So, two days ago, I was having a really hard time. I was very down.
But, a really great thing happened.
I have been ranting in therapy (and I go a few times a week, so she must really be tired of hearing this) about how I can be depressed and anxious at the same time. It seems to me to be an impossible state. Opposing forces at work at the same time on the same being. I would say that it’s impossible, and yet I feel it so often.
But, two days ago, I felt it start. I felt the actual beginning of anxiety during a depressed state. It was just a touch of anger at first. Here I am, depressed again, hiding in the bedroom crying. And a finger of anger touched my shoulder. Lightly, barely noticeable. But, barely noticeably means a little noticeable, and this time I caught it in the act.
I couldn’t stop it. But I saw it. For the very first time, I saw anxiety creep in during a depression.
I call it a really great thing, because part of dealing with this swirling mass of mental illness is noticing the start of the different moods. And I did it. And for me, seeing the start of this state that has been making me nuts for, literally, years, was HUGE!
I asked my therapist to write down and remember this moment. I know that I will forget. A couple weeks, months or even (sadly) days from now I will forget that I finally understood. Actually, scratch that. I’ll remember that I understood, I just won’t remember how.