Forgetting the bags

Forgetting the bags

I have really been struggling with my depression and anxiety for a long while. I finally decided that medication alone wasn't enough so I decided to see a therapist. I was hoping she would give me some coping tools because life should not be this hard.

I went into the appointment feeling broke and in need of tools. What I came out with was a feeling of being kinda normal. That was a strange feeling!  

I have been looking at my depression and anxiety as a problem that was messing up my life. What I discovered was that my messy life was causing my depression and anxiety.   Wow!

The therapist started asking about my life.  I start rattling off the events of the last four years. The death of my mother, addiction from self medicating, marital problems, surgeries including a Hysterectomy, changing hormones, and the loss of children, they moved out of the home.  She looked at me and said "Of course you are having a hard time dealing with depression,  look at what you have been through"  It was not until that point when I looked back at all I had been through, that I ever thought I might have a legitimate reason for being depressed and anxious.  I had been carrying all those bags but never realized how heavy they were.  

I think, when we get used to dealing with clinical depression, we sometimes forget to look for other reasons that may be adding to our depression and compromising recovery. 

We need to check for bags. 

The Year I Disappeared

My normal life

The Year I Disappeared

I used to be normal.  I had a normal life, with three perfect kids, a husband, and a great job.  I could go anywhere I wanted and I did.  Vacations, the mall, the lake, where ever I wanted to go.  I could also go to the Grocery Store.

The "Grocery Store" A big one.

I went to the grocery store today for the first time in two years...

I disappeared two years ago.  This is my journey of fighting my way back to my normal life and the real me. A life before clinical depression.

If you know what clinical depression is, you will understand my journey.  If you don't know what clinical depression is then drop to your knees and thank God.

I am not entirely sure why or when it happened just that around that time a lot of big things impacted my life.  My mother died, my daughter went to live with her dad and stopped speaking to me, and I change to a new job that literally turned out to be a nightmare.  I  remember the last day I went to that job, I got in my car, crying and called my husband to come get me because I couldn't drive the 40 minutes home. 

I guess it was probably an accumulation of traumatic events that caused me to slip away until one day i was just gone.

What were my two teenage boys that still lived at home doing?  I don't know, I was gone.  Why did my marriage disintegrate?  I don't know, I was gone.  What were all my friends doing?  I don't know, I was gone.  I didn't exist anymore.

This journal is about my journey to find "me" again. Because I don't remember a lot from the earlier times, those entries will be more broad time frames.  As we get closer to the present they should get more precise.

So stay with me and ride the ride of clinical depression, and together we will find out how it ends.  I will make it back.  I know I can find my way.