Yaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyy..........
I've publicly said I have depression. "Everyone gets sad you fucking dingus!" I hear you say. That's not what I'm talking about here. Depression, as an actual disease, is different for everyone. For me, I have to convince myself on a daily basis that I am worthy to live on the same planet as the rest of you. Somehow you are all Dumbledore and I'm Dobby in my head, although society just sees two people in a room more or less. Every once in a while this becomes a full blown mental rampage where I cannot focus on anything because all I want to do is die. In this state, "I can't even" has a whole new scary and very real meaning.
I started having suicidal thoughts around the age of eleven although honestly I don't care when it started, I'm not writing an autobiography, this blog is a snore-fest enough as is. I would say I went about 2 months straight in mental stability recently. This is not to say I didn't think about dying because the vivid imagery of bathing myself in oil, lighter fluid, and then setting it all aflame is mildly entertaining, but I went 2 months thinking "fuck it, we are all human so if they have no purpose then neither do I". It was actually a lot more optimistic than that. I wasn't skipping down fields of roses, but I wasn't drinking NyQuil like jello shots either with a gun in and out of my mouth. Then this weekend was like "ay, fackkk you". I spent the past 42 hours or so trying to forget I exist. I spent about 13 of those hours asleep and another 14 playing Paper Mario. I like Paper Mario, but it didn't really make me happy, it was just, again, me trying to forget I exist and Paper Mario has an entertaining and non-imposing enough atmosphere to help with that.
My original plans for the weekend were maybe spend a few hours with some friends but mostly just knock out a bunch of productive shit. Whaddajoke!
A lot of people really don't understand this mentality, even some professionals, so the point of this post is not to say "woe is me" in a sad hope that you will feel something, but rather to give a new vantage point to something that you may not experience, or maybe you do experience and need validation that you're not a psycho. Well here it is. As often as I might tell myself that I'm worthless, psychotic, a sociopath, ugly, undesirable, miserable, pretentious, lazy, and stupid, at the very worst I am... probably only a really mild cocktail of those things but not the whole warehouse. Neither are you. We all have flaws and reflecting on them is healthy but beating yourself up over them isn't. Take it from someone who used to actually physically beat themselves up because I couldn't live up to my parents' fairly standard expectations and everyone else had something called sex except me. I was a very bland, stupid teenager, good lord, being an adult is so much cooler. Whoever reads this that is still in high school, ignore every sad motherfucker that tries to tell you that high school is the best time of your life. Holy shit!
Back on topic, why did I post this now? If my depression and constant mental bickering with my own psyche has been a constant for over a decade then what inspired this schlock? I wanted to be productive this weekend. This year in general I decided I wanted to be more focused on a few things I wanted to do rather than last year's giant web of whatever-I-want. Yesterday I was like "well, you're a noob at writing and drawing, and you were never really that good at either to begin with. People probably just told you that in the past to make you stop being a whiny bitch."
ME: Well, then I guess I should just work on mixing the album.
DEPRESSION ME: Why? So you can pretend you know how to mix some more? Or are you going to fuck with new stuff in Reaper again for 5 seconds, realize its not like Pro Tools, and then get pissed and stop like a little bitch?
ME: That's not fair... but I mean... I've been coming up with some ideas for new music maybe. That could be cool. Maybe even a little fun. People really like music. I could give them music and we could all music together.
DEPRESSION ME: Boooo!!! Your music blows, bro! Nobody even likes your shit and they never will!!!
ME: Well, now I'm too sad to record then... so um... drawing?
DEPRESSION ME: Bitch, please!
ME: But I want to do something productive.
DEPRESSION ME: You just want recognition because you're petty. All of your so called "creative projects" are just you stroking your own ego, and even then, because I'm here, you are way too much of a freak for strangers or even people you know to really care at all about anything you make, let alone appreciate it. Also you suck at singing. Like a lot. Also the ugly and single thing, but you already knew that because we talk about that every day when you wake up and when you go to bed.
ME: Eh, fair point. Let's play Sonic.
[I play Sonic Adventure 2 for 2 hours]
ME: Back to work then.
DEPRESSION ME: Fuck you!
ME: Orrrr Paper Mario!
Every time I went back to the computer was a similar argument, so I just went into the other room and played non-stop Paper Mario. It's 1:40 in the morning right now and I'm thinking about turning on the 64 again. But I won't. I mean, that's a really good game though, oh my god, but that's not the point. We should be honest with ourselves about our own feelings.
We Google things we need help with. Some of us with mental issues, diagnosed or not, will do the same thing. Or at least you should, that's what lead me to go get officially diagnosed. Trying to clear your mental issues without consulting a professional is like trying to shoot the thing that blows up the Death Star without cross-hairs. A lot of the stuff online can be helpful. It really can. When I'm just shot down with it, sometimes I will just look up sob stories like this one or documented ways to cope. One of those methods is having a real strong support system, like friends and family. Here's the deal though: they are people too, so you can't keep toilet-papering them, and sometimes, even if they're cool with helping you as much as possible, sometimes your friends have, um, I dunno, THEIR OWN FUCKING LIVES TO ATTEND TO! Don't be clingy. Also be aware though, that sometimes, you probably just think you are being a burden, but you are not actually being a burden. Thinking you are a burden can actually be more a burden to the person taking on your burden than what you thought was originally a burden. Woah. I should have slowed that line down, some of you are reading this at like 2am. Some of you are drunk. Some of you are making me jealous.
Your friends won't always be there, and for some of you that's where family kicks in, but for the rest of us that live on the more AMC side of reality, no chance in hell. For those of you who live on my side of reality, family is almost completely meaningless. Its traditional purposes hang on a thread. A thread that is supporting a trapeze artist who has mice chomping on his/her exposed ankles. Anyways. This doesn't mean your friends are assholes: they have many other ways to prove to you that they are assholes but not being there to talk for every time you think about boobs is not one of the things that make them an asshole. It only makes them a modern human. What do you do in these situations then? Stop being the victim.
NOTE: Stop being the victim DOES NOT equal "man up" or "stop being a pussy" or "go talk to Jesus about it because you are incapable of making your own decisions" (although if you have found a way in your life to make religion actually work for you in this context then that is actually pretty rad and you should keep doing that too). When I say "stop being the victim", I mean look at how I personified depression up above there. Make depression your step stool bitch like it has done to you for way too long now. Even when its more chemical components kick in and you feel unable to do pretty much anything, don't be destructive, but be assertive. I played Paper Mario today knowing that I would come out of this stronger, or at least that's what I blindly believed and it worked. I wasn't playing Paper Mario and closing myself off from the rest of the world waiting for an excuse to finally kill myself, because that wouldn't really solve anything, it would just add to the body count. If you feel your entire life is a problem, then solve it, don't selfishly get rid of it. Also realize though that this is futile, and we all die alone, but that doesn't have to be a bad thing. It's a human thing.
Draw alongside that YouTube tutorial that has been festering in that playlist for 6 months knowing with full confidence that a truck could paralyze you from the legs down tomorrow. Go out on a date with your friend's friend knowing just how possible it is to sneeze in her food and later misread a signal and do something that turns you into a textbook creeper! Crawl around with me and everyone else in this beautiful world that feeds on flaws, and turn your flaws into something we can all breathe on, remembering that you are partially doing it for your own self-worth and that someone could gouge out your eyes because of bad traffic. By realizing that none of the stuff you worry about is worth worrying about, you find purpose, because you find why you worry.
You think worrying about those things makes you a pussy? It makes you a hero! All of the people I have tried to work with in the past and ended up ditching because I couldn't deal with them anymore either didn't have worry or worried just so you would notice them worrying. Don't be either of those people. You care so much about wanting to better yourself and to fulfill your goals that you marathon'd Twilight movies next to your stuffed animals because you have been single for so long, you aren't sure if you can put yourself out there in a romantic light ever again. Isn't that great? You felt shame for your past decisions, but not regret, and your worries beat out the insecurities of whatever asshole left you out in the cold. Sulk in confidence that this is a cocoon state; a metamorphosis, not the catatonic thing from Empire Strikes Back, even if it feels that way and you look in the mirror and see present-day Harrison Ford.
That's probably the best note to end it on right? Basically if there is anything to take from this, it is that someone else, in some vague sense, is feeling your pain, and even if you are alone on a technical level, it isn't forever, and with texting and the internet, it will probably last a few hours, tops. If you are trying to accomplish something that makes you feel like you trying to do something in general, as vague and hokey as that sounds, I think you're doing awesome and have mad respect for you already. No, really.
Another good depression tip: consistent sleep is better than more sleep. A week of 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5 is healthier for your brain than hours that look like 7, 8, 4, 10, 12, 3 and day of napping, 9. This also includes depriving yourself of sleep and blogging at 2 in the morning like a goob.
