Depression will kill me.
Maybe it will kill me via suicide. But perhaps more likely by stopping my heart because every time I establish a regular exercise routine, depression comes along and ‘what’s the point’ and I stop and my physical health declines. Perhaps it will be those feelings of utter indifference when an aggressive driver cuts into my lane and I see them coming but depression whispers “why bother braking?” Maybe by stealing my self confidence depression will prevent my earning a living and loss of medical care leading to death. Perhaps depression will convince me that alcohol will take away the darkness and my slide into oblivion along that terrible path will resume. Suicide is simply the obvious way depression kills; there are countless subtle and hidden ways for depression to work its will.
I’m not stupid. I can look at my past and see how depression led to self-medication with alcohol. I see how those two got me kicked out of law school in 1995 and left me with student loan debts I‘m still paying - a weight from my past dampening any future. I know there are multiple career openings I was denied because I could not perform as others could. Opportunities lost because I could not muster the energy to attempt them. Depression crippled my ability to be an entrepreneur.
Multiple relationships and countless friendships have eroded away from the gradual exhaustion of dealing with the depression that goes with me. Or my own lack of energy to pursue companionship. Or the shame and guilt which forces me to withdraw from the people whom I love.
“Call me.” You say and I cannot even speak to the woman I love in the next room. And if you called, how would I gather the energy to answer the phone?
Depression keeps me from being effective politically. In 2016 I was pretty highly regarded in Bernie’s primary campaign. Depression hit and I could no longer participate. Just no ability to keep going. That was my high water mark. Twice I have embarked on earning a living via my writing and advocacy with grand plans and good intentions and twice depression humiliated me so that I cannot face the people who support me.
I have a partner who truly loves me and I am driving her away. I can’t help her or support her because I can’t help or support myself. My daughter is a stranger to me and I am unable to find the strength to change that.
Over the past 38 years I’ve tried dozens of different anti-depressants and various medications designed to augment the benefits of those medications. Many helped for a while - some for years - but lost efficacy over time. In the meanwhile mismanaged medications destroyed my thyroid, caused massive weight gain I’ve been unable to lose and resulted in tardive dyskinesia.
Genetic testing has been done in hopes of learning what classes of medication are more effective. The medications indicated have been tried and worked for a while … but effectiveness always fades over time.
At long last I’m out of new medications to try so my psychiatrist recycles the old ones.
I’ve even gone off medications - but that is worse.
In desperation I paid $13,000 out of pocket for transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) when it was an experimental treatment and gained nine blessed months of relief from suicidal thoughts. Since then I have had three more rounds of TMS, each with diminishing returns - 6 months, 3 months, 3 weeks.
I’ve tried psychedelics in the past for depression. They kind of worked but given their legality I can’t get professional guidance so that I can use them effectively. Risking prison - which I’m sure would be wonderful for a suicidally depressed person - makes no sense so that option is closed to me.
The car accident on July 19, 2019 and the concussion from it has amplified all depressive symptoms up to an unbearable intensity. Couple that with the cognitive damage and loss of executive function and everything feels worthless.
I’m in process of applying to try ketamine for depression, but even if it works, the effects are temporary and contingent on having health insurance that covers it. Which I will not have without an income source. How to find a job which will allow me to miss one day of work each week to receive ketamine treatment is a mystery to me.
Depression will kill me.
Maybe not directly and violently. But certainly indirectly as it steals my relationships, my intellect and erodes away my health.
I’m ashamed to be here telling you this. I feel unmanned that I can’t carry my own weight, that I can’t help others, that I exist at all. I wish that depression had a point like cancer where one could say: “look, I’ve fought as hard as I can, I’ve exhausted the options, im tired. Please, let me go.”
But if I go, I’m terrible and selfish. I will have abandoned my daughter, my girlfriend, everyone who cares for me. I don’t know how mental pain can be compared to physical pain but I can say this: being here hurts constantly. During good times the ache is small and distant. During bad times the pain consumes all thought and energy.
Reading this you are thinking: he’s really at the bottom.
No. I am not. I am able write this, so have energy and passion enough to do so. This is not the bottom at all. This is simply a distance from which I can see the bottom.
After sobriety I was able to rebuild and reconstruct myself so that I could semi live in my own skin. I could contribute to the world around me. After the car accident all of that has been lost. Gradually, and then suddenly.
Before the car accident, spirituality was a comfort and helped. Since the car accident I can’t connect; all the old techniques fail. I am hollow inside.
I wait, knowing exactly how my story ends. One day, near or distant, directly or indirectly, slowly or suddenly, depression will get what it has always wanted. Depression has been my one lifelong companion; it remains when everyone and everything else has gone.
Depression will kill me.
Not today, I do not think. But it is patient and sly, wise in deception, sweet in its lies, cruel when honest, gradual in its poison, clever in its malice, but most of all, depression is persistent as the ocean, washing away strength and courage one grain at a time when I am strong; taking entire swaths of territory when I am weak. And I grow old and less able to reclaim what is lost.
Depression will kill me.
Comments are closed on this story.