Inside My Depression
Norbert Brown opens a window to his own chronic depression in hopes that it sheds some light for someone who needs it.
Sometimes there’s a trigger, and sometimes it just happens. You’re traveling through your life, getting up in the morning, doing the things you do, going to bed at night. Then suddenly you realize that it’s all pointless, and more importantly, that you’re pointless. Worthless. A burden to everyone you care about. A burden to the world.
I’m driving to the grocery store or to a lunch meeting. I feel tired, even though I got a good night’s sleep. It’s cloudy, and I’m taking it personally. The weather and my to-do list are conspiring against me — all I really want to do is lie on my side with my body curled around my knees. “I think I’ll resign,” I say, out loud, to no one, about nothing.
With practice, you can get very, very good at hiding it. The people you’re closest to, the ones who care about you most, can be fooled into thinking you’re perfectly okay. With a little more practice, you can fool yourself, too.
My kids are mystified by the diagnosis. Depressed to them means the same as sad. Depressed people cry a lot, or just stare into space. “You?” my son says, incredulous. “But you’re always so upbeat.” I write about my depression and my wife says “Sometimes I think I don’t even know you.”
It’s like climbing inside a bubble. Or like being forced into a bubble that you don’t want to climb into. Once you’re in it, it seals back up so you can’t see a way out. You can see the outside, but your vision is distorted by the bubble itself. You can yell, and you can cry, but no one will hear you.
I’m at my desk, writing. It’s an awards program or a product brochure — something exactly like hundreds of other ones I’ve written before. For no reason, I just stop breathing. I don’t take a big breath and hold it — I just make myself not breathe anymore, until I feel just the tiniest bit light-headed, then I breathe again. I keep writing, like everything’s normal.
It’s also like trying to perform some overwhelmingly huge task with none of the right tools. Bailing out a cruise ship with a teacup, or digging a grave with a broken measuring spoon. The thing has to get done. There’s nobody but you to do it. But you can’t see the point of even trying.
I’m cleaning the garage, or at least meaning to clean the garage. I look at the workbench, and it’s so covered in tools and scraps of half-done projects that you can’t even see the surface. The craft area is covered too — it’s become an ad hoc storage space for things that don’t belong there, but don’t belong anywhere else. I find I’m suddenly wondering what dead feels like.
You know suicide isn’t a solution, but you’re not looking for a solution. You’re looking for an end. And, of course, because you’re worthless and pointless, what difference does it make if you’re gone?
It’s been a slow month and I didn’t plan for that. Projects I was counting on got canceled, and the money is clearly going to run out before the bills do. I picture myself sticking a needle into my arm. I’ve never put a needle in my arm and I don’t think I really could, but at this moment I am imagining it so clearly that I can almost feel the tiny sting where the point enters, the spread of warmth under my skin as I press the plunger. If I were a heroin addict, I wouldn’t have all these responsibilities.
If you’re lucky (like I am) your depression isn’t a one-way ticket to addiction. But even so, you get why so many depressed people are addicts. If you found one thing that made it go away, even for a while, you might not be able to say no. And in the weirdest, darkest, most perverse corner of your mind, addiction has the same seductive allure that suicide has.
“I just want to die,” I say. I don’t know why those words come out of my mouth — I’m not desperate, or panicked, or especially sad. The sun is shining, I’m healthy, my family is healthy, the bills are paid. I ask myself — “Do you, do you really?” I think about it for a minute. “No,” I answer. “Too many people would get hurt.”
So you hang on, for whatever reason you can find. People are the best reason. Your wife. Your kids. The friends you love, who you know love you back. And you hope, and you say to yourself, “someday I’ll want to stay alive just for me.”
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This story was previously published on The Good Men Project.
About Norbert Brown
Norbert Brown is a freelance writer, producer and actor. He writes speeches and large corporate event scripts as well as essays and reviews, and he’s currently developing a solo theater piece called Slide Show. He lives on Cape Cod with his wife Liz, two of their three children (the third is fully cooked and on her own, but visits frequently), a dog and far too many cats.
