Bipolar Depression

Entering into a depression can be particularly scary for someone who suffers from bipolar disorder. I know it is part of my cycle of the disorder. But it is my least favorite part. Not that there is a good part to having bipolar disorder, because there isn’t, unless you want to count my mania induced writing. Which I tend to love.

So when entering into a depressive state, the first few days are often spent wondering if it is depression or just a bad day. Because after all every ‘bad day’ is not because of bipolar depression, just like every ‘wonderful’ day is not because of bipolar mania.

So the first day for me is always spent thinking “please do not let this be the beginning of a depressed episode” followed quickly by “I cannot deal with this right now”. While day two is spent a little deeper in the depression pit thinking “Well, crap, this might be depression after all.” And days three onward are spent wondering how the heck I am going to get through this episode and hoping that it will not last long or get too deep.

I spent a lot of my depressed time feeling like I am under water looking up, holding my breath, waiting for the storm to get worst, while hoping and wishing that the storm passes quickly. But knowing that the storm always gets worse before it gets better.

Next my jaded brain decides to overwhelm me with thoughts of despair, the need for extra sleep, low self-esteem, fatigue, self-hatred, and thoughts of self-injury. They become controlling. Dictating my every move, my every action. I sleep when depression tells me, I lay awake when it forbids me to sleep. I eat when it wants me to, I stop eating when it starts telling me why I should not eat.

Depression calls me names. Depression makes it hard for me to look in the mirror because I hate what I see. Depression beats me down and stomps on me, making sure it is hard for me to get back up and fight.

This is the point when I start thinking that depression ‘owns’ me. That it is not an illness that I will get over, but instead something that I will always be a part of, that will always be a part of me. Controlling me and reminding me just how little I am worth, just how much I am ‘owned’.

But you know what? Depression does not ‘own’ me. Depression can only control me for a little while, because then I get stronger, and I fight harder, and I crawl out of the depression ‘pits of despair’.

Depression is temporary. It always leaves at some point. Leaving me alone again, with my regular thoughts, my non-depressive self.

And one more thing,

Depression can kiss my ass.