Something different

Writing about depression

Mar 08, 2024

The picture shows a white woman who looks like she is screaming with half her face covered by a blue hat. — Sometimes, all I want to do is scream - not just because of the yearly hypocrisy on March 8.

This week, I want to try something different:

In the last few weeks, I have been working on a new writing project that is about depression. About my experience of living with it and my attempt of molding this intangible illness into a shape made up of words. By my estimate, depression has been my loyal and clingy companion for almost three years. Three years of ups and downs, oscillations between butterflies in my belly and anthills of fire ants in my chest. In other words: I am still smack dab in the middle of it, no end in sight. It is, of course, not encouraging either when your psychiatrist responds with yet another “oh no!” every time you share new developments - aka struggles - in your life.

The gif shows a white women with long brown hair nodding and saying "My life sucks." — I still don’t take myself too seriously.

So in this week’s newsletter, I share one chapter of the current project. My hope is that some readers will find it helpful, that some will feel seen, that some will learn something, and that a few share what the text evokes in them.

Gravity

Gravity is relative. I don't remember ever being afraid of water.

Now, I often feel like I am living underwater. Less light reaches into the depths; the vision is distorted; distances are unreliable. This is not to say that it is a horrible place per se.

Being surrounded by water has a calming effect. The feeling of gentle waves rolling by, bubbles rushing towards the surface, and fragmented light are wonder-full. Water is my protector as well as my prison guard. It shields me from too much data raining down on me; it envelops and embraces my boundaries. The fluidity of the medium allows for constant transformation and time and space are, for a moment, irrelevant.

But water also maintains a distance to others, to human connection, and human touch. The comfort it brings can become isolating in its familiarity. And as long as I stay in the light and don't sink into the pitch-black depths, gravity is no longer an enemy.

In school, we learn about Isaac Newton and his apple. It's always an apple, isn't it? We learn that the average gravitational pull of Earth is 9.8 m/s2. What we don't learn is that gravity is fluctuating; it decreases or increases depending on one's emotional state. Feeling joyous and full of love makes you feel like you are walking on air. Feeling the weight of the world on your shoulders and your soul being pulled apart in all directions yanks you toward the ground, unable to get up again.

Gravity is relative. It depends. When every cell of your body feels like it is filled to the brim with uranium, the heaviest naturally occurring element on Earth. [There's no point to even look at the heaviest synthetically-made element - called oganesson, just so you know.] Lifting a finger or raising your head by a hair is an impossible feat. All the blue whales that once roamed the Earth are holding you down. The ground becomes the most comfortable and uncomfortable, the safest and most dangerous place in the world.

Dust tickles your chin? Not important. Crumbs of cookies move further and further away as you exhale slowly out of your mouth? Not important. Stray hairs and skin cells - all former parts of you, structures and cells your body made - are in sight? Not important. They are no longer a part of you.

All I can do is keep breathing.

All I can do is keep breathing...gravity is relative.