Why I Share the Dark Times

My blog has been dormant for a while. My most recent post was in August of last year. Ever since coming to Korea, I haven’t written much new.

I’ve had a lot going on for sure. Great things have been happening since I got on that Delta Flight from Little Rock last October.

The past nine months have been some of the best of my life. I’ve enjoyed a very good year teaching elementary students in Korea. I’ve gotten to travel around this new country I live in and have made great new relationships.

It’s sometimes hard for me to think of how life could get much better. Yet even in the midst of my great new year, my acid shadows have followed me. The depression and mental health issues I’ve always struggled with continue to walk beside me. They have been quieter these past couples of months than at any other time in my life. Still, they are there and I am very aware that their words could, at any random moment, puncture my mind and send me spiraling.

My life has been great. That doesn’t mean though that the past nine months have been struggle free. I’ve had plenty of moments where I was deeply unhappy with myself. Even with all the progress I’ve made with therapy and even with all I’ve been able to achieve here in Korea, I’m still just as vulnerable to my dark moods.

I’ve shared my darker and depressive episodes online (especially on Facebook). It’s not a secret anymore that I struggle with mental health. In the past I wrote freely on my blog about my depression. Those posts were and remain some of the most viewed. More recently though I’ve stuck to quick Facebook posts.

Recently, a friend asked me how I was so comfortable being open with sharing my depression online?

In truth, I’m not always comfortable. I still worry about how others perceive me sometimes. This fear was a big one when I was younger but it diminishes every year. Much of that has to do with those people (friends and strangers) who have reached out after a FB or blogpost and expressed their gratitude or sympathy. Some have shared their own struggles with mental health.

Yes, there have been a few times where I’ve got negative feedback on what I’ve put out into cyberspace. The first comment on my coming out with depression blogpost was an anonymous person who told me to kill myself. I can count those instances on one hand though. The overwhelming majority of feedback from my posts has been positive and empathetic.

Letting others know they are not alone and knowing that I myself am not alone despite what my shadows tell me. These are the reasons I share my struggles. Sharing inner turmoil can, I think be a positive thing.

The longer I walk with depression the more I believe Henry David Thoreau’s quote that most of us are living lives of quiet desperation. In this age, social media feeds our desperation.

In an age where there’s a ton of pressure on people to share their accomplishments online and broadcast a rosy image of themselves that ignores our darkest times, we all suffer unnecessarily.  

Whether we like it or not, we are influenced deeply by what we see in our newsfeeds. Whether we care to admit it or not, we all compare ourselves to our peers’ social media highlight reels. (Even though we know we shouldn’t).

What we see impacts us and what we share impacts others. Throwing a few hardships out among a sea of filtered selfies, out of context accomplishments and incomplete life stories, would, I think, go a long way to helping people feel much less like islands of desperation.

Something Every Depressed Person Should Hear

I've almost always experienced depression from an inside perspective. Apart from, you know debilitating self-loathing, another disadvantage this gives me is that I often have a hard time seeing what depression looks like from an outside perspective. 

 

Still, the great thing about being human is you can put yourself (to an extent) in another person's shoes with some mental effort. Most of us don't do this as often as we should but I don't think anyone would say that trying to grasp another person's perspective is a bad thing.

 

As a depressive, trying to think of how others perceive me can also help me understand challenges those who don't suffer from depression have when they look at those who do.

 

One common question I think a lot of people who want to help a loved one with depression face is -What do I say to them?

 

This is a tough item to advise on even for someone who has regular struggles with depression. Many times, we depressives don't always know what it is we want or need to hear. When I'm in a depressed state I sometimes don't have the mental clarity to know what is I need to hear or need to do to feel better. All that I can really feel and comprehend is misery.

 

Depression also makes your entire perspective on life skewed. Everything gets filtered and twisted through a negative voice that makes even the most well intended advice come off in a critical light. For me this is especially true with advice such as 'Oh, maybe you should exercise more.' or 'Try and list all the positive things in your life.' While is this very well meaning advice and might help some people, a depressed mind will often process this as 'You see, this is something you could easily fix. You don't have any excuse for why you feel this way. You suck.'

Depression is very clever like that. 

 

Lastly, knowing what to say to a depressed person is hard to know because everyone experiences it differently. Although depression can generally be defined with terms like 'deep and ongoing sadness' and 'crippling despair' people experience it differently from one another. What triggers episodes in one person might not be a big deal for another person. As such, advice, comforting words or activities that might help one person won't necessarily be of benefit to another. I've known some people who use yoga to treat depression. For some that doesn't work mental exercises do. 

 

With all of that said though, and keeping in mind that what works for me might not work for you, I do think there's one message that depressed people need to hear, often multiple times. That is:

'You're okay.'

I think often we, (people) try and give advice to depressed people first without really making it clear first that we recognize the person's pain and still accept them. You may not necessarily understand it but you see that they are struggling and to be in that struggle is okay. 

 

From my own experience and based on what I've shared what other depressives, we very often know that we can take actions to make our lives a little easier. Often we're already in therapy and browsing tons of articles to try and understand and cope with our condition better.

When depressives get into a mood, we often know that our feelings are ridiculous in many cases. I know logically that the negative criticism I'm bombarded with is often not accurate. However, it's so powerful that it overwhelms me.

What we often lack in those dark times is not ways to feel better or a sense that it's okay that we feel this way. That our feelings or lack thereof are real and that the people who matter to us see this and value us nonetheless.

Does Facebook Need More Misery?

Does Facebook need more misery?

This has been on my mind a lot lately.

As I’ve been trying to deal with my bouts of depression these past few months, Facebook (and social media in general) has been a blessing and a curse.

On the one hand, it’s been a great way to share my darkest feelings and get support from friends. On the other, I’ve also felt as if I’ve been burdening others by putting negative energy in the newsfeed.

 This conflict, I think, exists on some level for a lot of people.

There’s an unspoken rule on Facebook that sharing too much negativity is taboo and that posting a status that reveals or alludes to a darker personal issue is simply attention seeking.

Personal problems should be kept personal, talked about in private or among close friends in a closed online setting like messages, email or Skype. 

These attitudes were what kept me in the past from sharing many of my problems online and they’re understandable.

Sharing too many personal issues online does get grating. It’s tiring to see that negativity in your newsfeed.

Yet at the same time I think there’s also a danger in allowing too much positive energy.

What do I mean by that?

Well, social media has a powerful emotional effect on people.

As much as we like to think that Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and Instagram are separate worlds from our ‘real life’ deep down we all know that what happens online is just as important as what we do in the office, at home or in the grocery store.

Our selves, for better and worse, are intimately connected to social media and the line between our day to day lives and what we do in cyberspace is increasingly blurry.

If you’re a millennial, this is especially true.

The younger you are, the more your feelings, attitudes and sense of self-worth are going to be informed by your online personas.
 

Now, you might say: ‘Okay, so doesn’t that mean we should focus on sharing positive or non-negative items so that we avoid bringing ourselves and others down?’  

 Well, in my opinion, no not necessarily.

Much like in ‘real life’ the unspoken rule about not being open about our miseries causes more problems than not.

For someone who struggles with depression, bipolar, loneliness, social anxiety or another issue social media is sometimes the only outlet they have for sharing their misery

Again this is especially true if you’re a teenager who’s practically been raised from the crib with a device in your hand.

If you’re wrestling with personal monsters the constant barrage of selfies, personal accomplishments, funny memes and self-aggrandizing updates makes it that much harder to open up both online and in person.

The fact that most people predominantly share good news about themselves, creates a false impression that everyone you know is in a better place than you and that no one else can relate to what you’re going through.

Essentially, it’s the iceberg effect. With social media, we almost always see the tip of the person floating above the water not the much larger, deeper part that’s beneath the surface.

Most of us know this. However, we’re human beings and that means what we know doesn’t always match up with what we feel.

Even if we know that the doctored Instagram images of Susie with her smiling baby don’t represent the hours of tantrums, dirty nappies and sleepless nights that come we parenting all we see is the smiling picture and that clouds our minds.  

 
The same can be said of Molly’s vacation to Spain, which no doubt was earned with hours of tedious paperwork and years of being unable to take long vacations.

Because of this, and because we are so intimately familiar with our own shortcomings and faults we bottle ourselves up.

 So what to do? If anything? 

Well, as I said before sharing every single difficulty is not warranted. Disputes with another person, no. Venting constantly about how awful work is, yeah probably not.

However, deeper issues I actually think are worth sharing. Deep personal misery, uncertainty in yourself, the fact that you aren’t as strong as you are at a moment are just as much a part of life as our happiest triumphs.

Sharing our miseries and uncertainties openly allows others to know they are not alone. It allows others to understand that most of us have similar or identical insecurities.

And when we do achieve something, the fact that we’ve been able to overcome the darker periods of our lives makes our accomplishments even grander.

I’m sure there are certain aspects of this issue I have overlooked or haven’t discussed.

However, ultimately I think adding a bit more serious, self-reflective and self-questioning updates about ourselves has more benefits than detriments.

If nothing else, the least we can do is know we aren’t the only ones who hide our miseries behind a smiling profile picture.

 

The Captive Inside Me- Self-Hatred and Self-Love

Self-Loathing by Princess-Hanners

 

I've thought of my self-hatred/depression in many different ways over the years. 

 

I've envisioned it as a cloud, a rain storm, a sadistic woman with white hair and a wide smile. I had a nightmare once where it manifested as a mental asylum with deformed inmates shackled to walls. I watched myself in the dream, as if from a CCTV camera, pounding on a door to the institution with my fists. All the while I screamed 'Why won't you let me leave!' 

 

Yet until a few weeks ago I had never thought of it as a victim. An enemy? yes; a terrible force of nature? For sure. 

 

But I had never tried to truly humanize the struggle inside me not until I tried to emerge from my longest and darkest bout in many years. 

In mid May, I got back to Kansas City after spending a few weeks on the road. I saw family in Ohio and reconnected with a number of friends in DC. While traveling I released my first self-published book on Amazon and by the time I got home, over thirty people had bought copies. 

 

The trip and the sales made me feel great but within the first week of being back familiar feelings of anger and self-deprecation appeared. 

An onslaught of negativity began inside me. It was so relentless that for days I was unable to leave my bed for very long. 

 

I stayed up late until the night unable to find respite from the voice that once again tried to strangle me from the inside. 

 

For almost every minute, of every day for four weeks I was in the grip of thoughts like these:

'You don't matter! Nothing you've ever done has mattered!' 

 

'You're worthless!' 

 

'You've wasted your life!' 

 

'You've done nothing important!' 

 

'You should have killed yourself years ago!' 

 

'You have no talent!' 

 

'Everyone is better than you and they always have been!' 

 

'You are a sack of shit! You should set yourself on fire!'

 

'No one can love you!'

 

And on, and on, and on it went. 

 

Eventually, I reached out to the wider world. The kind words of friends near and far gave me space to breathe. While I still suffered daily I had room enough inside my head to truly think and address my demon.

 

I started to take steps to strengthen myself. I downloaded a book on depression and anxiety. I started exercising again and taking my Zoloft regularly. I poured over articles about self-hatred and depression. I read and reread blog-posts, psych articles and Tiny Buddha entries hoping that I could find something that could bring me out of the dark.  

 

I discovered helpful information and testimonials. 

 

None were silver bullets but it was in the midst of scouring this information that I came to see my battered soul and the destructive voice of self-hatred in a new way. 

It came to me late one night after reading an article that talked about how hateful inner voices often say things to us that we would never dream of saying to others. Often, we treat ourselves worse than we treat those around us. 

 

I thought: What if I gave a human shape to my beleaguered soul? 

 

My imagination kicked in. I gave my inner self hair, eyes, ears, a nose, a mouth and a bruised and cut body. I saw my battered, injured soul as a person. A tortured individual who had been locked away and attacked for years within me.  

 

In my imagination, I saw myself walk to this poor man's cell, unlock his door unfasten his shackles and embrace him. 

 

'I'm sorry,' I told him. 'I should have come for you sooner.' 

 

I now had a face and a body for my pain and I had a new way of seeing what had been going on within me for years. 

 

Now, when I feel a surge of negative emotions coming on I turn to the nearest empty chair or space and visualize my hurt self in that emptiness. In my mind, I ask if he is alright and if he needs anything. I treat him as a friend in need. 

 

I've been coping better with self-hatred by envisioning my inner self as a beaten and maimed person who needs to be nurtured and healed. 

 

I've also come to see the part that hates me as another tragic figure. 

 

An enemy? Perhaps, but a wounded enemy acting out of uncertainty, doubt and lack of confidence. I am wary of him but I do not hate him. I can't allow myself too. 

 

He is me. I am him. In my experience, hating ones own self-hatred does nothing but empower it. 

 

Sometimes, when I hear him attacking my long suffering self, I tell him firmly to stop. I explain to him that he has no place here and tell him that while I am obliged to stop him I won't allow myself to despise him as I used to. 

 

This is usually enough for him to leave us alone and he departs with his head hung low. 

 

Since I've adopted this approach, my world has become considerably brighter. My wounded soul is bruised still but his cuts have closed. He's scarred but he smiles more and the hateful self has not been able to shackle him again. 

 

I have no doubt the darkness will come again but the next time he decides to try and dig his claws in I won't be alone and my soul will be more prepared to endure. 

 

If you read this, and you feel that you are in a similar struggle I hope my words provide insight and comfort. You may not believe it now, but you are not alone. There are many, many others who experience your pain and there is will inside you to live and thrive.

 

Get help, talk to someone call a hotline. There is a way to pull out the black claws from your heart. 

 

There is a way to heal. 

 

Deep down there is precious jewel inside you. It may be caked in the filth of self-loathing and self-doubt but it is hard and glimmers waiting for you to dig it out.