Living With Depression
This post is going to be similar to one that Michelle had posted about spoons.
For those who are scratching their heads, "spoons" refers to what it is like dealing with a chronic condition, especially one that has little to no visible symptoms. Every day you get a random number of spoons. Every time you need to do something, that uses a spoon. When you have no spoons left you are incapable of doing anything more. Some days you have lots of spoons, others only one or two (or none at all).
I have been diagnosed with both ADD and Depression. I take medication to deal with the Depression, and it is wonderful stuff. It doesn't make me a zombie, and it allows me to function with a "normal" baseline for emotional ups and downs.
Mostly.
I don't have much tolerance left for unresolved stress, so stress builds up and is well and good until suddenly BAM! it all comes rushing out and I become a useless lump for the next who knows how long. The same sort of thing happens with my energy levels: I can keep going and going, without pushing myself, until suddenly I crash.
Most days I do okay, getting a lot of what was on my list done, albeit with more downtime than most people would think is normal. Other days, I'm a dynamo running on all cylinders zipping through my to do list like a fiend. And then there are still the days with no spoons. Where all I can do is nothing. It's not that I don't want to do anything, but that I can't.
Because I know how easy it is for me to just wind down and do nothing, and how hard it is for me to wind up again and start working, I tend to push myself when I get motivated. This is a two edged sword though. An example would be my recent bout of leather working: I started to work on things, in a manner that I knew would help me to keep focused. And I managed to keep it up for a remarkable amount of time for me. Nearly two solid weeks of work, starting and finishing projects, finishing projects abandoned years ago, and generally feeling good about it all. But then a bunch of necessary things popped up that stopped me from working on it and now, well, now all my energy has gone. I had the energy, and I knew I had to keep going to keep it up, but that means that when I stop I'm totally drained, motivation-wise.
So now I have energy, but no motivation. It makes me feel guilty, that I should be doing something, that I have to find that next pool of motivation so I can push myself again to make up for all this time slacking.
I guess in a way, I'm more like a sprinter than a distance runner when it comes to working. I mean, my ideal work/school schedule would start early, end when needed, and only be 4 days a week. But not with a three day weekend. I do best on a M-T/T-F schedule. Wednesday as a sort of mini weekend allows me the time to recharge so that I'm not burning my reserves by the time friday comes around.
And that's where I am right now. I have the drugs to noramlize my baseline, but I need to figure out a routine or system or something to help me cope with all the little shit that keeps building up.
This isn't as coherent as I would have liked, and I'm pretty sure that I've lost track of what my conclusion was supposed to be, but that's because right now, I just ran out of energy. I can't focus enough to go over this or think about it.
For those who are scratching their heads, "spoons" refers to what it is like dealing with a chronic condition, especially one that has little to no visible symptoms. Every day you get a random number of spoons. Every time you need to do something, that uses a spoon. When you have no spoons left you are incapable of doing anything more. Some days you have lots of spoons, others only one or two (or none at all).
I have been diagnosed with both ADD and Depression. I take medication to deal with the Depression, and it is wonderful stuff. It doesn't make me a zombie, and it allows me to function with a "normal" baseline for emotional ups and downs.
Mostly.
I don't have much tolerance left for unresolved stress, so stress builds up and is well and good until suddenly BAM! it all comes rushing out and I become a useless lump for the next who knows how long. The same sort of thing happens with my energy levels: I can keep going and going, without pushing myself, until suddenly I crash.
Most days I do okay, getting a lot of what was on my list done, albeit with more downtime than most people would think is normal. Other days, I'm a dynamo running on all cylinders zipping through my to do list like a fiend. And then there are still the days with no spoons. Where all I can do is nothing. It's not that I don't want to do anything, but that I can't.
Because I know how easy it is for me to just wind down and do nothing, and how hard it is for me to wind up again and start working, I tend to push myself when I get motivated. This is a two edged sword though. An example would be my recent bout of leather working: I started to work on things, in a manner that I knew would help me to keep focused. And I managed to keep it up for a remarkable amount of time for me. Nearly two solid weeks of work, starting and finishing projects, finishing projects abandoned years ago, and generally feeling good about it all. But then a bunch of necessary things popped up that stopped me from working on it and now, well, now all my energy has gone. I had the energy, and I knew I had to keep going to keep it up, but that means that when I stop I'm totally drained, motivation-wise.
So now I have energy, but no motivation. It makes me feel guilty, that I should be doing something, that I have to find that next pool of motivation so I can push myself again to make up for all this time slacking.
I guess in a way, I'm more like a sprinter than a distance runner when it comes to working. I mean, my ideal work/school schedule would start early, end when needed, and only be 4 days a week. But not with a three day weekend. I do best on a M-T/T-F schedule. Wednesday as a sort of mini weekend allows me the time to recharge so that I'm not burning my reserves by the time friday comes around.
And that's where I am right now. I have the drugs to noramlize my baseline, but I need to figure out a routine or system or something to help me cope with all the little shit that keeps building up.
This isn't as coherent as I would have liked, and I'm pretty sure that I've lost track of what my conclusion was supposed to be, but that's because right now, I just ran out of energy. I can't focus enough to go over this or think about it.