Depression is Really Fucking Boring
On how literature has reminded me that depression isn't what you think it is
Earlier this year I read both The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath and The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and both books sparked the same thoughts in me.
I’ll be honest and say I was scared of reading Plath’s work, fearing it would be overwhelmingly miserable and drag me back to negative places I previously inhabited. Instead, I found it quite a pleasant read and surprisingly amusing. My experience of Perkins Gilman’s work differed slightly, but in a similar vein I got to the end of the story and went “oh is that it? That wasn’t so scary”.
And while I knew that the main characters of both pieces of work were describing severe mental health issues, the way they are written served to remind me of the mindset the depressed are in. They describe their thoughts and the ever present threat of losing control so brilliantly and simply, it’s as if they’re discussing their thoughts on the fact they need to buy more milk.
It reminded me of the misconception that depression is a never ending cycle of torrents of depths of despair and indescribable emotions.
And to some extent that is the case, there are of course moments of impending doom and a heaviness that hangs over you like a cloak, slowly smothering you until you can see no light through it. Like you’re standing in a canyon, watching a giant flood hurtling towards you and almost accepting your fate of having no escape. Simply feeling the force
But a thing people don’t really get is that depression is really fucking boring. It’s not all wailing 24/7.
Typical imagery of depression depicts people languishing in bed endlessly (see above). In reality, few people have such a privilege. Life goes on, tasks have to be done, jobs need to be kept. While it’s more of a struggle, you still wake up, do a few things and hope to go to sleep to get some respite. Like ‘normal’ people do. People expect tragic things of you but really, depression can be quite mundane on the whole.
In a way you feel a bit like a performing monkey. If you’re so severely depressed, people are so unable to understand your mindset that it almost feels like you’re being demanded to qualify or demonstrate it. To give them something tangible to understand even just a morsel of where your brain is at.
The thing is, the sadness and depressive thoughts seem so normal to you so it really doesn’t seem like such a dramatic thing that requires constant blubbering meltdowns. Sure, you know that things have changed and aren’t right but in a way you kind of just accept it? For me I just accepted my lot, I simply wasn’t going to be happy ever again and my life was to merely become an existence.
Don’t get me wrong, severe depression is horrendous and I truly would not wish it on my worst enemy. It’s ramifications ripple out from you and your loved ones, and it ravages your physical health as well as your emotional/mental/spiritual. I count myself increasingly lucky to have made it through those hard times.
I have been both the depressed and the loved one of the depressed. Before I experienced it myself, I have cried and begged a loved one to explain to me what was wrong. I needed them to give me something. Having been on the other side of the coin now, my mindset has changed.
Seeing a loved one in anguish is incredibly hard, especially when there’s no quick medicine to fix the problem. But bare in mind that someone who is depressed is not thinking exactly like you, they have different lenses on and while they’re in the thick of it, what they’re existing through just feels as it should be. There is no demonstration they can give you that will make their mindset make sense to you.
Why?
Because they’re just trying to get to the end of the day like everybody else. Yes, it really can be that fucking boring.