LT. Fumbles Makes Us Sad

Alright, boys, and girls, it’s time for Grandpa Josh to do some teaching.

Pull up a chair, stand, or hunker down on the floor. It makes no never mind to me, I just want you to be comfortable. This won’t be an extended essay, but there’s no need to have sore legs.

Settled?

Okay, then let’s get started.

Today we’re going to talk about depression. I know we’ve tread this topic until it’s well worn and familiar, but. That said, I thought it might be a good idea to take a refresher course. We live in the shadow of Captain Tripps, less attractive special needs cousin Lieutenant Fumbles.

In these days of sickness, quarantine (real quarantine not the underrated American remakes of REC), and idiot leaders determined to kill us all, it’s no surprise people, in general, are depressed. Life has changed, and none of us know when or if it’ll return to something approaching normal.

Deep breath, folks, I’m not going to tell you things aren’t as bad as they seem. That would be lying, and Grandpa Josh tries not to lie. Things are bad. As of this writing, more than 45,000 Americans have died from the sickness. The worst part of this is that almost all of these deaths have occurred since March first. Despite what the conspiracy theorists claims and bald-faced lies from the right, this is going to get worse until we have mass testing and a vaccine.
Those are facts.

Call it COVID-19, the Corona Virus, or the “CHI NA” virus (thank you president racist dumbass) the truth is C19 (what I call it for brevities sake) has changed the world. Things will probably never be the same no matter how much we wish they would be.

What does this have to do with depression?

Patience, I’m getting there.

I remember the first nationally reported cases of HIV/AIDS (or GRID as the homophobes insisted on calling it after it was officially classified as AIDS). What I especially remember was the special issue of LIFE magazine (does anyone else miss LIFE magazine, or is it just me?) with the bold title of AIDS on the cover.

That magazine burned itself in my memory.

For years afterward, the rumor mills dumped uncounted amounts of chaff into the world about AIDS. Only gay men could get it. Only men could spread it. The virus was airborne. And my personal favorite, the virus could be spread from toilet seats. My point is since there were only so many news outlets, sources of fact were limited.

Now we live in the information age (is it still the information age?), and a simple Google search will get you the relevant facts. Again, unless you are a conspiracy nutjob or a rightwing asshole demanding the business and beaches be opened because corporations and multibillionaires need to make bank on our corpses.

Access to almost all information might be doing as much harm as good.

Depression as a mental illness is a real thing. An average healthy person will get depressed when something happens. Loss of a job, natural disaster, death of a pet or loved one, loss of a job, end of a romantic relationship, and of course, severe illness are all perfectly understandable for a serious bout of depression in an average human being.

It’s a bit different for those of us living with mental illness.

This is not to minimize how awful depression is for mentally healthy people. It’s devastating, and the consequences can be dire. What I’m saying is those of us dealing with clinical depression, bipolar disorder, anxiety, phobias, and the multitude of other mental and emotional disorders started out at a disadvantage. The old “One-legged man in an ass-kicking contest” parable.

In other words, we are not handling this very well.

From my personal experience, my symptoms are worse. I’ve spent days on the couch not doing a damn thing, this includes showering and brushing my teeth because there seems to be no point to it.

The aggravation of my agoraphobia has lead to me not even wanting to step outside. I had to go to the grocery store, literally a quarter of a mile away ( no idea what that translates to for you Brits, Canucks, Aussies, and kiwis, and I’m too lazy to look it up) and when I returned home, I slept almost 12 hours.

I either sleep way too much or barely at all.

I’m snappy with my wife and kids, which leads to more depression because I know I hurt their feelings.

As stated before, personal hygiene feels irrelevant, and I mean more than just showering and teeth brushing. I’m not going into it, some things are too embarrassing for even me to share. But I think you can extrapolate.

I’m misplacing things regularly, and if you know me, that never happens.

Nothing makes sense, and everything seems stupid to me.

Oh, but the symptoms of depression aren’t the only problems. Kids I am currently suffering one of the worst manic and OCD episodes of my adult life. Mania has never been my primary symptom, and it isn’t now, but it’s never been this intense.

I am moving small things around the house in some constant attempt to find some alignment of objects. Part of me genuinely believes said alignment will protect my home and family from the forces arrayed against us. I’m not sure who or what those forces are, but I know they’re out there prowling the fenceline.

Waiting.

My mind will not shut down. No matter what, I do thoughts oom through my head at near-supersonic speeds rendering a partial vegetable no longer able to assemble coherent thoughts at my average level of intellect.

Dreams, oh fuck me, the dreams are unbearable. If they were all nightmares, I could probably handle it. I’ve suffered from night terrors most of my life, and weirdly my body has adjusted to them. What I’m dealing with are dreams so intense and realistic that when I wake up, I’m convinced for a moment that the dream was reality and waking is the dream. I know that doesn’t sound so bad, but when it happens four to six nights a week, it is a special kind of hell.
But that’s not the worst, not by a long shot.

I am hearing and seeing things.

I’ve never suffered from hallucinations, and I am not convinced these are real ones. But damnit they feel real. It’s human shapes and whispers. Sometimes I can make out the details of the persona, and sometimes I can understand the words, but never enough to bring clarity to them. It happens without a buildup, and I haven’t bee able to detect a trigger. I know they aren’t real, in my head, but they feel real. I don’t tell my psychiatrist because damnit I’m on enough pills, especially antipsychotics, and those fuckers are no joke.

I fear I might be losing it.

Alright, enough feeling sorry for myself. I know there are a lot of people worse off than me. People with no one to talk to. People being triggered by the other mentally ill people in their lives. People who won’t take therapy seriously and think they can do it on their own.

And, finally, the people I get the most pissed at.

These are the people who, at one time, sought help. They have been prescribed medication. Then, once they were feeling a bit balanced, decided medication is for the people who are really sick and that they are stronger than those poor pitiful people.

Remember, kids, pity is the first step on the road to hatred.

These people, no matter how good and selfless they are when they are balanced, do more damage to the people around them then you can possibly imagine. Unless you live in one of those hellish situations, then you know exactly what I’m talking about.

What does all of this have to do with C19 and depression?

Things are bad, and we’re all suffering. Now more than ever, we need to look out for one another. We need to reach out to those in need. We need to do our best to ease suffering. Whether you’re forced to stay at home, or you’re on the frontlines, we’re all in this together.

Mental illness is my personal cross to bear in these troubled times, and I wanted to share some of that with you. I wanted those of you in similar or worse situations to know you’re not alone. I wanted the people who do the unrecognized job of caring for the mentally ill in their own homes that you are appreciated.

What do I want to convey most of all?

I want you all to know that the only way we’ll gt through this is if we aren’t selfish. If we aren’t mean. And if we aren’t dismissive of the trials and tribulations, our brothers and sister are facing.

What I want is for people to be kind.

- Josh (04/22/2020)