It sucks not having the energy to do the dishes, or mop the kitchen floor. Or wash my hair. It's a burden to wake up in the morning and feel like icy boulders have made a home on your legs and chest, making it impossible to move. It's heartbreaking to look over at your sweet beloved who is still asleep and have to try and explain to him why today you won't be able to do the laundry. The guilt compares to carbon dioxide, slowly suffocating you, as you seek a respite in a your 5th rem cycle of the last 24 hours.
I fucking hate depression. I hate it. I have secretly wished for cancer, or some other debilitating disease, where there is more empathy or support. Less shame. More hand holding. More acceptance. More love.
So many people aren't kind to the mental illness card you are dealt. Shit, I am not even kind to myself a lot of the time. Every possible hateful look, feedback, or judgmental look I have received from friends, family, and colleagues during my 25 year fight with this floods my mind when I feel one of these overwhelmingly paralyzing bouts hitting:
- You're fucking lazy
- You are a liar
- You are dramatic
- Get over it
- Stop bitching
- Boo-hoo, you can't do the dishes. Big deal, I can't . . .
- People have to work harder than you to make ends meet and you can't even get out of bed
- You are a waste of a human
- You're victimize yourself
- I have it worse than you, Claudia
- You're crazy
- EYE ROLL, EYE ROLL, EYE ROLL
I am so tired of this life.
Please don't get me wrong. I have absolutely NO intent of harming myself or anything similar to that. I am just tired of these cards. Of this cycle. Of having so many dreams and goals and they being halted because I couldn't meet with a client, or because I didn't go to a gym class and wasted the money, or because I cancelled on dinner with a friend for the 10th time, or because the overwhelming waves hit me from the back, knocking the air and jovial outlook right out of me. Because I feel like I have wasted my life away on dreaming, and do not have it in me to accomplish my goals.
I'm tired of hating myself. Of looking in the mirror and judging the shit out of the girl looking back.
I want to be "normal" and wake up at 9am and have coffee and read the news. I want to do laundry because I want to feel productive, not because I am one day away from wearing my bathing suit bottom and/or my prom dress. I want to clean my apartment because it's awesome coming in to a house that smells like pinesol and Clorox, not because I am hosting a dinner for friends and need to keep a facade of "I have it all figured out".
I want to go to the gym because I know it will help, not because I want to look good in some dress I wore 8 years ago.
When somebody asks me what's wrong, I want desperately, DESPERATELY, to have an answer. And most of the time, I don't. It's just because I have a chemical imbalance in my fucking brain. It's because my serotonin has the attention span of a kitten. It's because these were the fucking cards I was dealt.
I often think what my life would be like if I didn't have depression. And it hurts tremendously. I feel like I would be super successful in my career. I feel like less people would be disappointed in me. I feel like I would be a better daughter, wife, friend. Maybe I would have written that book, launched that talk show, bought my mom that house. Maybe I wouldn't have settled for the absolute shitty female friends I have tolerated my whole life. I would have told them to fuck off a lot sooner, and would have stood up for myself a lot more. Maybe . .
Maybe
Maybe
Maybe
Maybe
The Maybe rabbit hole. One I am very well acclimated with.
Guys, I truly love my life and, despite the challenge of a mental illness, I am proud of what I have done. But not this week. Not in the last 2 weeks. I'll be better soon. Right now, I am just simply tired of it.
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