Depression is very selfish. I am not saying that depressed people are selfish, by no means, just that depression makes it nearly impossible to see past your own nose.
A friend of a friend's friend (slightly complicated, but not totally important to the story here) killed themselves recently. This poor lost soul felt that no one loved them, that they were a loser and they took their own life. This indeed was absolutely not the case as this person had friends and family who cared deeply for them, who loved them a great deal, but the selfish monster that is depression made it impossible for this person to see that. Tragedy was the result.
I can absolutely relate to how that poor person felt. I battle constantly with my feelings of self worth, or lack there of. If I set myself a goal that has 10 steps, and I achieve 9 of them, I see myself as a failure, in spite of the fact I got 90% of it right. Viewed objectively I know that I am not, but the depression seizes the small failure, and magnifies it until that is the only thing that matters. This line of thought can become an ever tightening spiral, pulling you ever in and down, until you cannot function any more. I know because I have been there.
As this selfish spiral increases, more and more you begin to feel that everything is pointless. Why bother trying? You are just going to fail, so save the effort. As this feeling increases. it becomes more and more difficult to see what is going on around you. You pull away from your support network, shut down lines of communication and you just wall yourself up inside your own head, which is the worst place you can possibly be because the advice you are giving yourself is toxic at best and more than likely self destructive.
I struggle every day with this. Some days are better than others, but I cannot let my guard down because a moment't inattention can cause months of despair. I have not been at a point where I want to hurt myself for a very long time, decades in fact. The most recent episode I had where those types of thought began creeping in, I immediately went for help, and the last three years have been more good than bad (objectively anyway, I still feel like a failure).
It has been and always will be a terrible struggle for me...
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YOU ARE NOT A FAILURE!!! AND YOU ARE LOVED!!
ReplyDeleteHUGS!
I know that I am loved on an intellectual level. When my life is graded against the norm, at the moment I am a failure. Divorce, foreclosure, bankruptcy, living in my mother's living room... Not a yardstick of success by any means. As a person, I think I do pretty well most of the time.
DeleteDepression makes you miss all of that though. All you can do is focus on the negative. That is why it is selfish...
Thank you for this my friend! This concept gave me an entirely new perspective on my own feelings of sadness/depression, and to be honest, opened my eyes a little. It helps me to remember that as a father of four, and a husband of 23 years, selfishness is not a luxury I can afford, nor, really want, I have too much I could miss from the position I sometimes put my head in, not to mention it's a little hard to breath down there :)
ReplyDeleteJ.H.