"The Only Way Out is Through"

I’ve been struggling. I want to say for the last couple of weeks but, it’s been for more than a year now. I guess it may have spiked in the last couple of weeks. It does that – the depression – it’s there all the time just underneath the surface waiting for me to forget to take my medication or for something catastrophic to happen and send me reeling.

While I did take my medication this morning, it appears that I’ve missed several days, possibly four. I’m on Prozac and Wellbutrin. There was a time when my goal was to “get better” so I wouldn’t need to take the medication, but I’ve since come to realize that its the meds that help me get up in the morning. They help me care about what’s going on around me and they help me feel calm when I’m faced with chaotic or anxiety-producing situations. I even have a handy dandy little colour-coded pill keeper for every day of the week. There’s a morning box with a little sun symbol and an evening box with a little moon symbol so that I don’t get mixed up. (I have unrelated memory issues.)

I slept all day yesterday. All day. After sleeping all night. And then I slept all night last night until around noon today. This was probably due to extreme emotional stress coupled with insane heat and humidity. I don’t handle either of those well. I did have heat-related sickness yesterday. But.

But when I woke up today, I knew I wasn’t tired. I knew I wasn’t sick anymore. And I still wanted to stay in bed. Hide from the world. Disappear. I didn’t want to work. I didn’t want to go out. I didn’t want to visit anyone. I didn’t want to think or move or do anything at all. I know what this is because I’ve experienced it before, and I know that if I give in and I stay in bed and I hide from the world that it could last forever. I don’t want that. I know it will pass, so I need to work through it if I can, so as not to disrupt my life too much.

I got up. I took my medication and had breakfast. I had a shower.

This all sounds easy, but it wasn’t. I’m not sure that I can explain the kind of internal fight and determination it takes to do this when you’re in the middle of a depression. It’s like there are two energies inside me – the depressed one intent on staying stone still and the one with hope who will fight till the last breath. Usually, the depressed one is much stronger than the hopeful one, probably because he (I feel like the depression one is a ‘he’) is an expert at overshadowing the light of the hopeful one, who is definitely a ‘she.’ In any case, today her light had just enough of a spark to keep me putting one foot in front of the other.

When I left my apartment, my plan was to go to my mother’s house where nobody was home so I could work. (I’m a bit behind in my writing for work this week.)

I didn’t make it there, at least not right away. I was driving and thinking about this week, the days past and those in front of me and I remembered that the only way out is through. I needed to speak with my former boss about a project and I was feeling a lot of anxiety about it, so I’d been putting it off since Monday. I decided to go see her. She wasn’t there, but several friends were there, and they greeted me with so much warmth and kindness. If we weren’t in the middle of a pandemic, I would have hugged them all!

The weird thing is that I did something I almost never do, something I haven’t done before – I told them I was experiencing a depression today while I’m still in the depression. (I usually don’t admit to these things until I feel well and good and in the clear.) I admitted that I’m not at my best, that I’ve been depressed, that I’m overly anxious, and just feeling ‘off.’ I have another meeting tomorrow morning with people I know and there is no reason whatsoever that I should be anxious, but I am. Like MASSIVELY anxious. It SUCKS! (It’s hours later and I’m still anxious and I’ve gone above and beyond to be prepared. It’s nutty and it’s frustrating.) Anyway. (Yes, I say that a lot.) Anyway.

I chatted with a few of my friends. I made plans to meet with one of them next week. And I’m not sure how this happened, but I think I agreed to start volunteering. I was feeling a bit better.

I relayed the message I had for my former boss. All will hopefully be good for everyone.

I got in my car, which I can only drive when I’m not super tired, and I tried to decide whether to go to my mom’s house or drive to Kemptville for Starbucks. Just because. You see, I have an addiction for the green tea Frappuccino with soy milk – no whip and only half the Matcha, please. Starbucks won out. I ordered my drink, along with a meatless sandwich and a croissant. Then I sat it my car facing shrubs, trees, and wildflowers and I finished listening to an Against the Grain podcast.

At this point, it was getting late, so I thought about just going straight home, but I didn’t. I drove for a while and then I decided to go to my mom’s house. I still needed to pick up some more of my things. I had been living there for exactly 13 months on Monday. I’m in the process of moving my things – mostly books, a LOT of books – back to my apartment. Anyway. I stopped at my mom’s.

The first thing I did was go to Scoobie’s grave. Scoobie is my mom’s cat. He was euthanized on Monday and then my sister and I buried him. There’s a beautiful flowering tree marking his grave. I knelt by the tree, and I cried, and I talked, and I listened. He didn’t speak to me. (Obviously.) But I felt a little better. Not much. I loved that damn cat. He was mean and cranky and just an overall bossy little booger head, but I loved him. He was loving with me. He was sweet with me. He followed me around. He chatted. He listened. And now he’s gone.

I pulled myself together and went into the house to pack up some more books. I loaded my car with my books and some plants and my favourite pillow. Then I drove back to my apartment where my two cats and my roommate’s cat live.

I’m surrounded by three furry lovebugs and they help. A lot. Salem is extraordinarily helpful. One hug from him and it feels like all the yuck is being pulled out and disintegrated. I think he’s a healer. He seems to sense when I need a hug the most and he’s always there. Meara is still a bit standoffish because she hasn’t quite forgiven me yet for leaving her for an entire year, but she will. Eventually. She and I were two peas in a pod before I left, and I know we will be again. Lia, my roommate’s cat, is elderly and not at all well, but she still makes me feel like she’s glad I’m home. (Not when I’m administering pain medication for her osteoarthritis. In those moments, I’m sure she’d rip my face off if she could.)

Tonight, I’ve hung out with my roommate for a bit. (He’s now off to work.) And I chatted via text or messenger with some friends. I did some actual work. I’ve flicked the same scary looking spider off my arm of the couch twice in the last half hour without losing my shit. I think Meara is hunting it down as I write this… she’s a pro at catching and eating spiders and bugs. She can catch almost anything, so she’s not allowed out of the house unsupervised. (I don’t want to feed into her serial killer tendencies.)

And now the night is coming to an end because I must get up early. I must get up early so I can make it to an appointment on time. I need to be on time, and I need to be able to converse, which I can’t do well if I haven’t slept enough. (This impediment is an unrelated condition, but it does cause stress.) I have several meetings tomorrow. I need to be rested and ready. I need to be NOT depressed. I don’t know if I can make that last one happen. But I’m going to try.

I’m going to keep doing the things I know that work. Like getting up. Taking my medications on a regular basis. Showering. Eating. Going outside. Interacting with positive people. Writing. Meditating. Praying. Learning new things by reading a wide variety of topics, listening to podcasts, and watching documentaries. I’m going to continue putting one foot in front of the other until I make it through because, as Goethe said, the only way out is through.

(By the way, that quote has gotten me through an awful lot since I first came across it in my early 20s. Before that – and sometimes even still – I would do everything that I could to find a way AROUND a challenge, not realizing that I was simply extending the pain because the only way out was to face the challenge head on and journey through it. And I’m sure you know what “they” say – in the end, it’s the journey that matters, not the destination.)