not sure if I took my medicine because I can't remember doing it 2 minutes ago  I can't read or watch a movie to relax because I am watching my "mind movie" and completely missing the one in front of me.    or interest in life-  I want to run away...to get in my car and drive for as long as I can stand it.  I daydream about needing to be hospitalized so I can get some rest.  I think about getting away from the housework, the kids screaming, the blah blah blah blah blah.  I don't clean because it's just going to get dirty anyway.  I don't engage with my children; I tolerate them until bed time.  I stop taking your calls or tell you I am "crazy busy".  I make excuses so that I can skip meetings and girls night out.   hollow- I stop being able to feel.  I'm not sad or scared or lonely.  I'm nothing.  I sit and stare, blinking on purpose to make sure I am still awake. The boys are running around and playing and I am sitting motionless on the couch listening to the sound of my own breath.  My friend hugs me and the love is sucked up into the black hole of my depression and I don't get any of it for myself.  This is when I start to try things to be able to feel.  I obsessively press my fingernail into my thumb, just to make sure there is feeling.  I walk outside into the frigid air because the extreme cold feels.  You will notice that SADNESS is not mentioned in this definition.  Depression isn't about feeling sad.  It is not being bummed out that you didn't get the job.  It isn't (necessarily) the feeling you got in high school when your boyfriend broke up with you.  It may not even be the crushing loneliness you felt on a dateless Saturday night.  The initial emotions are sadness, disappointment, rejection, grief, and loneliness. While those are hard and painful emotions and can make you feel melancholy, that's not really what the mental illness "depression" is...at least not in my experience. (SIDE NOTE: If you DO have depression, those things can be triggers)  Instead, it is a whole paradigm shift from what is real to what depression tells me is real.  I often liken it to putting on a pair of sunglasses.  I still see the world, but depression is a lens that changes how I interpret it.    My motivation for sharing this with you isn't to garner sympathy or to prompt you to tell me that these things aren't reality.  I'm not trying to feel special by airing out my brokenness.  I am allowing you to see this so that I can help you understand that depression is complicated.  It is multi-faceted and complex.  Most importantly, depression is often without reason.  While (nearly always) my worst seasons of depression are triggered by an event, that event can be something that happened 15 years ago.  I relive it like it was today and then my brain starts down this strange little pathway to depression.   It can be an event that seems innocuous to the outside person, but for my mind, it was just the kick it needed to start spiraling into depression.  I can even suffer through this when everything is mostly right in my world.