It is one of those common knowledge things, that today is the most depressing day of the year. Cold weather, post christmas feelings and so on go on to support this idea.
My problem is, most mondays are blue. I have suffered with depression nearing 3 years. It’s not been easy, some days are harder than others and from conversations I’ve had and thoughts that I’ve been having, I’m not sure that the good days are good enough. When I set up this blog, my main intention was to just talk geeky stuff, but I have struggled putting stuff on here, since without the formats I have used in the past, have found the posts hard to write. So why not just write how I’m feeling and more of the stuff that happens to me. This would seem to do the greatest good for me and to be honest, no one is reading this blog anyway.
How this feels is there is a voice in my head that is constantly berating me and calling into question my worth and the pointlessness of life. It’s hard sometimes to get out of bed, to care about my appearance, or even wonder why it’s worth even trying to sort myself out. I have been crushed under anxiety, low self esteem and melancholy for so long, I just assumed this was me, that this was the guy I am. I was then reminded by my wife, that my view of self, isn’t entirely accurate, like most egos, it is a construct, created by me that is as false as any image pushed on me. It’s sobering to realise that 40 is coming up and you have no idea who you really are.
Depression and anxiety are like a tunnel, the problem is, anxiety makes you afraid to move forward, while depression wants you to stay still, because there’s no way out of this tunnel and even when it looks like there is, it’s not where you think it is. Some days you feel better and you think you’re out, other days, you feel that you will never get out, that this is just who you are now, but it isn’t. Sometimes the only way to know the end of the tunnel is there, is if someone who believes in you, tells you it’s there. I have such a person, but I know that right now, I don’t deserve her.
Time to get myself into gear and sort some stuff out, I realise that writing, just writing anything means more to me than I had first realised, so this’ll continue. It’s a hard thing to realise how trapped you are in your own head and how much this effects those around you. I can be toxic to the people in my life without ever realising, so now I realise it’s time to start putting the effort in and working at all this. I am worth fixing, I am worth being made better and above all, the people who love me, who know me, they deserve a better version of me in their lives. For them, for me, I have to do more, do better. I will always suffer from depression, this will always be a part of me, but it no longer has to own me as it looks like it has for the last two years.
If anyone reads these ramblings, look after the people in your life, mental illness affects so many more of us than we think and it’s a battle that we are always waging alone. Sometimes a kind word and someone taking an interest is more than it seems. Living alone with all this in your head is hard, because it’s like a broken bone, but no one sees the cast, no one knows the crutches are there and few take it seriously. I was always afraid of losing my mind, but the reality is much more frightening.
But to end this on a positive, I have it on good authority, that I’m the best daddy. I have more than one person who believes in me, just the other one’s a little on the small side.
A Munky on Merseyside 
Reblogged this on Standing Guard and commented:
Should start cross pollinating these posts to get them more out there
great post.