The Fog Of Depression And Rebirth

Posted December 27th, 2007 by David and filed in Posts and blogs

Tags: blog, blogger, blogging, blogosphere, brain, cheer, Christmas, coolphoto, davidlind, hotphoto, interesting, life, lights, love, My photos, My writing, news, Nikon D70, pain, poem, poems, Poetry, posts, talk

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I have been wandering around Blog Land this morning wondering what to do next. It only takes a moment with the stats to realize that all those cheerful Christmas posts I wrote in the past few weeks are old news. Someone has turned out the lights on my stats and I had to laugh about it.

So I stopped in several places and found some bloggers who are doing things that I admire. And I wanted to share them with you. The first has an interesting post about women and the challenges of getting ahead on the net.

http://www.emomsathome.com/blog/2007/09/18/getting-on-the-technorati-a-list-in-a-male-dominated-blogosphere/

This post was packed with information and very enjoyable. It also led me to another blog by a woman who has managed to crack the top ranks while writing about her life. That is quite a challenge as the stat list on the prior blog notes that only 6% of traffic heads in this direction.

I’m sure I am the last person to have noticed her existence. Heather Armstrong and

http://dooce.com/

This was the passage that caught my eye.

“I suffer from chronic anxiety and depression, and I believe it started manifesting itself when I was in high school, maybe earlier. I didn’t seek treatment, however, until my sophomore year in college when I was on the brink of dropping out …”

http://dooce.com/2007/12/13/because-i-couldnt-say-it-phone

I can perhaps experience more sympathy for this person than many because I experienced Dysthymia or recurring bouts of depression from the time I was in high school until now actually. Except that I do not experience it now because of the wonderful results of taking Welbutrin. It does go away! And I only started taking it regularly a couple of years ago. So that means I was dealing with depression for about forty years. And you wonder why I am so cheerful sometimes!

It can take a long time to come to terms with the need for a medication of this kind on a regular basis. She talks about this in a post that breaks my heart. It is so well written and full of pain and honesty. Still…she has made the decision to stay with the medication forever. Or at least until we have left this shadow filled vale of tears. Because that is what it is for someone who is depressed. It starts with a bright day and you may not have a problem in the world. And suddenly there is a very dark cloud moving in on you. Can you think of a day when an afternoon storm rolled in and suddenly you were running to pick up the kids and the lawn chairs before they blew away?

I have a young son who is much like me. With my encouragement he is taking Welbutrin. Keep an eye on the kids! Mine will never experience the torments I endured.

I used to worry that I would lose my soul if I took an antidepressant. I wondered whether I would be able to meditate or experience a full range of emotions in my daily life. The verdict is that I can do this. Recently I wrote a group of poems in about two days. I don’t know where they came from because I had never done anything like this before in my life. I have always enjoyed poetry but was never able to actually focus well enough to be creative.

Blogging actually helped me to reach the point where these were possible. Because it is a creative venture also. And it always will be for me. This is more important than any amount of money I could earn from advertisers. This blog is about redemption and a second chance. It is about life and the force that will eventually reclaim us from the prisons our brains construct for us.

b71e38c6 The Fog Of Depression And Rebirth