An Increasing Spiral

I am wildly impatient. When I've decided what to do, when I've clicked a button, I want it to happen now, if not yesterday. If I had a nickel for the number of times I've frozen a computer by clicking on too many things at once, I'd be rich enough to buy a better computer that would go fast enough. So when it comes to my own mental health, my own self-improvement, I have trouble giving myself the time and I space I need and deserve.

I can't entirely remember where I read this, but someone once said that recovery isn't a straight line but more of a spiral. Even if it feels like you're back where you started, you're probably still improving in a smaller way you didn't notice at first. While my mind accepts that easily, try telling my heart. It's disheartening, though, isn't it? You'd think that after 10+ years of the same fight I'd have developed stronger muscles. Maybe I have, but damn would it be nice to set my weapons down for a moment. I'm tired.

Depression. What a big word. I don't use it much, and I think maybe it's a bit like Voldemort-- names have power, and unless you're ready to face the enemy, sometimes it's easier to stay a step back. Oh, I'm not depressed, I'm just tired. Feeling down. Having a bad month. Much more approachable that way, isn't it? Much easier to ignore.

It's been a weird, or bad, or down...well, year really. It snuck up on me, because for a while there, things were going so well. Finally, I thought, everything was coming together. A fulfilling job that left me with ample free time to pursue hobbies. A solid group of friends. A budding relationship. Sure, the bad days came, the anxieties jumped out from behind curtains, but I bounced back like those bottom-weighted dolls that refuse to fall over.

So, when things started to roll downhill, I told myself it would be fine. I'd forgotten the signs. No one manned the watchtowers. It came in steps. A breakup that hit harder than expected. Friends moved to different countries. But I put my head down and kept busy, kept working, and ignored the signs telling me that Things Were Not Okay, that they were in fact Getting Worse.

The thing that's always been tough for me about my depression (as if there's only one thing?) is that it's subtle. I've never really felt suicidal or the desire to hurt myself, and half the time I don't even feel exactly what you could call sad. It's more of a cold wet blanket that I can't quite seem to shake off. It's heavy and cumbersome, and the easiest way to ignore it is to just fall asleep under it. It's like the opposite of rose-tinted glasses; it makes everything a bit gray, a bit damp, a bit less exciting. Everything seems harder to do, because even the smallest movement requires so much more effort than usual. I guess the fancy word is apathy.

But apathy is tricky. It feels like exhaustion, and with the way I overwork and overschedule myself, it's normal for me to be tired. To a point. However, when I spent nearly the entire two weeks of my winter vacation in bed doing nothing because even getting up to get dressed seemed like more than I could handle, I knew that something needed to change.

I guess that's part of what this blog is about. What's the buzzword these days? Living mindfully? As much as I'd like to avoid thinking my thoughts and feeling my feelings, in the end, that's what leads to things getting worse than they need to be. It's time to start keeping myself accountable and, like Dumbledore, calling my enemy by its name.