Pandemic Depression: Roller Coaster Edition
What year is it again? March?
Since my last post, which was 100 years ago, I've had good days and bad days. Up to two(?) days ago, the bad days hadn't really felt like depression per se; they felt more like pervasive and crushing fear.
Like, fear feels like the correct response right now. Everything is scary! But, as we know about me, because my mother never taught me how to have a reasonable response to illness, I have always struggled to find that right line to walk. I don't want to be a hypochondriac, but I also don't want to underplay and get the proper medical help I need. And that was BEFORE a global pandemic!
So you can imagine how I'm struggling with that right now.
Here's a glimpse inside my brain:
That last thought usually brings me back down to the ground a little.
I know I'm so very lucky to both work from home (I worked retail for 10 years and I'd be out of a job now if I still did) and that my employer is doing everything they can to retain its workers. It's a kindness that they have no obligation to offer, but here we are. I'm sad and grateful and grateful and sad and scared and just all the feelings.
Then, two days ago, Bernie resigned. And, like, I wasn't even really a Bernie fan per se. If you love him, great, and as long as you're not one of the bullying brosefs, I support you and here's a hug because he was the last progressive in the race. He was like 4th on my list after Castro and then Warren and I'd been grieving losing Warren as a candidate already, and so was prepared to vote for the one of the two old white men that was a progressive and probably not a rapist.
But the sudden realization (that I'd been avoiding), that I'd have to knowingly vote for a rapist in this next election just to remove the narcissistic megalomaniac ignorant old white (orange) male rapist from office crushed me. Knowing that this is my only choice is traumatizing.
Not to mention how our supposed democracy is designed to disenfranchise millions of Americans and most of us didn't even pick this man to represent us. I'll never not vote, but national elections are only the illusion of choice. Our voices aren't heard. This is not a democracy.
I'll vote for him. I will. But I am sick about it. America is a rape state and, as a sexual assault survivor, reaffirming that is traumatic as hell.
Enter stage left: crushing depression. I found myself hoping that I'd get the virus and die before I had to vote for a rapist, then my brain became sure I would. Then the waves of sadness would roll in all over again because I don't want to die, not really, and I don't want to hurt my husband or my family or my cats, but I also don't want to live through this. It's all awful and terrible and I know that this one sense of injustice pales to the many injustices occurring to so many people daily, but this particular one broke me.
But I think I did a couple things right to cope with that: I left myself feel that, really sit with it and let it flow through me, and then I sought some small things that genuinely make me happy (small things like happy tiktok videos and looking at my friends' Instagrams so I could remember how much life and love there still is). And then I just avoided politics for a day.
This last one is really hard for me to do. I'm a politics junkie. I have been since I was a teen. It's fuel and it's masochism and I just gravitate to it and I can't help it. But, also? There's nothing that screaming about it and crying about it and getting into online debates about it will change. Biden is the nominee. He's better than Trump, even if I think he's not great. Accepting this shitty situation is going to do one singular thing for me: keep me alive.
I cannot speak for anyone else, but I struggle with control. I think that's a pretty human thing to do, for one, but growing up with a narcissistic and abusive parent means I had NOTHING in my control as a child. Nothing was my choice. Nothing. Everything was about my mother. When I first had choices in my grasp, I didn't know how to make them on my own. I'd not only never been taught how, but I'd never been allowed to do so.
So I struggle with making decisions, but I also hoard control like it's made of oxygen, like it will literally keep me alive. Those small things in my power, they are MINE and I don't let anyone take them from me.
And the world right now? Absolutely fucking out of control. Our jobs, our government, our very lives are out of our hands (to an extent, but don't make me rabbit hole again). THIS IS VERY HARD FOR ME. But but but also? Also? Accepting that can be liberating.
My therapist taught me a very simple task: write down the things our of your control and literally throw the paper away. So simple, but so symbolic. It's out of my hands and set I throw that away. That doesn't mean I won't grieve or be angry or stop worrying or whatever; it means I accept I cannot control it.
This is also why, I think, I find chaos more comforting than destiny or religion. There's no higher being or higher purpose pulling the strings: shit happens and I have to navigate it. Sometimes that shit is choosing between two rapists, but at least the cards aren't already dealt, at least some things are up to me still.
Does that make sense?
It's not checking out. It's not disengaging. It's just focusing on what I can control so I don't spin out about what I can't.
I'm not perfect at it. It takes active, ongoing effort, but it does help. I have good days and bad days. It's going to keep happening like that. It's going to be the least fun roller coaster ever. Even though I didn't pay for this ride, I didn't get in the line, I didn't strap myself in, I'm on this ride regardless. I might throw up a little, but I can do my best to hang on tight and try to survive it.
Since my last post, which was 100 years ago, I've had good days and bad days. Up to two(?) days ago, the bad days hadn't really felt like depression per se; they felt more like pervasive and crushing fear.
Like, fear feels like the correct response right now. Everything is scary! But, as we know about me, because my mother never taught me how to have a reasonable response to illness, I have always struggled to find that right line to walk. I don't want to be a hypochondriac, but I also don't want to underplay and get the proper medical help I need. And that was BEFORE a global pandemic!
So you can imagine how I'm struggling with that right now.
Here's a glimpse inside my brain:
*deep breath*
Everything is terrifying. I'm scared to go outside at all and yet have been forcing myself to do so to stave off agoraphobia, which is another of my mother's mental illnesses and we know my biggest phobia is just becoming HER, but now I'm more scared of exposure to THE VIRUS and I have no idea if I'm being rationally debilitated by this fear or if it's truly becoming a phobia.
*deep breath*
I'm scared of contracting it. I'm scared of my husband and I both getting it and trying to survive it and I'm the one with a family full of paramedics, EMTS, and firefighters, so of the two of us, I'm the better nurse (he's a great carer to be fair), so what if I get really sick? Will he know at what point I should go to the ER for emergency ventilation? Will he know how to bring down a fever when I'm delirious?
*deep breath*
But what if we both die at home? Will anyone know? Who will take care of the cats? Will anyone be willing to come into our disease-ridden home to get our kitties? What if parademics come and leave the door open and Hobbes gets out? He can't take care of himself! What if he runs in the street or gets eaten by a coyote? Oh but now I read that cats can get COVID-19 too, so what if I get it and give it to my cats, but I can't take them to the vet because we don't want to kill the vet either and we're all going to die at home and I have no control over any of this at all.
*deep breath*
And what happens if one of us dies and the other lives? We are still newly-ish married and haven't combined bank accounts yet! No way I'm going into a bank now. Does he know all my passwords? Who will handle all of this when we're both dying?
*deep breath*
I'm so glad we don't have children.
*deep breath*
What if I lose my job? My entire industry has collapsed and I'm thankfully still employed and my boss is pivoting me into a new role which I'm both grateful for but also grieving the career I'd built for the last decade+. But at least I'm working and I'm working at home.
 |
| This is my brain on anxiety |
I know I'm so very lucky to both work from home (I worked retail for 10 years and I'd be out of a job now if I still did) and that my employer is doing everything they can to retain its workers. It's a kindness that they have no obligation to offer, but here we are. I'm sad and grateful and grateful and sad and scared and just all the feelings.
Then, two days ago, Bernie resigned. And, like, I wasn't even really a Bernie fan per se. If you love him, great, and as long as you're not one of the bullying brosefs, I support you and here's a hug because he was the last progressive in the race. He was like 4th on my list after Castro and then Warren and I'd been grieving losing Warren as a candidate already, and so was prepared to vote for the one of the two old white men that was a progressive and probably not a rapist.
But the sudden realization (that I'd been avoiding), that I'd have to knowingly vote for a rapist in this next election just to remove the narcissistic megalomaniac ignorant old white (orange) male rapist from office crushed me. Knowing that this is my only choice is traumatizing.
Not to mention how our supposed democracy is designed to disenfranchise millions of Americans and most of us didn't even pick this man to represent us. I'll never not vote, but national elections are only the illusion of choice. Our voices aren't heard. This is not a democracy.
I'll vote for him. I will. But I am sick about it. America is a rape state and, as a sexual assault survivor, reaffirming that is traumatic as hell.
Enter stage left: crushing depression. I found myself hoping that I'd get the virus and die before I had to vote for a rapist, then my brain became sure I would. Then the waves of sadness would roll in all over again because I don't want to die, not really, and I don't want to hurt my husband or my family or my cats, but I also don't want to live through this. It's all awful and terrible and I know that this one sense of injustice pales to the many injustices occurring to so many people daily, but this particular one broke me.
But I think I did a couple things right to cope with that: I left myself feel that, really sit with it and let it flow through me, and then I sought some small things that genuinely make me happy (small things like happy tiktok videos and looking at my friends' Instagrams so I could remember how much life and love there still is). And then I just avoided politics for a day.
This last one is really hard for me to do. I'm a politics junkie. I have been since I was a teen. It's fuel and it's masochism and I just gravitate to it and I can't help it. But, also? There's nothing that screaming about it and crying about it and getting into online debates about it will change. Biden is the nominee. He's better than Trump, even if I think he's not great. Accepting this shitty situation is going to do one singular thing for me: keep me alive.
I cannot speak for anyone else, but I struggle with control. I think that's a pretty human thing to do, for one, but growing up with a narcissistic and abusive parent means I had NOTHING in my control as a child. Nothing was my choice. Nothing. Everything was about my mother. When I first had choices in my grasp, I didn't know how to make them on my own. I'd not only never been taught how, but I'd never been allowed to do so.
So I struggle with making decisions, but I also hoard control like it's made of oxygen, like it will literally keep me alive. Those small things in my power, they are MINE and I don't let anyone take them from me.
 |
| Me trying to control the things I can't control |
And the world right now? Absolutely fucking out of control. Our jobs, our government, our very lives are out of our hands (to an extent, but don't make me rabbit hole again). THIS IS VERY HARD FOR ME. But but but also? Also? Accepting that can be liberating.
My therapist taught me a very simple task: write down the things our of your control and literally throw the paper away. So simple, but so symbolic. It's out of my hands and set I throw that away. That doesn't mean I won't grieve or be angry or stop worrying or whatever; it means I accept I cannot control it.
This is also why, I think, I find chaos more comforting than destiny or religion. There's no higher being or higher purpose pulling the strings: shit happens and I have to navigate it. Sometimes that shit is choosing between two rapists, but at least the cards aren't already dealt, at least some things are up to me still.
Does that make sense?
It's not checking out. It's not disengaging. It's just focusing on what I can control so I don't spin out about what I can't.
I'm not perfect at it. It takes active, ongoing effort, but it does help. I have good days and bad days. It's going to keep happening like that. It's going to be the least fun roller coaster ever. Even though I didn't pay for this ride, I didn't get in the line, I didn't strap myself in, I'm on this ride regardless. I might throw up a little, but I can do my best to hang on tight and try to survive it.
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