**NOTE: I  STARTED THIS POST INTENDING TO BE AMUSING…because that is what I do. Rather than talk about problems I try to make people laugh. When I write I want to be mostly uplifting even while acknowledging the struggles that everyone goes through. Pointing out the struggle and the success is meant to be encouraging but you know how sometimes you just need a good cry or a place to vent? This post didn’t turn out short and funny as I intended but maybe I just needed to write it. Maybe someone needs to read it. If not today then maybe whenever they are going through something and they happen to find it…if you don’t want to read about an ugly depression that lasted a couple of months just read the bold at the beginning and end. 

    I know that much like the road construction here in Florida we are all a work in progress but after finding myself in much the same condition as I was this time last year I am thinking I should have the nickname D.O.T. rather than Kiddo. I don’t know about where you live but here it seems like as soon as they get finished repaving or widening a road they start all over again making improvements on the same stretch of highway. I see so many Bob’s Barricades that I feel like I am starting to recognize the same ones on different projects.

     Every person’s life has ups and downs and keeping a positive attitude is very important. Sometimes it can be hard to stay positive. During the last half of 2018, I experienced roadblocks and detours. Earlier in the year, I had once again started writing my novel based on my life growing up in central Florida. I started out excited to be revisiting my childhood and fictionalizing it until I got to July 4th of 1976 which was our countries bicentennial but then the memories got too real. I was three years old in July of 1976 but the memories were getting very emotional for me so I took a break. I took a few days off and then a week and currently I am still stalled on that project. In July of 2018, I had finally gotten back into better shape after the surgery on my cervical spine that I had at the end of 2017 and was leaving my doctor’s office in a great mood due to the fact that my weight was on record as finally going down and because I had just been told that everything was looking great and that I wouldn’t need to be checked again for six months. Then WHAM! On the way home from that appointment I had a car crash that involved a car stalled in rush hour traffic that totaled my car and gave me whiplash that hampered me physically for about six weeks. On top of the physical pain and daily headaches, I was trying to get another vehicle in a hurry while bumming rides to and from work.

     In August I finally found a vehicle that I could maybe afford but I wasn’t thrilled to be getting it. A 12-year-old minivan brings its own set of problems but it was hopefully going to be better than bumming a ride the 35 miles to my job every day. Replacing a vehicle unexpectantly is very hard on a single income and I am still paying for that literal ROADBLOCK. The van had to be in the shop three times in the 1st four months that I owned it and it is in desperate need of tires but I still owe $650 on it so hopefully the tires last a little while longer.   The whiplash cleared up and I started making physical progress again midway through September and when October arrived I was feeling encouraged. I am a strong person and have made difficult comebacks before so I felt like I could do it again. I had maintained my optimism despite my setbacks because I am a strong person and also because I am a naturally optimistic person that finds joy in the everyday beauty of the world around me. I felt great mentally and emotionally so no problems that arose were actually a problem. 

     I usually enjoy being with my own thoughts so being single isn’t typically a big issue for me. Even though I was alone a LOT I wasn’t sitting around feeling lonely and sorry for myself and I had actually started to envision a happy future for myself without a partner. I was still excited to get up every day despite the fact that I wasn’t super happy about my replacement vehicle. I was very much aware of the fact that things could have turned out much worse and was just thankful to still be cruising along.

     November was upon me before I could even believe it and then WHAM! Here came the mental/emotional DETOUR. Brain chemistry and hormonal imbalances can be a bitch…as much as I tried to fight it with physical activity, a healthy diet, positive people and sheer force of will I eventually slipped into one of my depressions which of course left me feeling unmotivated and at times helpless. I seemed to have swung from being my usual insomniac self to having narcolepsy.  I was doing all I could do just to get up and go to work. You know how alcoholics are considered to be ‘functional alcoholics” as long as drinking doesn’t interfere with their work or other responsibilities? I felt like as long as I kept getting up and doing what absolutely had to be done to pay the bills I was at least functionally depressed. I just kept fighting like Atreyu in the Swamps of Sadness and would even have a good day here and there.  A couple of times I felt like I was coming out of my funk but it had sunk its teeth in deep and wasn’t letting go. Many mornings I  woke up despairing of the fact that I had to face another day and stayed in bed as long as I could and still make it to work on time.

     Despite usually being a ‘yes person’ I had started being a ‘maybe person’ because I hate saying ‘no’ until eventually I was turning down invitations and making excuses or just saying I was tired or just not up to doing anything. After several weeks with the blues I began waking up with tears already in my eyes and occasionally the idea of ending it all would whisper to me from my dark places before I even opened my eyes. I pushed those whispers aside and got up and took care of business. As I moved through the day I felt like there was an actual physical quilt weighing me down. The quilt felt so thick and heavy it must’ve been soaked with the tears of other tortured souls. This sopping wet quilt made it hard to move and hard to take a breath. I felt utterly alone and hopeless and was fighting tears so often during the day that my eyes started to feel irritated and my vision was blurry.  I intentionally put unhealthy thoughts away and tried to focus on how good everything in my life was. There was so much to be thankful for and I was never ever a quitter. Everything was feeling impossible but that didn’t mean that it was impossible. I felt alone but that didn’t mean I was alone. When people asked how I was doing, of course, I said that I was doing fine. I knew that just like in the past this stupid pain in the everything depression would just burn off like morning fog after the sun comes up. I just had to hold on and keep trying to try. I hated that my sons had to go through the divorce of their parents and I had done everything I could to keep my marriage from ending. I would never want to put them through something that would be more traumatic and even more shameful than a divorce so I focused on staying strong for their sakes. At least in this situatuon, I was the only one in charge of the outcome. If I ever quit trying to try I knew I could be lost like Artax to that tragic Swamp of Sadness. We were all forced to accept the unfair loss of Artax but I refused to accept my own loss. I struggled not to give in to the darkness even though I was finding it harder to totally ignore the dark whispers that suggested I just stop fighting and sink. 

     I was almost glad when I got one flu and then another because it gave me a legit excuse to stay home on the couch in my sweatpants and t-shirt when I wasn’t at work. Recently I had been hating going to the gym. When I did get my ass to the gym I was hating every minute of being there. I was FORCING myself to stay as long as I could but sometimes stopped after a single mile on the elliptical and often skipped the rest of my workout completely. When the flu hit me I didn’t have to hate myself for skipping my morning and evening gym visits. I was too sick to workout and expect to recover in a timely fashion. When I am not depressed I have to force myself to be smart and skip a few workouts if I get a cold or flu but I hadn’t felt like going to the gym for almost a month when I got the flu so this was a bit of a relief. I would stay hydrated and rest and heal up!

     Along came the holidays and for the 1st time since I had to start working full time when my husband left five and a half years earlier, I had a lot of time off from work. I didn’t have the money to go anywhere or a reliable safe vehicle but I was just relieved not to have to get up and get dressed and drive to work worried that my tires were going to blow. I was very very depressed at this point but planned to use the time off work to force myself back into my gym routine as a way to combat this soul-sucking darkness that I was literally feeling for no other reason than something being off balance chemically or hormonally. Mid-forties hormones are whack yo. I had a plan that I knew would work for me. Instead of going to the liquor store I went to the grocery and bought a cart slap full of healthy foods that I love and enough delicious coconut water for a week and a half. I had eleven straight days without having to work and I was going to use it to get my healthy mindset and healthy emotions back in shape while also getting my body back in shape. I let about five people that I always enjoy seeing know that I was available to hang out for the next week and a half. I needed to be with people that make me laugh. I had begun to feel more alone that I have ever felt in my life and wanted healthy interaction. It seemed that everywhere I looked I saw couples. Happy couples. Everyone, no matter their age, weight or hair color had someone to snuggle with, shop with, laugh with.

    You know what Burns wrote about the best-laid plans of mice and men often going awry? Well, that is true for the plans of women too. Unfortunately, everyone was super busy during the holidays or didn’t have any time off from work, or they had gotten the flu too or had spouses or friends that they were spending time with and I only got to do something with someone one day halfway through my time off. That one day was beautiful. I used that day as hope to hold on to and as proof to my doubting self that life is amazing and worth living.  As I previously mentioned, I am a loner and I am pretty self-sufficient. I can be my own mental coach and encourage myself when things don’t go exactly right for the most part but I am in a stage in my life where my kids are grown, I don’t have a partner, I don’t have friends that I see every week. I work in an office with very little interaction with other people. Hardly any conversation is in my life now. Almost zero physical contact a day. I hug my son when I get home and when I go to bed. That is it. My life as a lonely loner was starting to feel unbearable for the first time ever. After years of progress with my self-esteem, I was back to the point of hating my guts. I hated everything about me. I hated my being weak and needy and hated that I was being tempted to give up. I hated that I couldn’t just will myself to be better. I hated myself for hating myself.

     Despite hating everything from my looks with my wrinkles and grey hair to my weight and a closet full of clothes that I can not wear comfortably I just kept encouraging myself to hold on until the darkness ended. I was having two-sided conversations with myself. I only talked to myself about my negative thoughts and feelings. I never wanted to bum other people out with my insignificant problems and if I did get a chance to have an interaction with others I didn’t want to waste it complaining about my own shit. I would never involve someone else in the drama of self-harm urges. No one wants to hear me comparing the dark thoughts about hurting myself (or worse) to having a craving for something that isn’t healthy. You know when you don’t WANT to keep wanting that unhealthy snack that will NOT STOP calling to you from the kitchen? You try to distract yourself or eat something healthy so you won’t still want it and you might even make it into bed without caving but then you can’t fall asleep for imagining giving in and just taking ONE BITE? During my dark times hurting myself (or worse) can keep pestering me the same way.  For no real reason, other than an imbalance in the force. No one wants to hear that and even if they did I didn’t want to share that about myself. I have made promises to not ever do myself harm again and I have kept those promises. I even have a tattoo as a constant reminder to never act on those unhealthy urges.

     I wanted positive interactions with people. I wanted to be someone that someone else would enjoy being around even if I was no longer enjoying being with myself. Rather than saying “woe is me my life is so hard I should just end it all” I was speaking positive things to myself to refute the negative things that were no longer just whispering. I kept encouraging other people if I encountered any and meaning every positive word I said even if I wasn’t feeling it. I was making positive posts on my social media and doing my best to enjoy the scenery and the sunrises and the sunsets and then a few days ago just as unexpectantly as it descended the darkness lifted. 

    Nothing changed with my situation but some chemical or hormone must’ve rebalanced itself and I was released. My spirit was no longer being strangled or trampled on. I was no longer resisting dark urges. I was back to being myself waking up at 4:45 a.m and energetically running on the elliptical by 5:15 doing my Rocky air punches as I ran while jamming to the magical vintage synth of the Eurythmics. Every 20 minutes I would jump off the elliptical and do 10 pushups and jump back on before the 30 second pause caused the machine to reset. 

     In July I had listened to the audio version of a book I had read by Stephen King called Finders Keepers. In the preface are two quotes. The first quote is from Joseph Campbell “It is by going down into the abyss that we recover the treasures of life.” and the second quote is from a character in King’s book and a character in a character’s book in King’s book (King fans will understand how that works) That quote is “Shit don’t mean shit”. The two quotes stayed in my mind while I was going down into the abyss. They sort of became a mantra for me. 

     My life is not bad. I have a great job with very little to no stress. I am renting a house that is a thousand times better than the apartment I had to move into for four years. I don’t live in a location that is freezing cold. I have two wonderful sons and recently gained a daughter-in-law and a 6-year-old grandson. My life is pretty damn good. I just got a second job that allows me to have conversations with people a few nights a week so now I will at least have those interactions while hopefully earning the money to get tires on the minivan.  I try to be a positive influence on other people and I am a happy laid-back person. I am extremely thankful for all of the good things in my life but depression can come out of nowhere for seemingly no reason. Just the same way my low key mania can just come back for no other reason than some whim of my body and brain chemistry. Mania is way more fun and productive than depression but even low key mania has dark dangerous urges disguised as fun times.  Urges that I sometimes have to use my sheer force of will to ignore. Over the last couple of decades, I have gotten really good at not acting on impulses and compulsions. I am thankful that I have this much control nowadays because the past couple of months were a doozie of a depression.

    This morning I saw the progress photos that I had proudly taken to compare my January 1, 2018 smooshy body to my July 1, 2018 fitness. Fortunately, I had just magically come out of my most recent depression and didn’t have a relapse! I have to pave the same stretch of road I paved at the beginning of last year but at least I still see a road ahead of me. That is why I started this long ass post: To say that since I have to keep working on the same thing over and over again I should be called D.O.T. The only reason I won’t change my nickname is that I can’t decide whether to pronounce it Dee-oh-tee (almost rhyming with coyote) or just go by Dot (rhymes with hot). Call me what you will, I got this.

~KiDDṏ