Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about the time a high school classmate told me, “That’s because you’re always miserable.”
I contradicted her statement, stating that I’m actually a reasonably happy guy. I thought it then, and I think it now. How do I reconcile saying I’m happy, with being clinically depressed?
Easy, I’m not sad (miserable), I’m depressed. Hell, I wish I were sad, dealing with sadness is a piece of fucking cake compared to depression.
Sadness is an emotion. Depression is a medical condition.
It’s actually really hard to explain, because (as I’ve said before), if you get it, you get it. If you don’t, you don’t.
If you haven’t felt the despair, the helplessness, the hopelessness, the cloying, clinging grey mist holding you back, holding you down, then lucky for you. Really. Because you don’t get it.
I’ve spent the last two weeks fighting through this shit, and just when I think I’m through, another wisp of the mist grabs me, and I lose another day.
I spent the weekend cleaning and gardening. I shaved my head and cleaned up my beard. Hell, I even showered. I spent both Friday and Saturday night smoking cigars and shooting the shit with a friend who gets it.
The whole weekend I was happy.
Except, in the moments I stopped moving, the grey mist was still there. I was hungry, but had no appetite. I was busy, but had no motivation. I was telling awesome, fun stories about my kids, and wanted to die.
I was happy, yet at the same time, depressed.
It’s the contradiction at the heart of my existence.
