Something is Better than Nothing
I don’t think I realized living in the mountains would teach me so much about my mental health.
When I moved down to the Gunnison Valley to work for a small school that I knew nothing about, I fell in love instantly. With the school, the people, the land. It’s hard to describe the beauty down here — the sky’s a different shade of blue and the mountains stand as immense, quiet guards over those who are drawn here.
Because this is a place where souls are drawn.
When I made the move, I thought I had a pretty solid handle on my mental health. I knew what my depression looked like, knew how to cope with things that triggered my anxiety. I was sure I knew what to expect. These dual forces have been with me for over ten years; there was no way the hooligans could throw something new at me, not in this place where I felt more like myself than I ever had before.
Lol. Joke’s on me. Again.
It was an odd feeling to realize my mental health was sincerely suffering while going through the motions of normal daily life. I was still making it to work on time and spending time with my partner. I took my daily walks around campus. I wasn’t spiraling out and acting dangerously like I have when my mental health’s taken a dip in the past. It was like an out-of-body experience to look at my behaviors, thought patterns, and physical presence and go, “Oh shit. I’m depressed.”
It’s the “Oh shit” moment that forced me to pause. Because it felt like such a surprise.
Which is ridiculous. I acknowledge that I have this disease — I talk about it all the time. I know that it’s chronic. I recognize that I’ve had it for years. I’ve accepted that it will be with me for the rest of my life. I have a pretty good idea of the kind of pain to expect.
And those two managed to outfox me again.
I had the “Oh shit” moment in mid-November and I had it again in when I came back to the mountains after the holidays. It was a moment when I looked around at this spectacular world, at this insane life that I’d fought like hell to find and never could have imagined and I felt…nothing.
I didn’t feel hate or angst or sadness. I didn’t feel resentment. I didn’t feel despair. I didn’t feel the need to destroy everything around me.
I felt nothing. Nada. I’ve never been more in love with the life that I’m living and I couldn’t feel a damn thing.
I wouldn’t wish it on another living being.
I stared at mountains that used to move me to tears and couldn’t muster a shrug. I made meals that I’d dreamt of cooking and didn’t taste them. I filled the first home that’s ever belonged to just me with flowers and candles and music and felt so empty. I finally started skiing again — something that I’ve wanted to do for years — and struggled to smile when I finally reached the bottom of the hill.
I’ve never had a depressive period that’s felt this way. Void. Empty. Nothingness.
That feeling of nothingness is the scariest face of this disease I’ve had to stare down because it slipped in without me even noticing. I was living this beautiful life full of love and laughter and this insanely deep feeling of nothingness slipped in the back door and set up shop inside of me. And then asserted control.
It felt like I had been swallowed up into eternal darkness, darkness that sucked the breath from my lungs as I floated in a sea with no waves, no movement, no coastline in sight.
Without breath, how was I supposed to cry for help? Without light, I couldn’t possibly know that help was out there.
Stuck in darkness like that, it’s hard to believe light will ever return.
I’m one of the lucky ones — I’ve lived long enough to know that things always get better. I have supportive humans who hold me up when my brain feels too heavy to carry around. I have access to mental healthcare and have had the chance to talk to a few therapists down here who assure me that I’m ok.
I’m lucky because I recognize the importance of fighting through the days of nothingness to get back to the place where life feels overwhelmingly full. I’m lucky because I’ve listened to the din of dark days swell into a symphony of song time and time again.
I know that it will get better.
But what do you do when a full life suddenly feels empty?
I’ve noticed myself pulling out of that unrelenting void over the last ten days. The depression made one false step — it let in a faint sliver light into the dark and I’ve been swimming like a mad woman toward it ever since. Last night, I felt myself break the surface of that stifling, unmoving sea. I filled my lungs with fresh air, gulping it down after slowly suffocating for months.
This morning, as I made the same walk to work that I made yesterday and the day before and every day since I have entered the dark, I heard to the birds sing. The winter sun kissed my cheek. Diamonds danced in the snow. I let a few tears slide from behind my sunglasses. I filled my lungs completely. I caught a glimpse of the mountains that I’d first fallen in love with over my shoulder, standing guard.
Because there it was. It stirred in my brain. I felt it in my chest. I looked around at the world and felt something. I promise that feeling something is infinitely better than feeling nothing.
Keep going, friends. Keep going.
