As some or you, or perhaps no one, has noticed I haven't been around much lately. I pondered long and hard about whether to even mention my absence or to go into the details about why I haven't been here and I've decided to mention it but not in a terribly detailed fashion.
You know those days where it seems nothing goes right and the world seems as though it is against you and decides to not only make your life hell but to stomp all over your dreams at the same time. I've just had about a month of that. A few days or even a week's worth I probably could have coped with but when it all comes at once it is just rather difficult to keep your head above the water never mind slapping a smile on it when the waves try pulling you under.
When I was 18/19 I was diagnosed with clinical depression, and anti-depressants and counseling were prescribed as a way to drag me out of it. I think that once that has happened to you you become more adept at recognising the signs that a bad patch is coming and one of the things my counselor taught me were coping strategies to try and deal with it before I reached the point of a bottle vodka under the duvet which had been my go to cure all for a bad dose of the blues. However, sometimes all the coping strategies in the world can't help you. Especially when one of them is to distance yourself from
all things that could cause a melt down. Sometimes the world at large doesn't seem to be aware that you've taken all you can take and continues to give you crap that you slowly drown underneath.
The last few weeks have been the closest I have felt to going back to that terrible place since my Father died six years ago. Had the weeks of horror occurred in any other month it probably wouldn't have been a problem but November is the month that he died and whilst over the years the date has got easier to bear, this year what with everything else that was going on it was too much to cope with. The week leading up to the 7th is one I dread and it takes all my coping strategies and every ounce
of self control I have to get to that day and get through it without sitting in a corner and rocking backward and forward whilst sucking my thumb. I simply don't have the strength or the energy at that time of year to deal with anything else.
Depression is a horrible, horrible thing. I don't pretend to corner the market on suffering and I know that what I went through was mild in comparison to what some people struggle with and I was fortunate to have a place to go and heal and put myself back together without having to hold a life together at the same time. I remember the first time I read Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the part where the Dementors are described literally made me have to put the book down and go away, it is the closest description I have ever found to what being depressed was like for me. The inability to find the joy in anything is not the sort of person I am, I've always been someone who loves the small things in life and when that leaves me I feel bereft and so alone that nothing and no one can make a difference.
But now, now I feel as though I am coming out of it. I've let go of some of the stuff that was upsetting me and decided to move on and accept that there are things you can't change. The things I can change well, I'm working on those. As for my dreams. I think they're intact, a little tarnished but I am buffing them up and beginning to believe in them again.
I always said that my blog would be a place where I would only write my happy thoughts because who really wants to read or keep a record of the low spots in their life. However, writing for me has always been cathartic and being a grown-up really leaves very little time for sitting down and scribbling it out so instead I've put it here. So if this post seems disjointed and peculiar I apologise but sometimes things are better out than in regardless of their format.
Normal service shall now hopefully resume! I've missed you!
