Depression Ain't Pretty

I really shouldn't be writing here. I'm behind and under deadline. I've been working on a novel deadline for the past three to four weeks. Unfortunately, my chronic motor tic disorder has been inconvenient and robbed me of many productive days. Many, many, many.

Then family drama hit me on Friday like a busload of mines. I spent hours upon hours this weekend triaging feelings and putting hearts back in order. Now everybody's happy, but I've got six and a half hours to pull off a miracle.

Considering how hellish things have been lately, I'm not holding my breath for a bailout from God.

Which brings me back to here. I shouldn't be here. However, I dealt with a particularly crushing bout of Depression this weekend and I thought I'd share with you how I handled it with my iPhone and Twitter.

7:24pm Realized I was depressed and knew I needed to do something about it. I had a novel to write, parents coming over, and more family drama awaiting me. However, I was too depressed to think of anything, so I took a self-portrait of my face to see how bad things were. They were very bad:

7:28pm Depression isn't pretty. http://twitpic.com/4ygvq

7:29pm I need to go through the routine: Am I depressed? Yes. Do I have a reason to be depressed? Yes.

7:29pm Is the amount of sadness appropriate for the situation? Want to say "yes" so will. Is the Depression helping me resolve the situation? No.

7:30pm So what am I going to do about it? I need to move. Change my shirt. Brush my teeth. Wash my face. Clean the livingroom. See where I'm at.

7:40pm Better? I also smiled 100 times to offset the downward pull on my face. Depression is down from DEFCON 1 to level 2. http://twitpic.com/4ykk0

As you can see I am a long way from being happy, but I feel the difference between the two photos are stark. Don't let Depression defeat you. Fight it. I do, and will continue to do so for the rest of my life. Because of my efforts now I'm at DEFCON 3*. I feel I was able to handle the family drama much better because I made an effort to not let Depression crush me. They were superficial things that made a big difference because I made the effort to move and fight.

Find your own techniques, no matter how silly or trivial, that can pull you out of a slump. Depression doesn't have to rule our lives.

Now back to writing. Thanks for reading.


*DEFCON was a arbitrary rating I pulled out of a hat.







Like reading The Splintered Mind? Share articles with your friends, link from your blog, or subscribe!

---