This Too Shall Pass

I am fighting strange bouts of depression right now. (I know, I know, no foreplay with that one. I went straight into the hardcore stuff.) I have been since last week. This isn’t one of those really bad periods that I have went through in the past. I just have hours in a day every few days where I feel bleak, and I want to curl into myself and disappear for a bit. I am not suicidal. I don’t know how to describe how wanting to press the pause button on feeling is different from pressing the stop button, but it is.

Yesterday evening I was going through a pretty heavy bleak spell. I was in the middle of it, and I knew I needed to ask for something to help, but I didn’t know what, or how to get it. Finally, I told my mom what was going on, and a little later, I told her I just needed her to hug me, tell me she loved me, and that I am awesome. She did, and I felt better.

I guess that was lesson one. Learn what you need and how to ask for it. It sounds simple, but I don’t think it is. I think we all have a hard time figuring out exactly what we need, and if we do know what we need, sometimes we don’t know how to ask for it. I think we want those people around us to instinctively know what we need, but that is asking too much of anyone. It is okay to need things, and it is okay to ask.

Then I was sitting here last night writing with my music really loud in my ears feeling my bleak. I let myself feel it. I didn’t try to subvert it. I just kept telling myself that this too shall pass. There is so much power in that simple knowledge. I have been here before. I know this pain and this bleakness. I have fought it, and I have won. I know that this too shall pass.

I am so thankful, with every fiber of my being, that I understand what this is. I am thankful that I can stare this in the face without shame because I know that. I know that this is something I can live through.

I remember before I understood. My heart breaks for anyone going through this who is too afraid or too ashamed to get help or try to understand. I remember trying to lock it away, afraid that if I acknowledge it, it would overwhelm me. If you know, though, what this is, you can face it and raise your chin. You can whisper to yourself that this too shall pass.

Life is a gift; the good and the bad. I know that sounds so strange coming from someone who sometimes wants to press the pause button and be blank for a moment, but even those moments I wouldn’t trade.

You earn your scars in life. Many more people have a lot more scars than I do, but these scars are mine. My scars have taught me things, like I am strong in my own way, and I am brave in my own way. They are teaching that being emotional isn’t bad. They are teaching me that there is something glorious in the fight, and that life is the fight, not something that happens when the fight is over. You live through this moment to get to the next, and even though this moment sucks, this moment is life, and that this moment has value. There is power in that.

So.

Deep Breath.

Chin Up.

Feel what I am feeling.

Whisper: this too shall pass.