I Think I’m Okay

Back in May, I wrote a post admitting that I was in a pretty serious depressive episode. Admitting it out loud was an important step for me to start to work on getting myself back to normal.

Or as normal as I can be.

I’m writing this post to say that I think I’m okay. I say “I think” because I don’t want to jinx it. It hasn’t been an easy climb out of the ol’ depression well. I’ve slipped a few times, including a major meltdown at the beginning of June. But I bounced back from it pretty quickly, which is a sign that I’m doing better. Another sign I’m doing better? PMS isn’t a doom trigger anymore. Adding a shit ton of hormones to a fucked up brain chemistry somehow doesn’t mix well. Who knew? And while PMS still isn’t pleasant, it’s back to what I consider normal.

Functioning has gotten easier, too. It’s easier to stick to my sleep schedule. I’m making better food choices. I’m exercising regularly and it’s easier for me to exercise (except for whatever the hell is going on with my right knee; it needs to accept that we’re doing this and stop being a pain). I’ve kept my work goals reasonable so I’m not frustrating myself on the days when I do struggle. But getting my work done has gotten easier. I feel like I can finally THINK now. I have the energy to deal with things in a reasonable time frame; I’m not always putting them off. Leaving the house no longer overwhelms me. And I’m more forgiving of myself on the days when things don’t go as planned.

Overall, I feel better.

How did I do this? The hard way, of course. I went back to the very basics of dealing with depression that my therapist taught me ages ago when I was first diagnosed. Exercising regularly, keeping my sleep schedule, doing something creative, going through my day the best I could, and journaling.

When I first went to therapy when I was 21 (holy shit that was like 18 years ago), my therapist correctly dragged my ass by saying that I haven a terrible tendency of keeping everything inside. I do not vent. I stress myself and don’t release the stress. I do not express my emotions well or enough. Now, this is because I’m not a very expressive person when it comes to the “negative” emotions, but it was also reinforced by my parents who didn’t tolerate expression of “negative” emotions well, particularly anger. Both of them have wicked tempers, but got real pissy if their kids were ever mad, particularly with them. Wild.

Anyway, my therapist encouraged journaling because it was a safe way to express my emotions. No one else would have to deal with what I was feeling so I wouldn’t have to deal with their reactions to what I was feeling and subsequently their feelings. Journaling is a one-on-one feelings things. It’s a way for me to examine my emotional mess without splattering anyone else.

I’ve been journaling on the reg since I was 22. I’ve put a lot of crazy on a lot of pages. And a lot of it has been anger and frustration and irritation that I would otherwise turn inward on myself. Shit that pissed me off that I was in no position to confront or change. Obsessive thoughts that I would otherwise ruminate about until they drove me mad. Journaling took that all out of my head, put it on the page, and let me look at it and deal with it.

There’s been a lot of picking things apart in those pages lately. A lot of facing up to some nasty truths and a lot of looking at things I’d rather not look at it.

But it’s been for the best. And the years of practice I’ve had of dealing with my hellscape of a brain this way has actually made doing it comforting. I feel like I’ve expressed some of the puss of an infection that was rotting away my insides. The abscess is healing.

Now all I gotta do is not pick at the scab.