how are you holding up, allison?
I got asked that yesterday. And I answered, "Meh. Been playing a lot of ODST, I like it." A non-answer to the question. I'm good at that, these days. I segued into a discussion of video games, and the original question, earnest or not, was forgotten.
I borrowed it on Saturday evening and finished it this morning. Halo 3: ODST was fun, but it was short, and its story lacked the oomph of any of its predecessors. Loved the challenge of a weaker protagonist, though. I was up until 3:15 AM playing it, woke up around 9:45, and finished it by 11. It was good. I may, when I get money, buy it. When I get money. I don't have enough right now, and I don't have a job.
I am definitely battling depression now. One month and change since I became one of the unemployed. I have fears and concerns that vanish with passing weeks - I'm not pretty, or being trans is torturous isolation, or I'll never afford to survive, or I'm nobody without my job and my life doesn't mean much if I'm not serving some higher purpose anymore, etc. - but these are only masking the truly concerning threads: ennui, alienation, more anger and less self-respect. I question everything I do, now. I know that I've said dumb things to people and lost the respect of some people that I'd rather have kept.
I'm almost ready for my white knight to come save me, swoop me off my feet, and solve my problems... except that I wouldn't trust anyone for that. Me? Trust someone else? My non-relationship with this guy I was hanging out with ended because he wouldn't actually step up and make a move, and I didn't care about him or trust him enough to do it either. Maybe it was a gender thing - his issues with my alien-to-him trans history or my issues with his alien-to-me male cisgender history - but the why matters less than the acknowledgement. Now, I think a relationship would provide a helpful sort of continuous low-level counterpoint to some of the non-logic I throw up to trick myself into suffering more. Depression is a wicked bitch, though, and I'm not up for a relationship now. When I struggle to support even myself emotionally, I cannot in good conscience be even partially responsible for the daily happiness of someone else. I suppose, on many levels, I haven't been ready in a long time. Surely I've passed on opportunities I arguably shouldn't have, with people I could have loved very well, very deeply, and very safely.
I know, on a purely intellectual level, that my life is worth living, has intrinsic value, that which I do benefits other people, but I don't feel it. I don't get that easy casual comfort with my life that I used to have. I struggle when I shouldn't have to. And in the past, this has brought me to harm. I'd abandon activities, skip out on responsibilities, and ignore people.
This time, though, I'm still going to class and doing my homework. I'm still running tournaments. I'm not sending out as many resumes as I'd like, but I *am* networking. I have a resume draft I like, and I'm constantly tweaking it. I'm taking decent care of myself and in my flawed social planning, I'm spending time with friends, which helps keep up my mood. I'm offering moral support to those who need it, even the ex-girlfriend who treated me poorly calling me in an STI-related panic. (I'm fine, she's not.)
I'm exercising more than I was, though not as much as I could. I'm not eating as poorly as I did even a month ago, and I feel better for doing that.
I'm depressed, yes, but I am handling it way the hell better than I have done in the past. I'm a grown woman now, and I am able to face my problems with some dignity and strength. I have not once broken down weeping to my parents, turning to them to solve my problems as I have done in the past. I have not once canceled an obligation or social arrangement because this depression is getting to me. I'm not letting up on taking care of myself and my needs.
I turn to quotes a lot. Somehow I got the idea that doing so makes me seem smart, and maybe it does, inasmuch as I need to seem smarter than I am. There's one quote in particular I turn to when I'm feeling down. Originally from The Lion in Winter, referenced on West Wing: the exchange between Richard and Geoffrey in prison, when Geoffrey chastises Richard for maintaining dignity in the face of execution. "He isn't going to see me beg." Geoffrey doesn't even look at his brother when he says, staring behind the camera, "Why you chivalric fool, as if the way one fell down mattered." Calmly, simply and without a trace of understanding just how many people would come to (mis)quote it, Richard answers: "When the fall is all there is, it matters."
It matters.
And I'm not dying. I'm not sick, or injured, or suicidal. I'm just depressed. I suppose, though, in a sense, we're all dying. And with that in mind, it matters. And if we are all always falling, and it matters how one falls, I suppose it stands to reason that it matters how one lives. I don't feel it, but I know it, and that should be enough. Because if my life's all there is, it matters how one lives. And with that, I can press on.
So I'm doing okay. That would be the short version: I'm doing okay.
-Allison is headed to campus to do her homework at the labs
I borrowed it on Saturday evening and finished it this morning. Halo 3: ODST was fun, but it was short, and its story lacked the oomph of any of its predecessors. Loved the challenge of a weaker protagonist, though. I was up until 3:15 AM playing it, woke up around 9:45, and finished it by 11. It was good. I may, when I get money, buy it. When I get money. I don't have enough right now, and I don't have a job.
I am definitely battling depression now. One month and change since I became one of the unemployed. I have fears and concerns that vanish with passing weeks - I'm not pretty, or being trans is torturous isolation, or I'll never afford to survive, or I'm nobody without my job and my life doesn't mean much if I'm not serving some higher purpose anymore, etc. - but these are only masking the truly concerning threads: ennui, alienation, more anger and less self-respect. I question everything I do, now. I know that I've said dumb things to people and lost the respect of some people that I'd rather have kept.
I'm almost ready for my white knight to come save me, swoop me off my feet, and solve my problems... except that I wouldn't trust anyone for that. Me? Trust someone else? My non-relationship with this guy I was hanging out with ended because he wouldn't actually step up and make a move, and I didn't care about him or trust him enough to do it either. Maybe it was a gender thing - his issues with my alien-to-him trans history or my issues with his alien-to-me male cisgender history - but the why matters less than the acknowledgement. Now, I think a relationship would provide a helpful sort of continuous low-level counterpoint to some of the non-logic I throw up to trick myself into suffering more. Depression is a wicked bitch, though, and I'm not up for a relationship now. When I struggle to support even myself emotionally, I cannot in good conscience be even partially responsible for the daily happiness of someone else. I suppose, on many levels, I haven't been ready in a long time. Surely I've passed on opportunities I arguably shouldn't have, with people I could have loved very well, very deeply, and very safely.
I know, on a purely intellectual level, that my life is worth living, has intrinsic value, that which I do benefits other people, but I don't feel it. I don't get that easy casual comfort with my life that I used to have. I struggle when I shouldn't have to. And in the past, this has brought me to harm. I'd abandon activities, skip out on responsibilities, and ignore people.
This time, though, I'm still going to class and doing my homework. I'm still running tournaments. I'm not sending out as many resumes as I'd like, but I *am* networking. I have a resume draft I like, and I'm constantly tweaking it. I'm taking decent care of myself and in my flawed social planning, I'm spending time with friends, which helps keep up my mood. I'm offering moral support to those who need it, even the ex-girlfriend who treated me poorly calling me in an STI-related panic. (I'm fine, she's not.)
I'm exercising more than I was, though not as much as I could. I'm not eating as poorly as I did even a month ago, and I feel better for doing that.
I'm depressed, yes, but I am handling it way the hell better than I have done in the past. I'm a grown woman now, and I am able to face my problems with some dignity and strength. I have not once broken down weeping to my parents, turning to them to solve my problems as I have done in the past. I have not once canceled an obligation or social arrangement because this depression is getting to me. I'm not letting up on taking care of myself and my needs.
I turn to quotes a lot. Somehow I got the idea that doing so makes me seem smart, and maybe it does, inasmuch as I need to seem smarter than I am. There's one quote in particular I turn to when I'm feeling down. Originally from The Lion in Winter, referenced on West Wing: the exchange between Richard and Geoffrey in prison, when Geoffrey chastises Richard for maintaining dignity in the face of execution. "He isn't going to see me beg." Geoffrey doesn't even look at his brother when he says, staring behind the camera, "Why you chivalric fool, as if the way one fell down mattered." Calmly, simply and without a trace of understanding just how many people would come to (mis)quote it, Richard answers: "When the fall is all there is, it matters."
It matters.
And I'm not dying. I'm not sick, or injured, or suicidal. I'm just depressed. I suppose, though, in a sense, we're all dying. And with that in mind, it matters. And if we are all always falling, and it matters how one falls, I suppose it stands to reason that it matters how one lives. I don't feel it, but I know it, and that should be enough. Because if my life's all there is, it matters how one lives. And with that, I can press on.
So I'm doing okay. That would be the short version: I'm doing okay.
-Allison is headed to campus to do her homework at the labs