Mending Hearts: My Journey Through The Fog Of Depression - 2

Each of my posts in this series will be short so it won't become too cumbersome. I will do my best to merge both objectivity and sentimentality.

I have always been sort of moody. I'm an introvert and my dominant temperament is melancholic. I also have a photgraphic memory. I very hardly forget things. I don't forget the good or the bad. I only tend to fixate on the bad and dwell on this so much until the negative energy just takes over me. So, it might happen that before 1 remeber the 100 good things someone did to me, I will remember and repeat the 5 bad things they did.

Before I counted the goodness of God, I dwelt on the few times the devil got one over me. I kept replaying over and over the bad things, the dissappointments, etc. I loved God but I didn't trust Him enough to believe that He could still bring something good out of all the bad. The events that resulted in my period of depression started in 2008. Surprisingly, I didn't even notice the devil stealing my joy (you know he steals right? John 10:10a). I was drowning in self-pity and I wasn't being very watchful. I didn't fall immediately into depression though. It was a gradual process.

Then in 2012, just like that, eveything that seemed like joy evaporated. I lost my zeal for everything. I had been avoiding my friends for a while and by 2012, I had cut off all communication (although there were some precious few that kept coming back even as I pushed...I'm thankful for these ones). It became too much effort for me to socialize. I just wanted to be left alone to wallow. I was in turmoil and in so much pain. The kind of pain that I couldn't talk about because there were no words to describe them.

I noticed my parents being bothered about me. They couldn't understand how I could stay in my room all day (sometimes without food) and everytime they checked on me, I was in the same position. My laziness took on a new dimension. I lost my purpose. I was bored with life. I looked for the bad in everything and I stopped smiling...laughter was foreign to me. It was a period of losing interest. I couldn't read...I couldn't write...I couldn't watch movies...I couldn't concentrate and I cried for no reason and suddenly.

It has been recently proved that laughter/joy actually plays a role in healing. So, we can assume that depression does the exact opposite. The same was so in my case. I was sick every other day. It was like as I was getting over one, I would fall into another. Of course this went ahead and added to my already mounting issues.

I couldn't understand why everything that could go wrong was going wrong. I couldn't understand why God allowed me to go through all what I was going through since He had the power to make it all go away. I was angry...I was mad at myself, mad at my situation, mad at everyone around me (why couldn't they see that I wasn't okay?...why couldn't they help me?), I was mad at the world, mad at life and mad at God. I was full of anger. I was full of despair. And I was overwhelmed with worry and anxiety and I began to drown.

"A cheerful disposition is good for your health; gloom and doom leave you bone-tired." Proverbs 17:22 (MSG)

"A healthy spirit conquers adversity, but what can you do when the spirit is crushed." Proverbs 18:14 (MSG)

Boy, was I tired. I was always tired. And nobody could help me because there was no will to help myself either. People can only help when you let them. A pastor of mine once said, "the Holy Spirit is a gentleman, if you resist Him, He won't force Himself on you."

I was resisting. I enjoyed feeling sorry for myself because I thought I couldn't help being that way. I felt I was entitled to being sad. I thought life had been hard. Things haven't gone as smoothly as I thought they would. I'm hurting...I want to dwell on the pain. I've been short-changed. Life has been cruel and unfair. I should be wallowing in self-pity.

That did more harm than good.

I'll stop here for today.

To be continued...

Happy Sunday!