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Trying to keep a positive attitude meaning constantly reminding myself what I'm grateful for. In some moments I go into this dark place where I can't seem to remember anything in my life that I'm happy or grateful and when I do, my disease likes to twist them. For example, I can say I'm always grateful for my children but my disease will twist it into You don't deserve your children.
For years my depression coupled with extremely low self esteem kept me paralyzed from doing much of anything in my life. I never felt that I was worthy of anything good that was going on so I would self sabotage. I would just not show up to meeting or interviews. I would not answer the phone. I would not check or answer emails. I cut myself off completely, because I thought, what's the point? What's the point when I had no value or worth to anyone? When anything good happened to me I got nervous because I knew at any second it could get taken away. I could never relax and enjoy myself in the moment because I was on edge, when was it going to go away? When would I be alone again? What was the point on being happy when it was just going to end? Because you don't deserve it.
When I think back on it, I get so angry. It was such a waste of time, a waste of a life and I just pray that my children are spared the heart ache and physical pain that depression causes. I'm not sure what the statistics are on how inheritable it is, but if they get both of my issues (Crohn's and Depression) I'll feel horrible. All three of them have already got my ears, and that's enough to deal with for a life time.
I hope that in the future, if my children are afflicted, that they'll be able to talk to me about it and look to me as an example on how to cope. That's why I feel like it's so important that this is out there because there is a lot of shame associated with both of these disorders, but especially depression. It's often misunderstood because, "why can't you just snap out of it" or "why are you sad? you have a great life!" the one I got most often is the blank stare and the eye roll, which probably the worst thing for a depressed person because he leads to the self questioning, "what is wrong with me?" and "why can't I snap out of it?". The main issue with my depression is over thinking everything to the point where I am simply reduced to tears and unable to move.
I've been dealing with this for many years and it goes in phases. I have had to be on medication in the past but try to maintain with out it, it's hard. There is no shame in medication, there is no shame in asking for help, and that's something I have to remind myself of time to time because I do deserve a happy life. I deserve my children, my husband, my cat; I deserve all that, why? Because I get up every morning and I do the very best I can.
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In 2011 my goal is to "be brave" which means talking about things I normally wouldn't talk about and owning my story. Writing this and finding the strength to post it was hard but I think it's important, cause I know it's not "just me". Find me at my blog or on twitter @josneiderer
