The Battle is Won One Day at A Time

Overcoming 13 years of recurrent depression is a battle I win one day at a time, and its not easy to keep fighting.  I wake up in the morning some days after going through normal life stressors and it feels like I only have 2 serotonins left to my name and they want to fight each other, like pac-mans and are threatening to devour one another at the slightest perceived issue that I face.

The idea of being functional all day sounds as much fun as going on an arduous mountain hike.

The automatic negative thoughts are waiting for me to buy into the idea that life is to hard for me and I should just give into the low vibration thoughts stemming from feelings of being overwhelmed and unworthy.

I'm just sick and tired of giving into depression and its bullshit. It feels like every time I'm about to do something challenging, my depression wants to run interference, and for to long I've allowed it to get in my way.

For 11 years,  I bullied myself and worried about myself for getting easily sad and disappointed.  I knew it was wrong, but I did it anyways.  I also got scared when I had to take full responsibility for my life, and sometimes that fear lead me to depression.

All I know is that for today I have a choice.  Yes, those years of giving into automatic thoughts have taken their toll.  There's probably a highway of faulty neural networks that are working against me.

But honestly, just for today I'm not clinically depressed, and I will not give into the thoughts that send me spiralling downwards.  If due to stress and factors beyond my control I get triggered and anxious, I will ground myself and allow the scary feeling of powerlessness to pass.

The other key ingredient, is giving myself some down time and room to breathe.  My mind goes so quickly and it sometimes feels like I have 5-10 computer programs running at the same time.  Lately, after working 40 hours a week and upping my game in other areas of my life I've been feeling run down.  The landscape season was great, but I worked quite hard and honestly, I need a little time to recuperate.  The snow came fast, and I saw it as a sign to hibernate and slow down and do less in a day than I normally would.

This was hard because it gave me more time to sit with my feelings, but ultimately I know that I can't function on high gear without eventually crashing.  I've seen myself get kinda crazy when I push for to hard for to long, and than start getting obsessive, neurotic and spiralling downwards.

It feels like my brain sends me waves of negative thoughts because it almost wants to shut down and go into depressive mode because it cant handle the chaos that is my mind when I'm going to fast.

What I'm trying to do now is force myself to slow down and do self care, and not get frustrated with my brain, body, and mind needing to recalibrate.

I'd rather stay in bed longer meditating or resting in a good mood, than push myself to a place where I am clinically depressed before I allow myself to rest.  

Everyday is a challenge, but one day at a time I'm learning to just to my various energy levels and moods in order to guide myself towards recovery, inner peace and balance.

The Best Thing I've Ever Done To Beat Depression

Its been awhile since I've written in this blog, my open diary to the world.  I felt compelled to start sharing my experience, strength and hope on how to overcome depression a few years ago and I've never looked back.

In the depths of a depression, a Reiki- Healer Shaman Woman told me to read Therese Borchard's Blog, Beyond Blue.  Here was a bright, intelligent woman who knew the depths of suffering with depression, and wrote her story with courage and determination.  Her journey of self discovery helped me feel less alone and isolated on my bleakest days.  Like Therese, I needed an outlet for my frustrations and to give voice to alternative ways at looking at the causes and solutions to a complex illness.

What I felt guided to write about tonight is my gratitude for loving myself enough to quit drinking 11 years ago.  That quitting drinking and finding recovery was the best thing I've ever done to beat my depression.   I need the world to know that for me, battling mental illness, bi-polar 2 and ADHD as well as the dis-ease of addiction was wayyyyyyy to much for me to handle.  I believe that trying to put out two fires all the time is nearly impossible.  I see so many addicts with mental illness suffering in active addiction and fuck is it ever hard to get to the root of our issues if we keep using drugs and alcohol to mask our suffering.

Worse still is that women addicts and alcoholics pay dearly for their disease.
I hear countless stories of sexual abuse, homelessness, domestic violence etc coming from women that are trapped in their addictions and the unhealthy situations they struggle to free themselves from.

I still struggle with addiction to shopping, nicotine, caffeine and it ends up burning me to a certain degree.  Not wanting to sit with my frustrations, sadness and tiredness causes a vicious cycle of relying on stimulants to get me through rough patches.  The silly part is once I quit nicotine and reduce caffeine I won't  have big energy crashes that feel like mini crisis situations a few times a week.  I know when the time is right, I'll get the balance back, I'm going to 12 step meetings and reaching out for support.

Nicotine and caffeine will never say no to me, just like the alcohol and recreational drugs that used to be my friennemies and get me into so much trouble.

Many weekends in my young adult life where spent in complete debauchery, because the pain of being a lost soul was to intense, and getting wasted was an easy solution.  The consequences kept getting more and more severe until I had to make a decision,  keep fighting depression and alcoholism or accept help.  I was completely out of control once I abused substances.  I never managed to moderate for very long.

I made a deal with God on my way to rehab, and it went like this:


"God, I'm clinically depressed again, and I don't know what to do.  I know my drinking episodes are crazy and chaotic and dangerous.  If you really want me to face my alcoholism, you have to remove this clinical depression today and then I'll smarten up and go to rehab for long enough to find out if I have a problem."

So I've had over 11 episodes of depression and they take weeks or months to resolve.  Not that time.
Within 24 hours I was depression free and my eyes where wide open and I was ready to listen.
I was only 24 and still rebellious, but I stayed in rehab for 3 months and the aftercare program for another 3 months.  With all the support I got, I was depression free for 2 years, the longest stretch I've ever had.

All I know is that I wouldn't have the life I had today, if I hadn't put out one of the wildfires that was threatening to devour me.  I can't even imagine if I got drunk and did hard drugs recreationally.
I really think that kind of reckless behaviour could result in me being in jail, institutionalized or dead.

Instead, I have a messy, moody, beautiful life.  I've built a successful landscape business which gives me purpose and something to focus on, instead of worrying incessantly about my troubled mind. I have friends and family and a recovery community that meets me where I'm at on a daily basis.
One day at a time, I find moments of serenity and balance, even on rocky days where my brain refuses to co-operate and my demons cast shadows over my hope of gaining mastery over my bipolar.

I have to give myself credit for being intelligent and loving myself enough to quit flirting with my addiction, because together we were creating hell on earth for myself and my loved ones.

Today, I can honestly say that in-spite of the terrible suffering of experienced having survived several bouts of clinical depression, I'm on a windy road to finding inner peace and mastery and the foundation for my personal growth is my sobriety.