Depression is..
faces of illness
10th February 2020, Punta Del Diablo, Uruguay
(excerpt from journal)
The suffering of depression can’t be fully described to anyone who hasn’t experienced it firsthand.
Depression is:
Inexplicable feeling that nothing good will ever happen to you again
Lack of possibility to feel happiness
Panic attacks when you feel the greatest terror you can imagine, multiplied by 100x, and the feeling that “it will remain like this forever”
Detachment from reality, moments when you don’t know if you’re dreaming, this is for real, or it’s a nightmare that you’re trying to wake up from
Sitting at home all day, sleeping half of the time
Addictions raising in force
Lying to everyone around you, especially yourself
Loss of pleasure in doing all the things that used to bring you joy
Recommended soundtrack: Mathame - Nothing Around Us
Loneliness
No hope that things will ever be different
Growing guilt for who you are becoming
Shame
Despair and hurting your closest ones
Total loss of self-esteem
Attempt to cheat every day so that you don’t have to do anything, lying about plans, eternal procrastination of tasks which pile up causing even greater anxiety
Guilt
Self-hatred
Losing precious moments, moments that will never happen again to sadness
Drugs, alcohol, parties in search of temporary happiness, even if it’s pharmacological
Path towards addiction
Screwing up at work
Impossibility to tell your close ones how you are doing
Lying to yourself
Dirty house
Health problems, weight gain, loss of fitness
No desire for sex
Inability to feel love
Indifference to the love of others
Hurting yourself and others
Feeling of being a passenger on your life train
Loss of some relationships, deterioration of all
Galloping thoughts, an ever growing spiral of negative scenarios
Inability to enjoy the “little pleasures” in life
Urge to run away
Something you don’t want to admit to yourself
Something you notice way too late, downplay at the beginning
Something you are ashamed of in front of your friends
Inability to talk about what’s wrong with your relatives / friends / etc. Nobody understands it, you are given advice which is more or less like Depression Bingo meme - “go for a run”
Inability to plan
Pain of existence, Weltschmerz
Panic attacks when you act like a madman, and wonder if you aren’t one
Countdown of minutes until you you get back to your apartment, the only oasis where you feel relatively ok
Suicidal thoughts and death appearing as a not-so-stupid solution
Straining your significant other
Powerlessness of your loved one to help you, her despair that she cannot help you in any way
Deterioration of your wife's wellbeing. You know it's happening because of you. You would like to repair yourself, you’re thinking about it, but you feel absolutely powerless to take even the first step towards change
No idea how to take a good first step towards recovery
Combing the Internet in search of a solution, a diagnosis, only to become more confused once again, try some method, give up / no effect, and the feeling of despair & being a failure only deepens.
It helped 10751 people (as those shitty ads say) and not me? What’s wrong with me? I'm a piece of shit -> depression deepens)
Feeling that everyone around you is happy. Jealousy
Feeling that you are ruining other people's good times with your cloudy humor
Waking up in the morning panicked, with ruminating thoughts, recreating scenarios of how everything can go wrong this day, but also in life in general
Fear that it will always be this way
Going to your own bachelor party and not wanting to take part in it, not being able to have fun, ruining the fun of others with your behavior
Resurfacing of the worst of you, all your unwanted qualities, the demons
Mess in the house (Roman’s soup at the peak)
No pleasure in meeting friends
Loss of interest in anything
Wasting millions of hours on hopeless activities (e.g. I was watching Warsaw Shore...)
Blaming others for your suffering
Feeling of being a victim
Lack of self-confidence
Worst of all: Feeling that you don't deserve the privilege of suffering. The feeling of guilt attached to it
Indifference to everything that happens. Emotional burnout. This was probably the worst stage. This zombie state was HC. I felt nothing. Complete indifference
Suicidal thoughts
Shame
Avoiding your own reflection in the mirror
Bringing yourself into despair
Unbridled despair, tears from trivial reasons, and sometimes even without it
Hours spent shivering under the blanket
Feeling of being a failure, not living up to your expectations. Expectations of your closest ones.
Cheating your way out of meetings
Increased risk of putting yourself in dangerous situations
Lack of understanding, most painful from your closest ones
Listening to laughing at depression, and mental illness while suffering yourself
POWERLESSNESS
Meditating on the day “when everything will work out. Or at least be like it used to be"
Nostalgia for the old times. The good times.
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