The truth of the matter

The Big D is rearing its ugly head, attempting to devour me. Depression has been a personal battle of mine since I can remember. I hate that I can feel it approaching, shaking the ground I stand on, and I hate that I am paralyzed standing in its path. The irony is that I am so overwhelmingly positive on a day-to-day basis that I think no one would ever think of this as an issue for me. Yet every second year, on average, I lose several months of productivity to this monster. Each time, I am determined to stand my ground and fight it, and I am sometimes successful. Today, I am fairly certain that this is just the warning alarm sounding after a few high-stress (and moderately lonely) days. Growing up in a family that considered depression to be a made-up problem, something that someone should just be able to "snap out of," I am still hit by waves of guilt that I am sitting around, feeling sorry for myself. Realistically, I know that this will not go away on its own. I know that I need to own the Big D, and the only way to remove its power is by giving it a voice. There's still a big part of me, however, that requires me to maintain the facade of perfection (or, at the very least, optimism) that I have spent the past 26 years painstakingly constructing. Tonight, I feel surrounded by an impenetrable barrier of darkness. I find it difficult to concentrate, and nearly impossible to see the light at the end of the tunnel. This is my version of the Big D, this feeling that I am swimming through mud towards a prize that is not worth the effort.

This may be the most honest thing I've posted on the blog. And I don't mean to alarm anyone. I've been reading more and more inspiring people, and I feel that I owe it to them to exhibit at least a modicum of the courage that they've displayed in recent weeks. So yes. The Big D is rearing its ugly head. And I'm going to fight it, as I always do. And eventually I'll win, I know that to be true.