This post is going to be long, and followed by a second installment. Please bear with me. What I am about to tell you is deeply personal and true. Any ommissions or errors in content or the timeline are the fault of my own memory ..."In depression, faith in deliverance, in ultimate restoration, is absent. The pain is unrelenting, and what makes the condition intolerable is the foreknowledge that no remedy will come -- not in a day, an hour, a month, or a minute. It is hopelessness even more than pain that crushes the soul." -- William Stryon
" ... crushes the soul ..." -- People casually toss around the term 'depression' as if it were as insignificant as a headache. They become 'depressed' if they miss their favorite TV show ...or if the boyfriend/ girlfriend doesn't call ... or if the mini-mart is out of their brand of cigarettes ... or if they receive a less than stellar grade in school. They mean no real harm by this, of course; it's just a turn of phrase, but it nonetheless unintentionally minimizes the plight of those who are caught in the cold grip of true depression. Until one has experienced it firsthand, it is difficult at best to appreciate, much less, explain, the deep and traumatizing effects of clinical depression.
Depression of a protracted and deep-seated nature is a malignant cancer of the mind and the will. It devours from within. I know this because I speak (and write) from personal experience. Several years ago I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder. And while it has been estimated that between 20 to 25% of people over the age of 18 may suffer at least one episode in their lives, mine has shadowed me for years.
Until now, this has been, with few exceptions, unknown to even those closest to me. I have lived under this condition since at least my late childhood, early teen years.
"Who I am hates who I have been." -- Anonymous
Until several years ago, when my internal chaos finally reached critical mass, my depression remained undiagnosed. I knew something was wrong; I just didn't know what. I knew I didn't feel the way I should feel, yet I did nothing. For all of those years, until well into adulthood, it permeated every aspect of my life and even shaped my identity. Its threads ran through every relationship with other people, my family life, my career, my marriage; it colored every behavior and decision, dominated every action. At its lowest ebb, it had been a mild undercurrent of melancholy and at its worst it was completely paralyzing, taking away the desire to care about anyone or anything. And I paid the price for allowing that.
"You see only the outside ... I live what is within." -- Anonymous
Friends and family knew nothing about what was happening inside of me. I did not talk about it. I did not present the classic, stereotypical face of depression; I did not mope or cry. They saw only what I wanted them to see, what I allowed. But it was a mask, one that I wore so well for so many years that it became virtually indistinguishable from my own face. I wore that mask all throughout high school, through various jobs, throughout an entire nine-year marriage, as well as a subsequent nearly decade-long relationship.
Sooner or later living that kind of existence exacts a toll. Depression does more than seriously affect your mood; that is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg. A clinical depression is an incapacitating mental and emotional illness, affecting your ability to perform any task, no matter how mundane or complex, that requires even a shred of concentration. Marriage, work, personal relationships ... all suffered or fell by the wayside.
"Depression is not just sobbing and crying and giving vent, it is plain and simple reduction of feeling ... People who keep a stiff upper lip find that it is damn hard to smile." -- Judith Guest
Really, it is only hard to smile and mean it. The false smile becomes a mask, worn when needed, removed in private. In reality, I felt almost nothing about anyone or anything ... almost. What I did feel was overwhelming self-loathing. One of the durable, yet misguided ideas about clinical depression is that you can lift it up simply by convincing a depressed person that life is good and worth living. But when the darkness is as deeply entrenched in the mind as it was in mine that is a patently ridiculous notion.
I was in my late 30s, my life in complete ruins -- mentally, emotionally, financially, spiritually, -- before I finally sought help. Why had I waited so long? Why had I subjected myself to the better part of a life of misery? Why had I allowed this illness to so completely overwhelm and engulf me to the point it had? The answer isn't easy to face: I didn't want anyone to see my weakness. As a teacher of Martial Arts, I stood before my classes on a daily basis and taught my students -- especially children -- how to be strong and in control. I was neither. I saw myself as a sham. The content of the message I was imparting to my students was valid; but my practice of it was not.
"That's the thing about depression: Most people can survive almost anything, as long as they see the end in sight. But depression is so insidious, and it compounds daily, that it is impossible to ever see the end. The fog is like a cage without a key." -- Elizabeth Wurtzel, Prozac Nation
That IS the thing: I was so imprisoned in this fog, paralyzed not only by the depression but by my fear of its discovery by others, my mental energy throttled back to near-zero, that I merely went through the motions with my students ... hell, with the whole world for that matter ... that I just didn't care; I was drained, sapped of everything vital. I. DID. NOT. CARE.
I recall two specific incidents that at last put me on a different path ... but before I tell them, let me clarify something. Yes, depression killed feeling; but at the same time it was as if I was imploding, drawing far down deep into myself, smaller and smaller until I could go no further. When that happened, when I felt so isolated and insignificant and worthless an explosion occurred. I cannot explain it any better than that. The direct opposite of what I had described above: every emotion; every thought and feeling coalescing into one mind bursting eruption -- it boiled to the surface and I did cry ... I did rage ... I did strike out ... there is a price to be paid, I think, for the submission of our soul, for the damping down of our feelings and these explosions were the cost. For every action in the universe, it is said, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This was mine.
The first incident which I will relate happened only six or seven years ago and was one of these explosions: My girlfriend (and, at the time, fiancé) and I went for a walk after dinner one night; we did this frequently, usually following the same route and enjoying the time together. It was late summer, the weather pleasant, and the night warm even as the sun began to set. We lived on a side road near the largest natural lake in Northeast PA. Despite the weather and environment the conversation soon turned serious; we had been having difficulties in our relationship, brought about primarily from a failing business that I owned. I was pouring my heart and soul into the business in order to make a better life for us (at least that was my argument) but no matter what I did I met with dead ends and failure. The business was sending us into financial ruin yet I refused to give it up; it was driving a wedge deep into our relationship, yet I desperately tried to convince her (or myself, really) that success was only just around the corner. But that was the same old tune I had been singing for years with nothing to show for it. This, of course, is only a thumbnail sketch of the situation; it had been building to this point for years. I refused to see her side; insisting that I could do this for us ...for our future. But she bluntly told me that if things did not change, she doubted we had a future. The words hit me like a hammer, and then everything literally went black inside of my head and behind my eyes.
I honestly don't remember everything about that day ... I do remember feeling as if an avalanche was happening in my head, as if a vital part of myself and my reality had suddenly come loose and was going ... where? I don't know. I do remember falling to the side of the road on which we were walking, screaming, crying, feeling as if I was exploding into a million pieces. Was this what it was like to lose your mind? I do remember screaming about how much I hated myself, how much I wish I could just die, how much better off everyone would be if I were no longer around. I cannot fully explain in words the intensity of this breakdown. Until that moment, I had never felt anything like it. I would feel it only once more a few years later under much different circumstances (but that, as they say, is another story for another time).
I barely remember anything after that ... only vaguely recall making it back to the house ... what else I do remember I don't want to talk about. I knew then, at that moment that I was in need of serious help, that I could no longer carry this weight on my own. And if I didn't get some sort of help I would not live to see any future.
There was one other incident that occurred around the same general time but was much quieter in its execution. With one exception I have never spoken of it publicly until now. In order to make ends meet, I had taken a job managing a store at the local mall. It paid what, for me, was an astronomical sum. This was is in addition to trying to keep my business afloat. Two jobs, twice as much stress, frequent hours alone, too many thoughts racing through my head, caught in an endless loop. Until one night, at the close of business, I found myself in the back room of the store with the blade of a knife pressed firmly against my own throat. One small move, I told myself, one cut was all it would take to make years of pain disappear. And as I pressed that blade into the soft tissue of my throat I was ready to do it, without hesitation ... and I kid you not when I tell you that at that moment the phone rang and it was my daughter. Her voice ... the picture of her face in my mind ... is the only thing that stopped me from making a huge, terrible mistake. The conversation that followed was not significant in anything other than its timing; had it come only five minutes later ... who knows?
It was the combination of those two situations that told me I needed massive change. It was going to be a long, hard road back and it would turn out that there would be casualties along the way ...
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