The other thing to deal with.

I admit it. I take anti-depressants. I don't skip doses. I don't go off of them. I take them every single day. And generally, I feel like a pretty average person too.

But tonight with a single phrase from my husband, I turned to the dark side of my depression. 


Not too long ago, I felt like the bottom just dropped out on my emotions. I can usually feel a difference between chemical changes and stress induced episodes. This week I felt like crap from my dear auntie F beating my body into a pulp and obviously changing my hormone levels. So because I felt like that, I didn't go walking. This of course makes me feel worse. Hence with a single comment, I slid down the slippery slope tonight when I thought I was getting better. 


I hate feeling like this. It's more than sad, it's feeling batty, cracked, crazed, looney, mental, screwy, and unbalanced. 


In the blog world I stumbled across this incredibly thoughtful woman who in her journey has helped me view myself through my partner's eyes. While our situations are vastly different, I think it's helped me think about choices I make that effect my illness like not exercising. It is a choice. I am aware of my problem and know how to manage it. So if I don't do everything I need to do, it's a choice I make in managing my illness.


It's hard for me even to think of it as an illness. It's certainly not something that most people who look at me even know about because I function. As a teacher, I am appropriate and professional. I clean my house. I bathe. I chat. I make dinner. I have friends. But that is because I have the least severe type of depressive disorder known as dysthymia. It's the undercurrent of my life that can swell into a riptide that sucks you into the middle of the ocean.


Perhaps like escaping out of the riptide, I need to swim sideways. I need to change directions and keep the tide from sweeping me out. 


Depression is kind of like infertility. It's not something you talk about. It's something people expect you to be able to manage without much help. This post was actually really hard for me to write because I feel such immense guilt and self loathing about it. But if I'm going to be honest with you about my journey, these kinds of episodes are what I face whenever something gets tough. 


As I have talked about in other posts, this is an incredibly blessed cycle with love coming from many many places. At the same time, I am getting very very nervous about it. I need my body to be in a relaxed, calm place  so that I can be ready to get knocked up. 


Swim sideways Jen. Swim sideways.


xoxo