I Can

I returned home a few days ago from the first overnight trip I've taken without my family since 2011. I've been making an effort to process my experience, but it finally occurred to me that writing it all out would likely be the way to make some real progress towards dealing with this mental and emotional overload. (Duh, Joy...) And so, once upon a time...

...there serendipitously arose a last-minute opportunity to attend a four-day, out-of-town workshop. The stars aligned (i.e. my husband heroically rearranged his schedule) and I was able to go.

It was, in a word, amazing. But holy intensity, Batman! Long days, late nights, tons of new information, big ideas, fresh perspectives - more than enough to boggle my mind. Even more overwhelming was the constant challenge to assimilate, to incorporate, to apply what was being presented. But I was alert, focused, interested, excited - looking forward with great hope and expectancy to what could be. I was on board!

In retrospect, maybe what I experienced on the third morning was not much of a surprise at all. At the time, however, it came as though out of the blue - wholly unanticipated.

The morning session began with a time of singing together. In the middle of the second song, the all-too-familiar thick cloud of depression wrapped itself around me, choking me. I couldn't sing another word - I had suddenly lost the ability to believe that the beautiful words of acceptance and love and grace and forgiveness applied to me. Simultaneously, being around people became utterly unbearable. Without a second thought or a word to anyone, I headed for the door.

I'm coming to see what depression means for me in terms of what it takes from me. It robs me of the capacity to believe truth. It renders me feeling-less, numb. And it severely limits the possibility of receiving help from people who love me, since it blocks my willingness to accept care - convinces me I'm not worthy of such.

I don't know what I hoped to accomplish by running away. I wasn't thinking rationally - it never occurred to me that my absence might be noticed and cause my group concern. But as I sat outside in the cold, crisp air, I began to observe myself as if I were someone else.

I noticed particularly that though there was beauty around me - ancient trees clothed in late-lingering leaves, blue sky and clouds creating gorgeous celestial artwork, fresh mountain air - it didn't penetrate into my soul. I saw that my surroundings were beautiful, but it failed to move me.

I'm not sure how long I sat there, staring at the cement staircase upon which I had landed. Eventually, I was discovered, reprimanded, loved on and returned to the workshop. In the far recesses of my mind, I felt the glimmerings of regret that I had caused my friends anxiety, but it was pretty dim. I was still moving in a fog at this point - the remainder of that session was completely lost on me. I felt powerless to re-engage.

Then came a coffee break, and the reckoning. I was pulled aside by my group leader. I heard the words being spoken to me - a wonderful, intricate blending of rebuke, encouragement, truth, care and challenge. I was able to respond, just barely. But a bit of anger and indignation was starting to cut through the fog. I hate being reprimanded. I do not do well with people telling me what to do.

But I did it. I think the initial motivation was to just smooth things over, to shift the focus elsewhere, to make it look like I was okay, to keep everyone from pouring on more care and concern. But that small step in the right direction, even for the wrong reasons, started an avalanche.

The activity immediately following all this was in a small group setting, with people I'd met only two days before - and all men at that. I had been strongly encouraged not only to attend but to engage. So I did. Maybe it was somehow easier to talk to strangers about it, but I ended up sharing some of my struggles. And the genuine outpouring of sympathy and concern and wisdom and knowledge and love I received from these big, tough, manly strangers broke through the fog and broke my heart - in a really good way.

After all the heart-felt prayers and cleansing tears, it was lunch time and down time - thanks be to God! I met my leader in the hallway, and the joy on his face as he beamed at me and exclaimed, "You did it!" was a lovely reward for the exhausting, soul-wringing work of confession and repentance. And after I apologized to my dear friends for shutting them out and rejecting their love and concern, it felt like the sun had just risen again.

Several questions have emerged from all this that will need to be examined at length (some other time!), but I'm taking one extremely encouraging and hope-giving truth from this incident: when I have help, I can overcome. In clinical terms, the duration of a depressive episode can be greatly diminished by outside intervention.

God, please help me remember this truth. Help me to have the courage to reach out, and the grace to receive Your love through those beautiful souls You've placed in my life. Amen!

Help?

Help -  I need somebody

Help - not just anybody

Help - you know I need someone

Help!

I have never been one to admit I might need some help, let alone reach out and actually ask for it. I've written before about my fierce independence from a very early age (here), and how it eventually dawned on me that community was God's idea and plan for us all in the first place.  

That was before this depression reared it's ugly head - or at least before I acknowledged it as such. I'm now finding myself in very unfamiliar and unwelcome territory. I need help.

I don't want to need help. I very badly want to be able to "get through this" on my own. I've tried to convince myself that with enough prayer, enough soul-searching, enough self-care and positive thinking, that I can deal with it. Alas, it's becoming clear to me that my own efforts are insufficient.

I think there are several issues that are contributing to this feeling, and I wanted to sort through them so that I might better understand. The reason I'm thinking about this today is because my husband asked me this morning (carefully, gently, kindly, with much fear and trembling) how he could help me through this. 

My husband is an amazing man. His whole life has been full of challenges and injustices and difficulties. He allowed all that to shape him and enslave him for a long time. But in the last several years, that has changed dramatically - he has changed. Now, when a new or buried issue surfaces, he doesn't waste any time. He looks at it honestly, faces it head on and BOOM! - kicks it to the curb. 

I admire that so much. However, I have a sense that this process won't be so straightforward. I have to put it in motion by actually wanting help. As I explained it to him, I'm only at the point where I want to want help (which isn't much, but it's better than nothing).

There are various elements involved here. Pride, fear, shame, embarrassment, guilt, denial, a desire for independence and self-sufficiency, an aversion to self-revelation and a deeply-ingrained sense of being undeserving of such attention and aid all play a role in my reluctance to seek the assistance and guidance I know I need.

The laziness I've struggled with my whole life is also hindering me here. There are so many times when I just don't want to do the hard work of self-discovery and self-care and accountability and growth. I don't want any more soul stretching - it hurts. I want to avoid the hard conversations. Sometimes, I just want things to stay the way they are - I want to be content in my weaknesses and issues, and keep pretending that everything's okay.

But everything's not okay. And my struggles are not only hurting me, but the people closest to me, as well. I feel a little more willing to reach out for help for their sake rather than my own. 

Underneath it all is my overwhelming fear of failure and disappointing people. It sounds so ridiculous when I write it out - I'm afraid I'll fail at recovery, or healing, or whatever the eventual goal in all this might be. I'm terrified to reach out and receive support, only to let down those who are supporting me. I'm fearful that I won't "get better" and that my support network will throw up it's collective hands and give up on me if I'm not "coming along" as desired or expected. 

So really, what I'm looking for is unconditional love. Which I know can only be found in God. No one else can ever achieve it perfectly. And I've already practically rejected my not-yet-assembled mental health team because they won't be able to love me like God does. Yeah, that sounds pretty ridiculous, too. 

I know I can depend on God for that kind of love. But I also know that He's providing me with people who care about me enough to journey alongside me - to help and to guide, to encourage and to challenge, to bring healing and life and renewed hope. I'm so thankful for those who've already reached out to me, offering support and care and advice and grace. I'm praying for the courage to dare to take the necessary next steps.

Thanks be to God that we never walk alone.

Jekyll, Hyde, and the Other Guy

I'm trying hard to figure myself out. That's one major purpose of this blog -  "I write because I don't know what I think until I read what I say." (Flannery O'Connor) I spent most of my life ignoring myself while trying to help others figure themselves out, so I guess I had a lot of catching up to do.

The problem is, I keep changing. Sometimes it's good, upward growth (not literally, of course - I'm afraid that ship has sailed), sometimes I fall down, take steps backward and sometimes the changes are lateral ones, neither positive nor negative - just change. Now, I know I've just described life in a nutshell. For those who have been more or less self-aware, it's old hat but for me, at forty-one-and-a-half and just beginning to ask the questions in the last few years, it can still be a little disorienting.

In my most recent assessment, I've concluded that I have no less than three distinct personalities: one when I'm free from depression, one that emerges when depression envelopes me, and one when I'm teetering back and forth on the brink of depression. (Yup, it all centers around depression these days. And that's ok.)

When I'm free from depression, the world is my oyster! I'm the confident, people-loving, bubbly Joy with whom most people who know me are familiar. I am hopeful, full of plans and goals. I'm able to do the things I need to do, to participate in activities I enjoy and to delight in the world around me. I can care about people and share myself with them. This Joy has her issues and shortcomings, but she's learning to accept and even enjoy who she is.

Depressed Joy is best described as numb. (Incidentally, isn't numb a weird word?) Shrouded as she is in a thick cloud of nothingness, she doesn't feel much. Hope is gone, energy is gone, delight is gone, emotion is gone. The only real thing is delusion - which isn't real at all, by definition. She plods through her days in a dense fog, trying to do what's necessary. Being with people is agonizing at best; being alone is even worse. This Joy doesn't think much about accepting herself, her only goal is to keep her head above water, to keep herself from drowning in this invisible sea of despair.

I've only recently identified the third Joy - the one who is somewhere in-between. It's a strange place: hope is there, but delusion is there, too. It often feels like a tug-of-war for my soul, between two well-matched competitors. One will have the upper hand for a time, and then without warning, the tide will turn and the other side looks as if it will win. I've spent the last few weeks there, and it's terribly confusing and unstable. (I think I feel most sorry for my family and friends when I'm this Joy - like me, they never know what's coming next...)

You'd think that this discovery would be demoralizing, maybe - even frightening. However, instead of bringing me down, this observation has been most beneficial and freeing for me.

One of my newest disciplines is to consciously look for God's hand in everything. And the more I look, the more I see that His fingerprints are all over my life. Even in this.

So, armed with this new self-knowledge and more aware of God's presence than ever, I put one foot in front of the other, again and again. And when I can't, I can still know His peace, because peace is Jesus and He will never, ever leave me.

Thanks be to God.