Part of My Life

I've been wanting to write about this subject for a while, but haven't really known what I want to say. There is just so much than can be said.

I'll just relate what happened that made me realize I wanted to write.

I was getting for bed the other night, and actually noticed the last-last thing I do before going to bed, for the first time.

I changed my clothes. I brushed my teeth. I went to my room, and knelt, and prayed, and pulled aside the covers. I turned on the bedside lamp, and reached for the bottles.

I watched my writs flick exactly right to open them. I noticed the expert up-ending of the bottle to shake out, quickly and effectively, the pills, and I observed that I had done this so many hundreds of times that I didn't even think about it anymore--precisely bite the pill in two, along the scored line, because who wants to fuss with getting the pill chopper out tonight? All these things, with my mind running over the day, organizing and analyzing it without the interruption of bothering to paying attention to my actions, muscle memory guiding me.

This is a part of my reality.

Most of the pills I take are supplements like Calcium and iron, but one of them is not. One of them, as inconspicuous as the others, is an antidepressant, and I take it without hesitation these days.

There are some very strong opinions out there about these little tablets. I've been all over the scale concerning them, myself. I've been on and off them and all around them over the years. I've been diagnosed with a lot of versions of the diseases that branch off the word "depression." The most recent, and I think most accurate, starts with an M and contains the idea that it's a long-term condition, but at this point the labels matter so little that I truly can't remember what that M word is, and I don't really feel like looking it up is relevant. I just need to know what my response will be. My responses, I suppose, because there's not one answer. Even in one individual, there's not one answer.

It just is. Like: Hi, I have brown hair. I like chocolate and men and tickling my nieces. I enjoy being outdoors and I have depression and my favorite thing to do on the weekends is try new foods and hang out with friends. It's there, mixed in with all the other elements of what my life has been and how I understand myself and the challenges I've worked through and the ways I keep standing up.

I used to think that I had to hide it. I don't. I used to think that I was obligated to feel ashamed. I'm not. When I was telling someone that I have depression and they got embarrassed, I thought that I was supposed to be proportionately embarrassed, so as to make them feel comfortable.

No.

Life is life, you know? And we all have our different things. The way I see it, we are each working though something. One of mine happens to be this. And I just wanted to say this in a public way:

Responding to this illness is part of what I deal with, and working through it is something I am proud of. I have made so much progress. I know how to feel without swirling into choking blackness now. I know how to stop and give myself time. I know how to get up and go to work and I know how to persist even with heavy grief in my stomach and aching sadness spreading through me. I know how to feel true happiness from the hug of a child or the shape of the mountains while still in the middle of the hurting. I know how to see the beauty I simply couldn't conceive existed before. Sure, I don't see it all the time, but I know that it's real now. I know how to let myself be touched by the small moments of living. I know I know how to cope, and I'm even learning to thrive. Having depression doesn't scare me anymore.

And that is a triumph!