My Depression

I don't know where to begin. The last few days were challenging but I really hit my absolute breaking point yesterday and woke up sobbing uncontrollably this morning. I posted on facebook that I couldn't do it anymore. I was conflicted about posting - because I knew I wasn't myself and that I wasn't thinking the most sensibly. But I felt I needed to post it. It was like Heavenly Father was saying, "My daughter, you're in pain and you need to ask for help. The details of how and when it will come are not important, just ask and know what you're feeling now won't last forever." So I tapped post. Sobbed some more. Caught my breath. And fell asleep.

The kids slept in almost 2 hours later than do typically. Clearly other forces were at work and it was important that I get some good interrupted sleep. Just those 2 hours did just enough to keep me from crying continuously.

Before I give you some background, let me just say 3 things:

1.) I hope this post and my statements about my struggle don't come across as ingratitude. That really is not what it is. I don't think it's right to quell feelings of struggle because we are worried we are seeming ungrateful. I believe that is the adversary influencing us from confronting what is real and challenging to us personally and preventing us from getting proper help. I am incredibly grateful for my blessings - my husband, my home, my children, the gospel of Jesus Christ. My life is incredibly rich and brimming of beautiful moments and blessings. My struggles I am also grateful for. 

2.) I am also aware of the spectrum of the struggle of the human condition and how my meager contribution of what I have experienced is almost comical in comparison... I know many of you who are reading this have dealt with much worse. I still have a lot to learn and any advice you might have is much appreciated!

3.) I have heard varying theories on depression. Some people don't even think it's real and call it "being sad" and an excuse to medicate. Some people think it's caused by selfishness. Some people think half of the people who think they have depression are just sad and lazy, etc. Some say it's a chemical imbalance. Some say it's due to environmental factors. Some day it's a combination of all of these things. I don't know how much of my experiences fit into those explanations. I believe, personally, it's very real. I have dedicated much of my time to seeing if these applied to me and the selfishness one definitely applied some of the time but most of the time, it was completely out-of-my-control dark bleak seemingly-never-ending pain. 

Here's my experience with depression in nutshell:

My first experience was senior year of high school. I transferred to a new school. I had a hard time making friends. I did poorly in school. I was tired all of the time. I would come home from school and sleep a lot of the time. My head was a bit of a dark place. It wasn't too intense, it was just this very consistent, slightly brooding dark background that followed me around. It was fairly easy to distract myself of it some of the time but it was always there. I didn't even know it was depression, I thought it was just me being me.

The darkness intensified during my first year at BYU and I found myself having the first of a few very suicidal episodes. I finally told my dad what I had been feeling and got help. It was the therapist I saw during my 2nd semester that diagnosed me. Once the darkness faded, I thought I was all better so I stopped seeking help.

Fast-forward to getting married where I was surprised at how much it intensified. I was in a wonderful loving marriage but for some reason, adding this extra dimension in my life almost added this whole new surface area that could feel pain so any darkness that I felt before was intensified. I had 2 very intense suicidal episodes during this where my ONLY tie to reality and not taking my life was my testimony of Jesus Christ. And that I did not want to disappoint him or show ingratitude for what he did. If I truly believed in the Atonement and it's ability to heal us during any struggle. I had to stick it out. (I have to say, I do not believe that anyone that commits suicide is condemned! I am full of empathy for all who struggle with this in its varying degrees and cast no judgment whatsoever on the choices people make. It is never my right to do so.) During our marriage I tried therapy again and medication but as a mother who plans to be pregnant and/or nursing for at least the next decade, I just felt therapy would be too inconvenient and I did not want medication messing with my ability to get pregnant or produce milk for my babies. I brought this to the Lord and asked if he could help me come up with some other way to combat the depression or keep it manageable.

And I found it.

Here's an analogy of how depression feels to me now that I am older and can recognize it: When the "wave" comes, I first feel like lights are turning off in my head that I have to conscientiously turn back on again. (Like more prayer than usual, reading a few scriptures or getting through a conference talk throughout the day, watching an uplifting video). Sometimes that's all I need. And then other times the dark rooms turn into pits I trip and stumble into. So I pray. And I see the Savior sitting next to me. He never leaves my side. I look out of these pits and I reach out for the hand of someone that I think needs a nice phone call or text. Missionary work, in all its forms, is tremendously helpful. My effort to reach out to someone becomes the hand that pulls me out of the pit. Within the last year and a half, this has worked pretty well in keeping most of the depression within the realm of something I can control. Since Joanne has been born, however, my life has become more unstable and unpredictable and those things tend to make the waves come quicker and with more intensity. So now I am finding that instead of the steadiness of lights turning off and then pits appearing, it's pits appearing and then getting deeper and wider. 

Anyway, yesterday and this morning were some dark times. For anyone who hasn't experienced depression, imagine someone you are very close to dying. Imagine the emotional torture - the pain. Take away the loss but leave the pain. That's what it feels like. Sometimes I just have to sit there and feel it. Let the tears flow. They have no reality-based reason to be there so I just let it pass and it does. 

I hope I didn't create a boy-who-cries-wolf persona of myself. What I felt was real. I feel much better now but I still feel "sick."

I want to testify of the Savior. I can feel him near me during these times. I have expressed to him frequently that I want to love as he does and I guess this is part of getting there and I am grateful for that. I know that he lives. I know it. I know that he loves me and I know that he loves you. I know that what he did for us is real and eternally sustainable and that tapping into his sacrifice gives us a deep and abiding peace that does not exist anywhere else but through him.

Thanks for reading this. I apologize if I freaked anyone out!