Goddamn I am depressed today.
Exhibit A: I’m telling you this.
Work is “teh sukc”, as the kids say. The whole week’s been a reminder of how little they regard me and how little they need me. There were times in my job here where I said “if I left, it’d be a real problem for them,” but not now. I’m pretty sure they’d barely notice, as far as work scheduling goes. I’m a problem solver by nature, and work’s just giving me nothing. And even my fallback position, “invent projects for myself and improve things on my own,” is getting nowhere, because each time I try to get something done I get resistance from other people, and I have no authority to actually tell people to do things. So I’m feeling pretty goddamn useless right about now.
So, blah, I’m now in a position where I’m wholly working for the money, which I used to say I wouldn’t do, but here I am. And the way I feel now, I have no interest or ability to try to explain to someone else (e.g., interviewer) why I’m worth hiring, so I’m pretty much stuck. And it’s dragging me down something awful.
But, aside from wallowing, I wanted to post about this because I’ve learned something over the years that may help others who got depression. When I mentioned it to my therapist, she took a note to pass it on to other people, so I figure maybe I thought up something good.
Anyway, it’s this: don’t let depression depress you. I used to feel bad about being depressed, or I’d figure there’s more going on that’s making me depressed that I don’t even know about and go looking for other things that could be wrong (and usually make things worse), or feel generally inferior for being depressed. Or I’d realize I wasn’t doing anything to improve my situation, and “if you’re so depressed, why don’t you do something to fix it?” but I’m just in no state to do so, but given I’m generally a troubleshooter I’d feel like a failure for not fixing my problem. Which would be additionally depressing.
But now, I mean—I really feel like shit. My limbs are weak, I don’t even feel like sitting up, I honestly wanna find a dark corner and curl up on the floor. But at the same time, I’m like, so the fuck what. It’s just a mood, it’ll pass. No, I’m not being productive about myself right now, but screw it, I’m just not in a mood to do it. Eventually, my core goofiness will kick back in and I’ll work something out and be fine, but for now, I just gotta accept it and ride it out.
At that point, depression gets relegated to the level of, say, you wake up and your knee really hurts. You limp around for the whole day, and it’s painful and annoying and makes everything you do more difficult, but eventually it’ll pass and you’ll be fine. That’s kind of how I approach my depression these days: I woke up with a hurt in my brain, but I know that in a couple days it’ll smooth out. Even when I’m in the depths of my grandest mope, coming to understand this has provided me some real perspective and comfort.
