Anxiety/Depression

“You seem better since the pioneer trek.” My sister said. I was surprised to hear it, because I hadn’t realized the shift was visible from the outside. Possibly my sister is particularly attuned and able to discern how I’m doing. Yet I can see dozens of things each day which are easier now than they were before. Some of this is because I don’t think that anything else this summer has to offer will be as difficult as the trek. Some of it is because I’ve started taking medication for depression/anxiety.

Today and yesterday weren’t great days. Nothing bad happened in them, but I found it difficult to get things done because in order to engage with tasks I had to push through a cloud of thoughts. Most of them were about how I’m not good at [task], how I’d fail at [task], why [life thing] will only get harder, and how much work needs to be done. For several weeks I’ve not had that fog of negative thoughts. Before that it was thick, dark, and constant. What I don’t have today is the pervasive fear that causes me to over react to small things. When Patch begins to ratchet up in anxiety because something is wrong in his world, I’m able to observe and offer calm guidance. This is in contrast to me crashing into tears because I’m afraid his anxiety is evidence that nothing we’ve done has helped or will ever help. “Doomed forever” is not a very comforting world view and it landed on me a lot.

Naturally part of the brain fog is the thought “see, even medicine won’t help.” Which is a ridiculous thought, because even though I’m having a slog-through-it day, I’m not crying. Since starting medication I’ve had entire weeks without crying in them. I’d stopped believing it was possible to have non-crying weeks. Today’s ambient mood has more to do with some conversations I had in the past few days. The conversations churned up some feelings and thoughts. They reminded me that while things are better, our family still has emotional work to do, and most of that work is outside my direct control. I can encourage my kids to grow, I can’t make them. Even with the emotional churn, the conversations were good to have. They are part of the emotional work that must be done. Also affecting my emotions is the fact that my two daughters are off in California to visit grandparents. I know they’re safe and having good experiences, but the portion of my brain that tracks the status of my children keeps pinging me to tell me that a couple have fallen off the radar. That raises the ambient tension level in my brain.

Despite the brain fog I’ve managed to get quite a bit accomplished today. I focus on one thing at a time and work my way through. And every time a portion of my brain begins to fret about the next thing or things of next month, I reign it back in. One thing at a time is plenty. Or at least a way to get the necessary work done. The trouble is that I need to figure out how to sort and banish the fog. That’s about as easy as it sounds. I’m not even sure where to begin, except to keep taking the medicine for a while, and to feel grief when it occurs rather than to shunt it aside for later. Maybe one thing at a time will gradually make the fog disperse. For this week, I’m preparing for GenCon.

“How are you today?” She asked.
“Good.” I answered.
The exchange went by so quickly that I almost didn’t notice it. Except some part of my brain sat up and said “Did you just answer ‘good’ without thinking about it?” Yes I had. Which is strange because for months the casual “How are you?” greetings had been very fraught for me. Particularly if the greeting is uttered by someone with whom I have a relationship and to whom I owe truth. The other person really isn’t wanting to open up a big discussion about where I am emotionally. I knew that. And the grocery store or church hallways were not good places for me to open my heart and speak all my fears. Yet for a long time “fine” was a lie. I was not fine. I was struggling with all sorts of overwhelming emotions or I had my emotions clamped down so that they would not spill everywhere. Sometimes I said the lie. Other times I said “I’m here.” It was a tacit acknowledgement that sometimes just showing up is a triumph of sorts. Though usually the other person didn’t quite know what to make of my answer.

But today I answered “good” without thinking about it. And I was telling the truth. Sometimes it is the smallest of details where I can see how things are getting better.

Every summer we get the public service articles and news casts. “Drowning doesn’t look like drowning!” they tell everyone. And they’re right. Most drownings aren’t made of splashing and screaming. Someone just quietly vanishes into the depths, unable to bring themselves back to the surface where they can breathe. People drown because they’re out of their depth. Because they get too tired. Because once drowning begins, the rational portions of the brain get over ruled by instinctive panic.

Depression is like that too. On the really bad days, people just vanish. I know that my hardest days have me pulling inward, not reaching out. “Get help” everyone says to depressed people, but help is hard to summon if you’re already underwater.

Trial and error is an astonishingly bad way to treat an illness. Unfortunately for many bodily ills, it is all we have. I ran up against this when I had my tumor almost twenty years ago. “Let’s try surgical removal.” the doctors said, only they used many more polysyllabic words. When the tumor came back I was not thrilled to hear “Let’s try surgical removal AND radiation therapy.” It was a relief to talk to the oncologist who walked me through case studies and evidence. He showed me “We know what this is. We can’t guarantee that radiation will work, but it is your best chance.” I took that chance. It was miserable. The emotional after effects took a decade to shake. Yet it worked. I have to remember that in the middle of the process it felt like the doctors were just stabbing away in the dark.

“Have you tried therapy?” “Let’s try this medicine.” “That side effect is unfortunate, let’s try a different medicine instead.” “Well, you have to find the RIGHT therapist. Sometimes it takes a couple of tries.” At first seeking help for mental illness is a hopeful experience. sort of. I don’t know anyone who gets to see a mental health professional before they’re exhausted from managing their issues. You finally get in to see a doctor and that is a triumph. He’s an expert. He’ll know what to do. Then at some point you realize that even the doctors are stabbing in the dark, trying to figure out what will work. They just have a bigger wealth of knowledge and experience. But it is general knowledge, not specific. You have to be the expert on you or on your loved one.

The doctor hands you a flotation device, but you still have to swim to shore. The therapist teaches you how to use your arms and legs effectively, but you still have to swim to shore. Your loved ones want to show up in a boat and rescue you. But this is where the metaphor falls apart a little, because depression doesn’t give you a choice about whether or not you end up in the deep water. Learning to swim is imperative, because sometimes the friends and relatives don’t notice when the drowning happens. They can’t watch all the time. The only way out of the water is to swim. It is hard to watch someone who won’t swim and resists learning.

Lately my life feels like waterworld, no land to be seen, just swimming forever. It doesn’t help when trial and error brings me to a therapist who might be able to help my son if given enough time, but then life events mean that the therapist has to stop being a therapist. I thought we were at a point where we could just keep swimming (Swimming, swimming Dory’s voice sings in my head.) Instead I have decisions to make. Do I continue to use the grad student program and risk another therapist bailing on us? Do I venture out and try to find a different clinic? Do we let it rest for a while and see what the summer brings? I can’t even tell if therapy was accomplishing anything other than to give us a mandatory appointment each week. I’m quite tired of appointments. It also doesn’t help that we’re in a process of switching or adjusting medicines for two kids. I have to second guess all of my decisions.

So when the therapist tells me his news and asks what I’d like to do, I don’t have an answer. Just the soft feel of water closing over my head. Drowning is silent and it doesn’t look like drowning. I don’t stay under water because I learned how to swim long ago. I don’t even know why so small a piece in the ongoing treatment dumps me so deep in the water. I just have to follow my training: Find the surface. Float face up until you have strength to swim. Then start swimming in the direction of the shore. I can’t actually see the shore, but all rational measures tell me it is out there. And I have to remember that only a day or two ago I was out of the water. So were my loved ones. Many of the days are good and even on my worst days I can think of a dozen people with whom I would not trade troubles.

So on the swimming days, I’ll keep swimming. And I’ll excuse myself from some of the expectations. And maybe I’ll go watch Finding Nemo and let Dory sing to me.

This post was written four days ago. On that day I didn’t have the emotional resources to publish it. Today I can. I think the biggest difference is that the Planet Mercenary kickstarter is now closed. Even subtracting one of the list items has made that much difference. We’ll see what further difference is made when “interface with school systems and administration” is taken off my task list for the summer. For now, the words I wrote four days ago:

I am having a problem with blogging. This is may have been apparent to some who have noted that my posts have gone from almost every day to about two per week. When I do write, it is shorter and less full than what I used to write. I spent some time today listing the things which are making blogging more difficult. This is what I came up with.

1. I’m depressed. Yes, right now, this very minute. It may not be obvious in my online interactions or even during in-person interactions. I’m getting things done, filling social obligations, and going to all the places that I’m supposed to be. Only, if you look closer, I’m not. I’ve dropped out of things. I’ve canceled things. I let slide things that I would not let go if I had more focus and energy. My twelve year old has not done homework in weeks and that is squarely on my shoulders. (Yes his homework should be his job, but he’s more depressed and anxious than I am, which is part of the problem.) I keep doing the things which must be done in order to keep our family and business running. This includes doing some deliberate things to take care of me, because I recognize that if I break, everything will fall apart. But I’ve abandoned most of my creative efforts. I don’t feel like anything ME is worthwhile. I’m not writing fiction. I’m barely blogging. And every time I write anything I wonder why I even bother since none of it matters to anyone but me. Please note, I’m not saying this to ask for affirmation. I’m saying it because that train of thinking is a huge marker of depression. If you feel those things about yourself and your creativity, please consider that you might also be depressed. I hear that exact refrain from my depressed seventeen year old. And I tell him he’s wrong. He does matter. It will get better. He doesn’t believe me. He can’t. But he keeps going to please me. And I keep him moving in the hope that something we do will make a difference. And maybe if he is less depressed and if my other son is less anxious, then I might feel better. I’m having trouble believing that much of what I do makes any difference at all, but I keep doing things because logic tells me that actions make a difference. But all of that makes finding words more complicated.

2. I don’t want to be a burden. I’m aware that this miasma which surrounds my thinking is burdensome. I’m very aware that my bleakness comes out in my posts. I know that if I wrote post after post about depression, anxiety, parenting, stress, then it would be too much. People would go away. And they would have every right to do so. I don’t want to be that person who is always in crisis and who is frustrating to try to help because nothing ever gets better. And most days lately I have trouble believing it will get better. Logically I can see that things won’t be hard forever, but logic and emotions are barely on speaking terms inside my brain.

3. The Kickstarter. During the push for funding I want to be putting positive energy out in the world. I want to be expressing confidence in the project. I want to spill gratitude for the trust we’ve received. I want to share my excitement for everything we get to do. I really feel all of these things, but only in short bursts. And on any given day those emotions are hard to find in my brain. Instead my brain fills with the parts of running a Kickstarter that are hard. I am drained by the steady stream of interactions via email, Kickstarter message, Kickstarter comment, facebook comment, facebook message, twitter post, and any other internet-based communication method people can think up. People are happy about the project. They have a question. They have a request. Each person is owed a sliver of my time and attention. They are supporting our project, the very least I can do is spend a few minutes crafting a reply using my professional, competent, grateful, excited voice. Then there is the need for me to write my own excited tweets. I need to participate in spreading the word. All of this is part of my job as part of the Planet Mercenary promotional team. It is wonderful and it is exhausting. Lots of my writing has gone into email rather than blogging. I’m very aware of the dissonance if I’m attempting to put out positive energy around the Kickstarter via social media and then I’m blogging about how hard and depressing things have been inside my head. Blogging about depression derails the narrative surrounding the Kickstarter. It is bad marketing. Yet my blog should be mine. It should not be subverted into a marketing presence. I should feel free to write my thoughts. Round and round go the arguments. In the end I don’t write, because I can’t resolve the arguments before I’m too worn out.

4. Some stories aren’t mine to tell. There are a lot of emotional and therapeutic things going on inside the walls of my house. Exposing them to view might destroy some of them. Yet the various progress and regress are consuming much of my mind. I’m monitoring things, deciding what path to take, and weathering my own reactions to all of it. This takes up large portions of my problem solving and creative brain. Much of it would make fascinating blog posts, but I can’t write them now. Maybe later. And there is a distinct probability that if I can get my own depression to lift, I’ll have a clearer view of what I can and can’t write about. Yet in the meantime all these thoughts take up space in my brain like emotional clutter.

5. I don’t have enough quiet spaces. There are people in my house all the time. Most days I only have about thirty minutes between the time when my (anxious) twelve year old leaves for school and my (depressed) seventeen year old gets home. Sometimes I get an hour. For the rest of my work day I have to decide between doing something educational / therapeutic for my child or getting work done. We have at least two appointments per week, sometimes more. Lately a lot more. I’m also making appointments for myself, requiring me to get out of the house and spend time with friends. All of this chops my days into pieces. My work has to fit around all of these things. There never seems to be time to clear away all of the parent obligations and all of the business obligations at the same time. When I do manage to ignore all the other things, I dive into something restful (like watching a show) instead of something that would pull more effort and focus from me. I haven’t tried setting an appointment for creative time. I haven’t wanted to. It is hard to care enough for me to make that appointment with myself and right now I’d be unlikely to keep it.

6. I have too many jobs. Right now I’m managing customer support for The Out of Excuses Retreat, Our Schlock Store, and the Planet Mercenary kickstater. I’m supposed to be setting up the back end for the post kickstarter pledge system. I should be working on design. I’m managing mental health care for multiple children who are in various stages of meltdown. I’m interfacing with school systems and administration whose expectations need to be adjusted because of the meltdowns. I’m in the final stages of construction in my house as the carpet gets installed soon and then I can finally put all the things away. I should be doing accounting regularly and crunching numbers for things that happen post-funding. I’m teaching for my son who is working on school things from home. I also have to ship regular orders from our online store. Then there is the regular parenting tasks, enforcing bedtime, providing dinner, checking in with kids, driving to lessons, etc. Each of these tasks eats a portion of my brain space. Often I’m having to choose which thing to fail at. Having Kiki home has helped with some of this, but there is a huge backlog and things continue to accumulate daily. Every minute I’m aware of all the things I should be doing, but am not doing right at that minute. This awareness takes up the space where writing thoughts form.

The good news is that when some of these things clear up, it is very likely that writing will flow back into my life. That has happened to me before. It is the reason I’m okay with letting writing languish right now. Something has to slide, and I know that writing will wait for me. Yet the consequence of not writing is a feeling of disconnection with my writing communities and, more importantly, a sense of disconnection with myself. Disconnection aggravates depression. I haven’t found a solution for that yet.

After note: The fact that I was even able to write up this post indicates that some of the fog was beginning to clear. Me being able to post this also is a sign of clearing. I’m not going to read too much into it. I’ll take one day at a time, because contemplating more than that is not what I need to be spending my brain on right now. What I do spend my brain on is noticing that the emotional experience of my day does not necessarily match up with the facts of my day. When people say depression lies, this is what they mean. It feels like I’m doomed and nothing will ever get better, but I can clearly see that in a very short time I’m expecting changes. This is why I keep going and doing all the things. Also because in between the hard things, I get to feel flashes of the joyful things. I do feel excited for the kickstarter stuff. I see how well my fourteen year old daughter is doing. I get to enjoy my kids all playing together with my college daughter and her roommate who is visiting for a week. I am extremely grateful that the depression I feel is not a pit of despair and it does not wipe out every happiness. I’m aware that my life is a very good one. Hopefully I’ll find a way to feel that more often.