Finally, somebody GETS IT
A new post went up on Hyperbole and a Half today. Over a year ago, the author posted about being depressed, and the blog's been sitting idle since then. Today, she gave us the continuation, and she goes into much more detail describing her depression and how it feels. And this is the single best description of depression that I've ever read in my life.
The timing on this seems apropos, considering that just on Monday I posted something about my own depression. Let me be clear: What I was experiencing on Monday was mild and not really worth paying attention to. I have, and expect I will have again, far worse and longer-lasting bouts of depression than I've had this week. I just think it's a bit interesting that, having talked to you about depression recently, I'm now going to talk to you about depression.
Depression is hard to express clearly. There are lots of contributing factors to that: When you're depressed, you don't have the will to clearly express yourself to others, and when you're not depressed it's hard to remember exactly what it felt like, and besides you don't really want to. But one of the largest factors, and it's one that I've never really heard anyone else discuss (before today), is that expressing exactly what you feel when you're depressed makes you sound like a jerk.
I'm using the pronoun "you" here, though that's probably not really appropriate since I only know for certain what I've felt and can't speak to others' experiences.
There are things expressed in Hyperbole and a Half that I've never been able to say because I couldn't put them tactfully. Things about not caring at all about anything, including the people who keep letting me know how much they care about me. Things like "wishing that nothing loved me so I wouldn't feel obligated to keep existing."
Really, as I read the post I kept going "Yes! ...And, Yes! ... And, YES!" I know what it's like to do things I used to love and find that I just can't make myself enjoy them. I know what it's like to not know how to deal with all the Feelings other people are having at you. I know what it's like to have people Just Not Understand. (The dead fish metaphor is BRILLIANT.) There was one time I was telling my dad that there just wasn't anything I thought was worth living for, and he tried to counter that by talking about my as-yet-unborn nephew, and I was in the position of having to explain that no, family and children and love WEREN'T worth living for, and I felt like a monster.
My experiences aren't exactly the same as the Hyperbole and a Half author's, but then I don't think any two people have ever had EXACTLY the same experience with depression. But I think that the more people realize what commonalities their experiences have, the more we as a culture can grow in understanding and acceptance of one another. And I think that starts with talking about the things we don't want to talk about, the things that we keep hidden because it seems like no one would understand.
It might turn out that more people understand than you would have thought.
The timing on this seems apropos, considering that just on Monday I posted something about my own depression. Let me be clear: What I was experiencing on Monday was mild and not really worth paying attention to. I have, and expect I will have again, far worse and longer-lasting bouts of depression than I've had this week. I just think it's a bit interesting that, having talked to you about depression recently, I'm now going to talk to you about depression.
Depression is hard to express clearly. There are lots of contributing factors to that: When you're depressed, you don't have the will to clearly express yourself to others, and when you're not depressed it's hard to remember exactly what it felt like, and besides you don't really want to. But one of the largest factors, and it's one that I've never really heard anyone else discuss (before today), is that expressing exactly what you feel when you're depressed makes you sound like a jerk.
I'm using the pronoun "you" here, though that's probably not really appropriate since I only know for certain what I've felt and can't speak to others' experiences.
There are things expressed in Hyperbole and a Half that I've never been able to say because I couldn't put them tactfully. Things about not caring at all about anything, including the people who keep letting me know how much they care about me. Things like "wishing that nothing loved me so I wouldn't feel obligated to keep existing."
Really, as I read the post I kept going "Yes! ...And, Yes! ... And, YES!" I know what it's like to do things I used to love and find that I just can't make myself enjoy them. I know what it's like to not know how to deal with all the Feelings other people are having at you. I know what it's like to have people Just Not Understand. (The dead fish metaphor is BRILLIANT.) There was one time I was telling my dad that there just wasn't anything I thought was worth living for, and he tried to counter that by talking about my as-yet-unborn nephew, and I was in the position of having to explain that no, family and children and love WEREN'T worth living for, and I felt like a monster.
My experiences aren't exactly the same as the Hyperbole and a Half author's, but then I don't think any two people have ever had EXACTLY the same experience with depression. But I think that the more people realize what commonalities their experiences have, the more we as a culture can grow in understanding and acceptance of one another. And I think that starts with talking about the things we don't want to talk about, the things that we keep hidden because it seems like no one would understand.
It might turn out that more people understand than you would have thought.