SusanofO
Posts: 5672
Joined: 12/19/2005
Status: offline
|
I can get philosophical about this topic because I've read books that state that we ourselves planned the "difficulties" in our own lives before we decided to be born and that we would not have done it if it was going to be impossible to deal with.
This really heartened me when I read that, regardless of whether it is true, because when my first severe depression hit (I was 18) it was incapacitating. I am pretty bright, but suddenly the only way I could get through my college classes was by taking copious notes because my memory just wasn't working - I could remember almost nothing I read for very long. I also had no appetite and no interest in doing anything; everything was a supreme effort, even the simplest things. All of the color was gone from life. I became a consummate actress and smiled all the time - as far as I could tell, nobody guessed (except people who already knew) just what I really felt like. It is neither here nor there, but it is genetic; there's this thing that runs in my dad's family that has been happening for eons. He felt like he had ruined my life when this all started, but it was not his fault this happened (he's my dad, how could I ever blame him)?
At the time, the medications on the market had terrible side effects that no longer are really a problem today (weight gain, really bad dry mouth, zero sex drive) and I must have tried 10 different ones. It just didn't seem to end - I'd start feeling better for months and them - Wham! it would hit me again for no apparent reason. I was horribly self-conscious about it and didn't date anyone until I was a senior because I was afraid guys would think I was weird, somehow. I dated a really nice guy for 3 years starting my senior year, but he moved to California to go to law school, and we drifted apart.
The ups and downs went on for years (6 to be exact). I just kept hanging in there. My mother wanted me to drop out of college and go to a two year vocational school or a commercial art school, because she hated to see me suffering, but my father wouldn't let me drop out - he really encouraged me and told me just to stay there. He thought a bachelor's degree was important to have.
So I stayed in, and graduated Magna Cum Laude, and got the highest paid job in my graduating class in the business college (in a class of over 800). I also was the very first intern in the intenship program. I never told a soul (including any of my teachers) that I was on any kind of medication or had seen doctors about it - I was afraid of what they would think. My mother also told me not to tell anyone (she had "issues" with it I guess). Of course some of my friends knew, but it wasn't something I ever felt good about discussing. To this day I am not quite sure why the severity if what I was feeling seemed to lessen, but I am very glad it did.
I am convinced that was supposed to happen to me for some reason and to this day I am not sure what it is. This happened way before anyone talked about this kind of stuff on talk shows. I do have a lot more sympathy for people who experience severe sadness, for whatever reason - and just hate it when I hear people say things to them like:"Buck up" if they are seriously depressed (not helpful). Also, even if my husband didn't want children and couldn't give them to me, I would not have wanted to pass on these genes. I wouldn't wish that experience on my worst enemy. Adoption was always my only option.
I am not sure I ever "came back" from having had that experience. It profoundly changed my life and my outlook. I don't take as much for granted as I did when I was young. I am thankful for little things more than I was before that happened;
I can remember being grateful for just being able to drag myself out of bed. It is good for me to remind myself just how bad things once were, when and if I start wishing things would happen for me faster, or wish i was Angelina Jolie instead of who I am, etc.(because I know everyone probably has days they wish they had somebody else's life).
I am also really really glad it's over (and has been, for a long time). But I think there are things that happen that change you forever - but they don't have to make life unliveable - even though it might seem that way at the time - and I know it can really seem that way and it really stinks (my opinion only). Hang in there (whatever it is), puella. Tommorrow really is another day - it might not be better, but sooner or later, something will make it get better (promise).
-Susan
< Message edited by SusanofO -- 7/4/2006 2:29:14 AM >
_____________________________
"Hope is the thing with feathers,
That perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all". - Emily Dickinson
|
Plumbing the Depths - 
Profile
New Messages
No New Messages
Hot Topic w/ New Messages
Hot Topic w/o New Messages
Locked w/ New Messages
Locked w/o New Messages
Post New Thread