Friday 16 March 2012

My Thoughts: Day 19 of depressive episode; All quiet...for now.


Signing off the last post by saying my journey was about to get rough was premature, since the 13th the downward spiral has halted. A couple of things have helped since the last posting, firstly my beloved football club beat their fiercest rivals thus completing a double over them for the first time in 40 years, secondly I was given a excellent character reference from a friend for a volunteering position and having seen it it is clear they hold me in high esteem.

So those events have for the time being at least stopped the spiral by giving me a good (if only temporarily) morale boost. At the moment I am in limbo in how I’m feeling, I don't feel good, bad or just okay, its a strange void its almost as if me and the depression are in some sort of stand-off.

The next two days will be interesting, tomorrow i'm expecting the result of my second assignment for my course and the day after I will attending a selection day for a volunteer organisation where I will be informed whether I have been accepted to undergo training with them or not. 

Two good results from them could very well cut short this depressive episode or at the very least give me some more strength to withstand it...two bad pieces of news could simply plunge me back downwards.

16th March the journey continues.

Saturday 10 March 2012

My thoughts: Day 13 of depressive episode; where I’m at.


Well as the title says this is day 13 and the all too familiar symptoms have shown up and announced their intentions to stay for a while. My appetite is down, I don't feel like eating a lot of the time and when I do eat I don't enjoy it my stomach feels as though it is twisted most of the time, this is part of the nauseated feeling that I cannot shake.

The appetite and nauseated feeling is merely a part of the anxiety that accompanies the depression the two of them feeding off each other. Often the anxiety is suppressed by anger, any hint of it I get angry and seek to focus this on something or someone just to forget I’m anxious, I’m scared as something bad is going to happen to me or to someone I care about.

Without the anger to suppress the anxiety I am nothing more than a frightened child, confrontation of any kind is to be avoided at all costs as I feel weak and vulnerable, at the worst I am paralysed by it all.

Thankfully as long as I get to relax in a reasonably quiet environment I can keep everything under control, so at the moment I am hiding from the real world as I cannot stand being around people I can't relax and I get very agitated.

For the time being the worst part is knowing the worst of this episode is yet to come, when it becomes severe getting off the sofa or getting out of bed will take a lot of willpower, especially when during those waking moments I feel as though this is the day I will not survive and I have no desire to do so.

Ironically, despite my suicidal ideation being very high during the severe bout it will be the severe bit that prevents any suicide attempt as I simply won't have the energy to try, I won't even have the energy to write a suicide letter, instead I’ll be curled up in a ball for hours on end wishing to go back to sleep in the hope I won't wake up again or wishing for a heart attack to kill me.

Based on previous experience it will be a month or so before I descend into it unless something happens before then that is particularly stressful which could very well accelerate this episode.

10th March the journey is about to get very rough.