Living Chronically Blessed

I have struggled with depression since I was in middle school. The jury is still out on whether or not my depression is clinical or situational. If you evaluate the amount of time that I’ve been dealing with my depression, then it looks more clinical than situational, being as I have dealt with depression for 10 years. But, if you look at what’s happened in my life in the past 10 years, there’s a definitive argument for situational depression. Only God knows, how my brain is wired and I’m perfectly comfortable letting Him be the one who holds that information.

Yes, I’m a Christian and I have depression. Yes, I believe God has a plan for my life and yes, I’ve been suicidal before.

Depression is confusing and it takes real work to fight off the strongholds that depression tries to clamp down on. I spent several years of my life indifferent to whether or not I lived. Today I can confidently say that I feel blessed to be alive and I look forward to all the days that God has in store for me. I have big dreams these days and I’m eager to see them through. My depression journey has gone up and down and all over the place, but today I feel happy to be alive.

Being alive means feeling the good and the bad. I’ve experienced the loss of being numb to your emotions, in my experience, the numbness came after experiencing so much bad, that I subconsciously thought I was protecting myself by blocking out emotion altogether. After being on both sides of the fight I know that not feeling the good is just as dangerous as feeling the bad, maybe even more dangerous.

We live in a crazy time. We live in a world where every 5 minutes some type of headline comes across our screens letting us know that there is indeed a lot of pain around us. It’s easy during this time to want to numb all the emotions.

Maybe you now find yourself dealing with situational depression. Maybe you’ve never experienced the kind of pain, irritability, confusion, fatigue, anger, isolation, sleep issues, anxiety, and/or sadness. I don’t know what you are individually going through. I don’t know what this pandemic looks like for you. I don’t know what your nights look like. I don’t know where you are or what you’re experiencing.

I want to assure you that God does know what you are going through, and He cares for you.

I’ve been in some dark places in my mind and I know that it felt paralyzing. I also know that I fought my way to the other side and every day I fight to maintain my position here.

For those of you that are fighting the fight please know that you are not alone. If you need help, reach out.

I wanted to share with you some of the things that I have done and continue to do so in my fight.

1. Make a to-do list. Do not make a list that you won’t accomplish! That means if right now your to-do list looks like: 1) get out of bed 2) brush my teeth 3) eat something, then you go with that to-do list. If you don’t think you can get dressed that day, then don’t put it on your to-do list. The purpose of your to-do list is to make yourself feel your accomplishments. Because, hey, if you get out of bed today and eat something, I’m proud of you, you did it! Now, it’s your turn to be proud of yourself.
2. Take a shower and change your clothes. There’s something about washing off and smelling good that makes you feel a little stronger.
3. Turn off social media. Just do it. You’ll thank me later.
4. Respond to your texts. Don’t worry, you don’t have to be around anyone right now #socialdistancing. But, don’t isolate yourself.
5. Create a sleep schedule and stick to it. Depression zaps all of your energy, but to conquer this giant, you’re going to need to show depression who’s boss! You are in charge of when you wake up, not your depression!
6. Encourage yourself. Put up sticky notes, write on your bathroom mirror, blare your favorite song, listen to a motivational audiobook…I want you to be overwhelmed and annoyed with how many positive vibes surround you. Side note: Turn off the discouraging stuff. Don’t listen to the “Down in the Dumps” playlist on Spotify. Don’t watch the depressing TV show. Turn the discouragement down.
7. Take a walk. If it is 20 degrees where you are right now, then zip up the parka. If it is raining, put on the raincoat. You need to smell the fresh air. If you are physically able, then take a walk around your neighborhood. If you can’t take a walk, then sit on your porch or open a window, sit beside it, and breathe.
8. Journal. If you’re not a writer, I still need you to write during this time. It doesn’t have to make sense to anybody, not even you. Just write down what you are feeling. Let it out, it’s got to come out and this a good way to release it all freely and safely.
9. Sweat. Make it fun. Don’t run, if you hate running. But huff and puff a little, glisten a little, it’ll do you a lot of good. Pro tip: YouTube dance workouts, trust me.
10. Set a timer/set a date. Make a countdown to something. I don’t care if your countdown is to next week’s grocery pickup or to Friday night pizza night. Our options might be a little limited right now, but there are still options. Find a reason to get out of bed, if you can’t find one, then message me and we’ll find one together. Once, you make it to that date, then find your next thing to fight towards. Kimmy Schmidt once said, “A person can handle just about anything for 10 seconds. Just take it 10 seconds at a time.” I live by this mantra. Somedays I can’t do a full 30 minutes of exercising, but I do know even on my worst day I can do 5 minutes of something physical, so I set a timer for 5 minutes and I do it. This week I forced myself in front of my computer, put on my timer for 30 minutes and focused on writing. I spent 4 days just staring at a blank document, but I still marked it off my to-do list. Why? Because, I showed up and that was my biggest battle this week. And, guess what? Today I set my timer for 30 minutes and I wrote this post. In the fight against depression, showing up is the win.

Know that you are not in this alone. You are seen, even from 6 feet away. You are loved by the God who created you. You can do this. 10 seconds at a time, 1 hour at a time, 1 day at a time, you will do this. I believe in you. I’m proud of you. Fight on warrior!