I try to be cautious with my words. I try to be careful about what I call depression and what I call an anxious loop, and what I call Trouble and what I call Big Trouble. I try to examine which things are what they seem and which might be something else. It is hard to analyse, because our brains will never arrange things neatly and all in the right boxes. It’s hard to understand which mental health state comes from which feelings / which feelings come from which state / which states are more than feelings / which states are only feelings. Am I making any sense?
No. Let me start someplace else. There’ll be months when I am doing all the Good things that keep the slipperiness at bay. I’ll be up before the sun. I let it find me in the street. I’ll drink my water and stay almost fit, and I won’t waste time doubting my abilities. I’ll even socialise with people - or lots! Lots of people.
Okay, not lots of people, but life will be steadier. I’ll feed myself with ease. When there are obstacles looming, I’ll anticipate them, planning my activities around what I’m likely to feel or need. Life will not catch me unawares. The outlook wont feel so grim. I won’t drop out of contact with people I love for an uncommonly long time. I’ll do what I say I’m going to do. I’ll meditate. I’ll make it to your dinner.
Though I can get very depressed, I’m not quick to say I have depression. I don’t claim anxiety, either, though I think I’m having it right now. Right now, the colours in the park are almost too much to take. Everything is so significant and too much, and things are…like, very magnified, and there are so many existential questions playing around in my head like
what if but what if but what if but what if.
Anyway, I tell myself. It’s part of me, and I’m an Artist(e), okay!!? I do not want to call everything depression or anxiety because I am not always sure that it’s true. I know it is important to name a thing, but I also know what I feel is not always true. So many things masquerade as anxiety - the fatigue of this year, the effects of life on this meridian, mineral deficiencies, errands with too many steps to them, things that are not as they promised to be…
and so many things masquerade as depression - family problems, trauma in the blood, the constant sense of having too much to do, ptsd, changes in the weather and our hormones,
too much screen time,
too much everything etc, etc
so how do we separate one thing from the others? How to know what’s hidden in the soup? Are we Depressed or do we have Depression? Are we Anxious or are we having some Anxiety?
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to the utter to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.