Can we, just for one minute, talk about depression?
I don't like to talk about it. I don't like to think about it..and believe me, I like to think.
I started exhibiting symptoms when I was 11. It showed its face as anxiety. I had a very specific trigger, and when that trigger was pulled, I couldn't leave the house. My parents didn't know what to do with me. But, like all childhood fears, it eventually went away. When I got over that trigger, the depression started showing.
It isn't dramatic, especially not now, after 11 years of dealing with it. It comes and goes. I never feel like throwing myself off a bridge or listening to Dashboard Confessional. I've been to therapy, but I find it unhelpful, and when the discussion turns to medication (and it usually does), I know my time is up.
Because the fact is, I don't need meds. I'm pretty sure this is just who I am. Most of the time I am more than fine, capable of having a blast and maintaining my life. Some of the time I am weighed down, still functioning but quieter and more withdrawn. Occasionally I shut down a little...but then I have my writing and my music and my own head.
There are still triggers, yes. New ones all the time. But there is kind of a cathartic cleansing to the whole process, sinking to the bottom and rising back up. As for relationships...well, it can be hard to find people who understand this kind of thing. I am getting used to this, just as I got used to the depression in general. Sometimes I want to open up, sometimes I don't. Sometimes I love people, sometimes I just want to be with myself.
Depression hits the creative, the sensitive, the thinkers. Those three things are three of my best character traits. I'll take the mild depression if it comes with the territory. I just wish it was something more people understood.
Saturday, June 23, 2007
Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Rejoinder
The wrong end of a fascinating conversation
(ring ring)
Hello?
(pause)
Oh yes, hi.
(pause)
No.
(pause)
No, no. That isn't what I meant at all, I --
(pause)
What?? Why the hell would she say that?
(pause)
No, listen, do NOT do that.
(pause)
Don't you remember last time you tried that? You couldn't sit down for days!
(pause)
She's just going to have to do the thing with the bees on her own. You have enough on your hands with the lawsuit, and --
(pause)
Cream cheese?!?
(pause)
How did it get in the cream cheese???
(pause)
No no no, I just don't believe that. There is no way the mayor is that stupid.
(pause)
Ok, I'm sorry, say that one more time?
(pause)
Uh
(long pause)
Well...I've never heard anything quite like that.
(pause)
I think I'm blushing.
(pause)
Ok, I'm on my way. Don't let him leave before I get there.
(pause)
Stop, this is just crazy.
(pause)
No, NO, no more bees! Good lord, what is it with you and --
(pause)
Stay there! I'm coming!
(click)
(ring ring)
Hello?
(pause)
Oh yes, hi.
(pause)
No.
(pause)
No, no. That isn't what I meant at all, I --
(pause)
What?? Why the hell would she say that?
(pause)
No, listen, do NOT do that.
(pause)
Don't you remember last time you tried that? You couldn't sit down for days!
(pause)
She's just going to have to do the thing with the bees on her own. You have enough on your hands with the lawsuit, and --
(pause)
Cream cheese?!?
(pause)
How did it get in the cream cheese???
(pause)
No no no, I just don't believe that. There is no way the mayor is that stupid.
(pause)
Ok, I'm sorry, say that one more time?
(pause)
Uh
(long pause)
Well...I've never heard anything quite like that.
(pause)
I think I'm blushing.
(pause)
Ok, I'm on my way. Don't let him leave before I get there.
(pause)
Stop, this is just crazy.
(pause)
No, NO, no more bees! Good lord, what is it with you and --
(pause)
Stay there! I'm coming!
(click)
Monday, June 18, 2007
Disquisition
Why is everyone in their twenties, as Tom Paxton said, vaguely unhappy?
I have spent more time thinking on this than I care to admit, and I have come to the conclusion it is absolutely true. Here we are, as sexy and full of life as we'll ever be, and we're all looking for something more. We have great times, make memories, love our lives...but we are vaguely unhappy. I believe there are several universal reasons for this.
Location, Location, Location
When you hit the age of 18, you begin what is to become a long journey of partings. By the time you're 21, you can barely count on two hands all the people you miss at a given moment. You wander from place to place, home to home, and you are never with all the people you want to be with at once. You are forced to face the reality that you may never be in the same place as the person, or people, you want to be with. You realize the home you grew up in doesn't hold you anymore. You are in purgatory.
You say you want a revolution? No one cares.
At some point you realize all the youthful idealism in the world isn't going to pay the bills. And let's face it: At the end of the day, watching The Office and having a stiff drink sounds more appealing than changing the world.
Don't be a fool, stay in school
I'm still in college, going into my fifth year of college, and I can already acknowledge life doesn't really get any better. Yes, there are perks to being a full-fledged grown up, but on the whole, college is the place to be. Once you're out, people expect you to know things. And do things. But we can't stay here forever, because a bird with all its feathers looks like a total loser if it hangs around the nest.
Life is beautiful
I have a nice tan and no blemishes. I am free of wrinkles and crows feet, I have time to do my nails, I can get by with next to no makeup and I have yet to discover a gray hair. I can go for a jog without aching for days. Things are holding up. Still, I don't know a girl (or guy) on the planet who loves his or her body. We're not going to get any younger, but we just can't love ourselves. How silly.
We all just want to get some
Show me a twentysomething who doesn't think about sex roughly half the day and I'll show you a twentysomething in a coma. Almost everything we do is somehow motivated by that possibility of having sex. And don't you DARE say that isn't true for girls, because it absolutely is. It is how we are programmed at this stage of life. And while that can be great fun, it is also greatly troubling. It's like wearing those drunk goggles 24/7...it becomes very difficult to see a given situation in the correct light.
I can tell you this, though: I am not looking forward to 30.
I have spent more time thinking on this than I care to admit, and I have come to the conclusion it is absolutely true. Here we are, as sexy and full of life as we'll ever be, and we're all looking for something more. We have great times, make memories, love our lives...but we are vaguely unhappy. I believe there are several universal reasons for this.
Location, Location, Location
When you hit the age of 18, you begin what is to become a long journey of partings. By the time you're 21, you can barely count on two hands all the people you miss at a given moment. You wander from place to place, home to home, and you are never with all the people you want to be with at once. You are forced to face the reality that you may never be in the same place as the person, or people, you want to be with. You realize the home you grew up in doesn't hold you anymore. You are in purgatory.
You say you want a revolution? No one cares.
At some point you realize all the youthful idealism in the world isn't going to pay the bills. And let's face it: At the end of the day, watching The Office and having a stiff drink sounds more appealing than changing the world.
Don't be a fool, stay in school
I'm still in college, going into my fifth year of college, and I can already acknowledge life doesn't really get any better. Yes, there are perks to being a full-fledged grown up, but on the whole, college is the place to be. Once you're out, people expect you to know things. And do things. But we can't stay here forever, because a bird with all its feathers looks like a total loser if it hangs around the nest.
Life is beautiful
I have a nice tan and no blemishes. I am free of wrinkles and crows feet, I have time to do my nails, I can get by with next to no makeup and I have yet to discover a gray hair. I can go for a jog without aching for days. Things are holding up. Still, I don't know a girl (or guy) on the planet who loves his or her body. We're not going to get any younger, but we just can't love ourselves. How silly.
We all just want to get some
Show me a twentysomething who doesn't think about sex roughly half the day and I'll show you a twentysomething in a coma. Almost everything we do is somehow motivated by that possibility of having sex. And don't you DARE say that isn't true for girls, because it absolutely is. It is how we are programmed at this stage of life. And while that can be great fun, it is also greatly troubling. It's like wearing those drunk goggles 24/7...it becomes very difficult to see a given situation in the correct light.
I can tell you this, though: I am not looking forward to 30.
Friday, June 8, 2007
Palliate
I think there are few things harder to cope with than feeling alone.
By this I do not mean actually BEING alone; as a girl who has spent much of her life in a small house with two younger brothers, I value alone time as much as anyone. Recently I've even taken up running just to give myself an hour or so of Julie and ipod time...if you know me, you know that is a desperate measure.
But that feeling of being alone, of having no one to identify with, know your soul --it can be a rough place to be.
I find it difficult to say these kinds of things without sounding emo. One of the reasons I love writing is I'm so much more able to say what I actually feel...for example, never in a million trillion years would I actually say the words "know your soul." It's just not my style.
It's not that I really feel alone, per sae. I don't feel "misunderstood." I guess what I'm missing is connection. I'm pushing messages through my circuits and the currents are spinning off into nowhere...no one is picking them up.
I would like to have somewhere to hook up my circuits.
By this I do not mean actually BEING alone; as a girl who has spent much of her life in a small house with two younger brothers, I value alone time as much as anyone. Recently I've even taken up running just to give myself an hour or so of Julie and ipod time...if you know me, you know that is a desperate measure.
But that feeling of being alone, of having no one to identify with, know your soul --it can be a rough place to be.
I find it difficult to say these kinds of things without sounding emo. One of the reasons I love writing is I'm so much more able to say what I actually feel...for example, never in a million trillion years would I actually say the words "know your soul." It's just not my style.
It's not that I really feel alone, per sae. I don't feel "misunderstood." I guess what I'm missing is connection. I'm pushing messages through my circuits and the currents are spinning off into nowhere...no one is picking them up.
I would like to have somewhere to hook up my circuits.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
