It has been incredibly difficult for me to even start writing this post for several reasons. I have been going through severe depression for the last two months and as I begin to write this I realise that along with all the other emotions, I feel extremely angry for people not taking mental illness seriously, not understanding it or worse yet, ignoring it altogether. 

I want to talk in detail about depression, mainly for people who don’t understand what it means to be clinically depressed. So if their close ones are suffering from this, they may possibly be able to identify the signs. People are woefully unaware of what depression is and what happens to the depressed person. I will admit that what irks me most is when people dole out advice without having a clue about clinical depression. 

What happened

It started when I had a seizure in January (read ‘The Spirit catches you and you fall down’).  In some cases it is possible for depression to follow the seizure. This happened in my case, however it has been nearly two months since the seizure and I am still fighting the ensuing depression. 

When the depression started, I could not even get out of bed. I felt fatigued all the time. My body felt like lead. I wasn’t able do anything. Things that usually give me pleasure like reading and meeting friends felt like a weight on my shoulders. I had a constant feeling of anxiety, deep sadness, hopelessness, shame, guilt; you name it, I felt it. It felt like there was a weight on my chest and abdomen. It was debilitating. 

Trigger

I could not understand what had triggered this severe depression. The seizure causing this kind of depression didn’t make sense to me. I spoke with my therapist and psychiatrist to understand this better. My psychiatrist said that sometimes seizures can act as a trigger for an unrelated, independent full-blown depression. 

He and my therapist were both of the opinion that all of the suppressed trauma from my father’s hospitalization due to COVID-19 in September 2021 had caused this depression. I had inadvertently kept the anxiety and stress buried inside and now that things are better and I have had time to relax, my mind is processing everything I had gone through, in the form of a major breakdown that has manifested as severe depression. 

What is depression? How does it feel?

I came to India a few weeks ago and the depression kept getting worse. I didn’t feel like doing anything or talking to anyone, even close friends. Usually the first thing I do is call my friends. I felt fatigued all the time. Initially I attributed that to jet lag but then one week turned into two and I only felt worse. 

It is critical to understand that this is NOT laziness, it’s the illness. No one wants to feel like this, believe me. It is a feeling that comes from somewhere deep inside. I am not Bipolar II Disorder, I have Bipolar II Disorder. This is a very important distinction to make- one between the person and the illness. 

The symptoms may present themselves as that of a physical illness- fatigue, sudden racing of the heart, feeling a pressure on your chest and abdomen etc. The other symptoms may be not feeling like doing anything, not being able to get out of bed, melancholia, extreme sadness, anxiety and stress and nothing gives you pleasure. Through depression like this, negative and suicidal feelings are common. 

Think about the saddest experience you have had and what that felt like. Maybe you felt a clenching in the pit of your stomach, like you wanted to scream and cry but couldn’t, maybe you felt helpless, maybe you felt like all the energy was drained out of your body; that is what depression feels like. Now imagine feeling like that everyday, all the time for days on end. 

What helps?

Most people’s reaction to this is ‘Go out, you’ll feel better’ or ‘Meet your friends, you’ll feel better.’ Unfortunately that doesn’t help. When you’re in a severe depression like the one I’m currently experiencing, almost nothing helps. Your mind is working overtime to just be able to do basic everyday activities like eating, brushing your teeth etc. Anything outside of that causes additional anxiety that drains energy.

It is important to not be alone and be around someone who will take care of you and at least understand the illness a little bit. I’ve been with my parents for the last few weeks. They can’t understand how I feel but they know what might make me feel comfortable and loved. I cannot control the depression but I can attempt to somehow manage it a little bit so that I don’t end up in the abyss, even though I’ve been circling it for over a month now. 

In Boston, my husband took care of me. He was amazing; he did everything he could. Let me be when I needed to be alone, held me when I needed to be held, and took over all household chores. 

I have been talking with my therapist and psychiatrist regularly. My psychiatrist has changed some medicines and my therapist has been helping me by talking it through with me and giving me some exercises. 

When nothing gives you pleasure or motivates you, it is really hard to do anything and so you have to force yourself to do at least a few things. One of those is exercising (extremely challenging as my legs feel like lead). If I am unable to get out of the house to exercise, I try to walk around inside. But largely, I just have to wait it out. 

Not doing things comes with its own set of complex feelings like guilt, embarrassment, shame, helplessness etc. My therapist says that I have to allow myself to grieve and heal now because I didn’t do it when my father came home. I have to allow myself to feel fatigued and that it is okay if I don’t feel like talking to people or doing anything.

Moving on

I am better today than I was a month ago. Yesterday I caught myself humming a song and that caught me off guard. To me, this is a sign that maybe this horrible period is coming to an end, for now. There have been others in the past and there will be more in the future. For now, I am waiting for the day I open my eyes in the morning and want to get out of bed. 

If you are experiencing the symptoms mentioned above, please contact a mental health professional. 

I am not a mental health professional. All blog posts are based on my subjective experiences and opinions.