Am I Really My Depression?
Or is my depression really me?
You know those days where there is nothing in the world you want more than to climb into a dark, empty hole and never come out? Well I do. And it’s horrible. Well that’s a lie, there is a certain level of comfort in the sought-after solitude of depression. Not the comfort that you want to bask in, but the kind of comfort which - succumbing to its hollowness - brings a certain level of contentment. The kind of comfort only depression can bring.
Well that describes me today. Not sure why I feel this way, but alas, here I am. If I’m being honest, my darkest moments are set on by minuscule events, if by anything at all. Those tiny events have a knack for snowballing so quickly, you are caught up in the avalanche, with no way to escape. And you know it. You see it coming, but can’t (or maybe won’t) do anything to avoid the assured destruction.
Amazing how there is such disconnect between one’s intellectual comprehension, and your emotional action. You know what the path to safety is, but you can’t bring yourself to take that first step. And even if you do take that first step, you convince yourself you’re too winded to move any further. You welcome the destruction: the suffocating demise of all that is sanguine. When pondering this self-inflicted despair, one cannot help, but to stop and ruminate over the dependency we have built on each other. I need him and much as he needs me. We may go days, weeks, or even months without contact, but we will see each other again soon. We always find a way. Me and my depression, in an essential, but undeniably toxic relationship…
I am depressed.
I am not my depression.
My depression is not me.
I am me.
No one defines me
but me.
Especially not my depression.
If I am my depression,
Where do I go when
My depression takes pause?
I am still here.
My depression is not.
What if my depression
is not depression,
But rather just ME?
Then while I am not my depression -
My depression IS me…
What else am I, then?
What else could I be?
So many things!
Wonderful, exciting, happy things!
But today… I am depressed.
Just…depressed…
~A. Hanna
Alex Hanna
By day, Alex works as a technology consultant, performing large-scale system development projects. By night, he works with his loving wife, Jenn, to run Challenge the Storm. Suffering from depression and anxiety, himself, he dedicates every day to helping one single person. Something as small as putting a smile on someone else's face may have a bigger impact than you think.
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