Fear and Hope

Mental illness is scary.  Being diagnosed with depression and anxiety scared the crap out of me.  And to make matter worse, the diagnosis came when I was at a point where I couldn't cope anymore, so my brain really wasn't working in a normal way.  I was scared to take medications, scared to tell people, scared to keep going, scared to stop, just plain scared.

Mental illness is also scary for people who don't have it.  It is unknown, it makes people act in unpredictable ways.  Depression can so often take over an ability to be rational and to problem solve so people will look like drama kings and queens.  It is scary to watch someone change and act is strange ways.  Because mental illness is not well understood it is scary and hard to know what to do.

So how do we make it better?  How do we provide hope, both for those with mental illness and those who care about them?  I really believe sharing our stories, caring about other people, really listening, making a point of knowing each other will help.  I write this blog and share my story publicly partially because it helps me, but also I hope because it helps others.  I hope it gives hope to other people that things won't always be horrible, or that they are not alone or whatever it is that they need.  I know that having people in my corner has been such a critical piece of feeling better and I want other people to know that there are people who will be in their corner.  I will if you need.

Depression doesn't really scare me anymore.  I live with it everyday.  Will I ever be cured?  Who knows?  At some point I will attempt to stop taking the anti-depressants and see if I can manage.  If I can awesome, if not I will keep taking them.  Can I manage my depression and live with it in a way that means depression doesn't define my everyday?  I really believe I can.  I am learning some of the triggers for me and I have also dealt with so much of the stuff that contributed to it.

Everyday I choose to find a way to be better, to live in a good way, to know that depression isn't all of me.  I am bigger than that.  On bad days, it is pretty overwhelming, but most days are good.  For me it's a choice I have to make over and over and over again.  It would be easy to let myself be depressed but I know that there is a better way.