Bleeding Me
Every day, I crash.
Like clockwork these days, sometime around 3pm, my mood and outlook tank. I go from doing just fine to compromised and emotionally broken in seconds. Everyday. Not exactly at 3pm, but in that realm.
This is connected to a drop in blood sugar and some other body/brain chemistry stuff. I’ve experimented with snacks or having an energy shot in the afternoon, but those have not consistently shown worthwhile results. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t, sometimes they backfire. So, the search continues. What is clear is that it’s entirely biological and it’s entirely manageable.
And that kind of depresses me.
A dozen years ago, I was dangerously delusional. Knights. Hearing the queen of the moon singing. Magic. I just cringe to recall those days. And yet there is part of me that wants those days back. Why? Because of chance. Because of the unknown.
I can’t grasp the magnitude of the hubris for what I am about to say, yet I understand life and the world all too well. Not enough to predict or control it, but just about everything I see or experience has an explanation grounded in precious few originations. Emotions, potentially even thoughts themselves, are chemical reactions taking place in the brain. Tweak a chemical and transform a person. We are little more than the result of the pH and nutritional contents of our cranium. Change the electrical sparks or the chemicals floating inside and that’s it.
Love isn’t a thing. It isn’t some magical force that flows through the universe or influences our actions. It’s a collection of IF-THEN statements related to physical attraction and emotional-intellectual familiarity. Infatuation, a crush, can run its course so predictably that it can be scheduled down to the day practically.
Goddamn it, that’s depressing as fuck. And every day around 3pm, I’m reminded of it. If I switch medications (which I am hoping to do next Friday), then maybe the trigger reminding me of this will be removed. But the reality seems to remain the same: electro-chemistry rules all.
This poisons concepts of so many things. Justice, fairness, righteousness. I once thought honor was a trait above and beyond all things. It was as critical as a soul and as important as life itself. Maybe moreso. Now I’ve learned it’s just another word for honest. Chivalry is misogynistic; lionizing, idolizing, fetishizing women. They aren’t people, at least not to the chivalrous.
I want my depression to be a black cloud sitting within my lungs. A curse placed upon me before my soul came to this earth. A virus that travels through the spirit. I want my depression to be something.
But it isn’t.
Depression is a chemical inequity. Either the release or uptake of a chemical in the happiness quartet (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins) is what causes it. It’s not necessarily genetic, but it’s like cancer in there are genetic factors and environmental factors and behavioral factors. It’s a chronic illness, like any other. For all intents and purposes, I have emotional diabetes.
And every day, around 3pm, I am reminded of this. As I set aside panics, sadness that would break anyone else, horrifying thoughts, and prurient fixations, I am reminded of this. Neurotransmitters in my brain are acting less than optimally and, as a result, I am faced with the gaping abyss of existential horror.
So I close with this, a quote from the Hogfather by Terry Prachett, a conversation between Death and his daughter (I think):
“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little-"
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
"They're not the same at all!"
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET-Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point-"
MY POINT EXACTLY.”
I roll that exchange around in my head quite often. I feel like there is some grain of truth in there somewhere where maybe I can find the singing of the moon queen, find the magic of those days long past. I haven’t found it yet. I fear I’ve forgotten how to find magic.
I don’t know if that inability is a loss of that which I could once do, or gaining an insight into what once deluded me. But if that magic was born out of ignorance, then I would carve my brain from my head to have it back for even an instant.
Like clockwork these days, sometime around 3pm, my mood and outlook tank. I go from doing just fine to compromised and emotionally broken in seconds. Everyday. Not exactly at 3pm, but in that realm.
This is connected to a drop in blood sugar and some other body/brain chemistry stuff. I’ve experimented with snacks or having an energy shot in the afternoon, but those have not consistently shown worthwhile results. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t, sometimes they backfire. So, the search continues. What is clear is that it’s entirely biological and it’s entirely manageable.
And that kind of depresses me.
A dozen years ago, I was dangerously delusional. Knights. Hearing the queen of the moon singing. Magic. I just cringe to recall those days. And yet there is part of me that wants those days back. Why? Because of chance. Because of the unknown.
I can’t grasp the magnitude of the hubris for what I am about to say, yet I understand life and the world all too well. Not enough to predict or control it, but just about everything I see or experience has an explanation grounded in precious few originations. Emotions, potentially even thoughts themselves, are chemical reactions taking place in the brain. Tweak a chemical and transform a person. We are little more than the result of the pH and nutritional contents of our cranium. Change the electrical sparks or the chemicals floating inside and that’s it.
Love isn’t a thing. It isn’t some magical force that flows through the universe or influences our actions. It’s a collection of IF-THEN statements related to physical attraction and emotional-intellectual familiarity. Infatuation, a crush, can run its course so predictably that it can be scheduled down to the day practically.
Goddamn it, that’s depressing as fuck. And every day around 3pm, I’m reminded of it. If I switch medications (which I am hoping to do next Friday), then maybe the trigger reminding me of this will be removed. But the reality seems to remain the same: electro-chemistry rules all.
This poisons concepts of so many things. Justice, fairness, righteousness. I once thought honor was a trait above and beyond all things. It was as critical as a soul and as important as life itself. Maybe moreso. Now I’ve learned it’s just another word for honest. Chivalry is misogynistic; lionizing, idolizing, fetishizing women. They aren’t people, at least not to the chivalrous.
I want my depression to be a black cloud sitting within my lungs. A curse placed upon me before my soul came to this earth. A virus that travels through the spirit. I want my depression to be something.
But it isn’t.
Depression is a chemical inequity. Either the release or uptake of a chemical in the happiness quartet (dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, endorphins) is what causes it. It’s not necessarily genetic, but it’s like cancer in there are genetic factors and environmental factors and behavioral factors. It’s a chronic illness, like any other. For all intents and purposes, I have emotional diabetes.
And every day, around 3pm, I am reminded of this. As I set aside panics, sadness that would break anyone else, horrifying thoughts, and prurient fixations, I am reminded of this. Neurotransmitters in my brain are acting less than optimally and, as a result, I am faced with the gaping abyss of existential horror.
So I close with this, a quote from the Hogfather by Terry Prachett, a conversation between Death and his daughter (I think):
“All right," said Susan. "I'm not stupid. You're saying humans need... fantasies to make life bearable."
REALLY? AS IF IT WAS SOME KIND OF PINK PILL? NO. HUMANS NEED FANTASY TO BE HUMAN. TO BE THE PLACE WHERE THE FALLING ANGEL MEETS THE RISING APE.
"Tooth fairies? Hogfathers? Little-"
YES. AS PRACTICE. YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES.
"So we can believe the big ones?"
YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
"They're not the same at all!"
YOU THINK SO? THEN TAKE THE UNIVERSE AND GRIND IT DOWN TO THE FINEST POWDER AND SIEVE IT THROUGH THE FINEST SIEVE AND THEN SHOW ME ONE ATOM OF JUSTICE, ONE MOLECULE OF MERCY. AND YET-Death waved a hand. AND YET YOU ACT AS IF THERE IS SOME IDEAL ORDER IN THE WORLD, AS IF THERE IS SOME...SOME RIGHTNESS IN THE UNIVERSE BY WHICH IT MAY BE JUDGED.
"Yes, but people have got to believe that, or what's the point-"
MY POINT EXACTLY.”
I roll that exchange around in my head quite often. I feel like there is some grain of truth in there somewhere where maybe I can find the singing of the moon queen, find the magic of those days long past. I haven’t found it yet. I fear I’ve forgotten how to find magic.
I don’t know if that inability is a loss of that which I could once do, or gaining an insight into what once deluded me. But if that magic was born out of ignorance, then I would carve my brain from my head to have it back for even an instant.