#Depression knocks me on my ass!

It still surprises me that after all these years battling depression, it can still knock me on my ass! It’s frustrating and exhausting. But, it shouldn’t be surprising. Not really. Dealing with depression symptoms – something I’ve done for almost 20 years – is like playing the same crappy computer game over and over, and there are bugs in the program that put you in a seemingly endless loop.

In the grand scheme of things, my depression is managed. It never goes away, though. Symptoms come and go on the regular; some times they’re worse than other times – like now. I’ve spent the day doing practically nothing save for plenty of negative self-talk:

“You’re a fake!”

“You’re lazy!”

“Just get UP and DO some-thing… ANY-thing!”

“Stop staring at nothing!”

“You should go for a walk.”

“You should be grateful for your life!”

… and so on.

Worse yet, I hear my negative self-talk, know what it is and have coping skills to deal with it – but I don’t use them. I mean, what IS that? THAT, is a symptom of the depression. When you know all the things that help to alleviate it but you can’t bring yourself to do them!

This isn’t one of those blog post that will have a meaningful conclusion other than to perhaps say – “Hey, it’s okay to have these bad days. If this is all you can manage, then this is all you can manage and it’s okay. You have an illness and sometimes it’s hard to get through the day. Let go of your guilt. Tomorrow is a new day.”

Wait – I guess that was the meaningful conclusion. And if you’re still reading this, know – like I do – that you’re not alone.