ive mentioned before about how lucky i am to have a group of friends and family around me while ive been dealing with depression. im positive that without those people, especially one or two in particular i would be dead right now.
looking back to the worst times i have often wondered what those people thought about my actions, words or decisions i had made. at that point in time how i didnt think about any of that. i didnt think about things i said and did affected those around me, and how those actions may have had a significant impact on how that person/those people saw me as an individual.
during the early stages of my depression, before everything finally came out in the open and i saw the doctor about it i confided only in 2 people. every time i spoke to them things were negative, bleak and to put it bluntly, fucking depressing. they tried so hard to cheer me up and take my mind off things. they were constantly doing it. every day, for at least a couple of hours each evening they'd talk to me via facebook, but nothing seemed to work.
they put so much effort into trying to help me (and still do) but seeing none of it paying off must have sucked BIG time for them. actually, i KNOW that it sucks trying to help someone but nothing seems to work. it makes you feel pretty useless. the frustration about now being able to make things better must have sucked so much.
looking back, i HATE that i put them through that. i dont know if they did feel that way, but i know i have felt like that when ive not been able to help someone i care about.
another thing that i think a lot of the people close to me found difficult was the fact that my mood and state of mind can vary greatly from day to day.
hell, even during one day my mood can go from elation to 'im just going to go hide in a hole somewhere' faster than Usain Bolt can run after 7 cans of red bull. little things, insignificant, almost non-existent, pointless things could cause me to flip moods. even the thing which made me laugh one day could make me feel like shit the day after. i think that those around me would have found it very difficult to have 'normal' conversations with me, especially when they didnt know what could set me off. everything ended up being a risk for those people. do we ask him about this? do we tell him about that? shall we see if he wants to go there? etc. all of them such silly, insignificant things that could set me off. it was a very wobbly tightrope for anyone who had any form of interaction with me, especially if that interaction was something important or personal to me or the other person involved in the interaction.
another thing that suffered was how new people viewed me. im shockingly shite at social interaction. especially with people i dont know.
before everything went tits up inside my brain i at least used to try and talk to people (although im no good with talking to women. women are scary!) my depression caused me to become very introverted. early on was the worst time though. i didnt speak to new people. no eye contact, no self confidence. my physical appearance wasnt good. it cant be a good first impression, can it? do they see me how my close friends and family see me; as someone who is a decent person but who is having problems at the moment, or do they see me as some rude, scruffy weirdo who wont look at you or speak to you, even if you speak to him first?
it was even worse if a new person tried to speak to me if i was in a bad mood. i'll be honest; when im in a bad mood im a rather large twatface. im not pleasant to be around. if someone, say a person at a skatepark, asked me something on a good day then i'd be fine. i could help them out with whatever it was they wanted. if they asked me on a bad day then the reply was not as nice. nope, definitely not nice at all. again, people who knew me well could tell when to interact with me and when to just leave me alone.
while im nowhere near back to normal i do know that i have changed a lot, and the way people see me has changed too. i wear my emotions on my sleeve now, whereas before i used to keep everything hidden inside. i have become really open when talking about my depression and experiences with self harm. (shit, would i really be writing a blog if i wasnt?) i dont know how i ended up being so open about it, it just happened.
the weird thing is, ive actually had people say im "brave" for writing these things. while i appreciate the compliment i must say that im not brave at all. im just a normal(ish) guy dealing with something that affects 1 in 5 people. i started writing this blog a way for people to maybe get a slightly better understanding of what goes on in the mind of a depression sufferer. im not trying to be brave or macho or trying to become mr jimmy bigbollocks. im just trying to be me.
depression fucked me up.
im trying to get things back together and get my life back on track, however i cant do that alone. i need those people who support me and look after me. without them i am royally fucked.
im truly sorry to those who i may have upset or made feel bad. to the 2 people who i talked about earlier in this post; i love you both very much. i wouldnt be here without you to, so thank you. C and A, you are both brilliant.
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