The Black Dog

Winston Churchill, political innovator and legend, is known to have had a drinking problem, spurred by his association with what he termed "the black dog."  Historians acknowledge that he was referring to the beast of depression.  Since several people have asked me lately what depression is like, I thought it was time I write a little about my own experience with it.

I would say that Postpartum depression strikes me at around two months after having a baby, but it doesn't strike.  It creeps up on me, like a shadowy stink.  I bar the doors and batten the windows to no avail--it slithers through the cracks of my conscience and roots itself deep somewhere in my mind.

I am writing this blog post because depression is something everyone loves to talk about these days, when it has to do with someone else.  Maybe that is because it is difficult to express what depression is like at a personal level.

My experience with it has been unique to me, but I am sharing it because it may help some of you who are either struggling with this yourself, or know someone who is.

For me, postpartum depression coincides with the start of my post-childbirth-hair-falling-out-fun.

I first began noticing my recent bout with depression was returning a couple of weeks ago.  The gloom of it started trickling into my heart, leadening it, shaping it into something I don't recognize.  I sat on the couch in my sun-filled family room, watching my children dance lightly to childish songs, and I felt the silhouette of my emotional self slipping.  I was being pulled away from the rest of my being, down a dark slope into a thorny place I don't feel safe in.  I dug my fingers into the murky walls, I stalled my feet; nothing I did could stop my descent.

I desperately willed myself to remain fully with my children, to remain fully with my own self.  Helplessly I cried out soundlessly in the recesses of my soul, tears filling my eyes.  I smiled more brightly than I had even a minute before in order to force my consciousness to ignore my inner slipping.  "Great dancing, kids!" I mustered, the enthusiasm in my voice exhausting me, my effort to remain fully engaged with the events around me depleting my energy.  But I no longer felt completely part of that world.

And now, I am plagued by pricking heaviness.  It drags behind me like an anchor, the bungling chain clasped around my heart. I fight during my day to keep the miserable feelings at bay--I prefer to be happy, sunny, warm.  Despite monumental effort on my part, the Black Dog of depression robs me of my agency to choose how I am feeling.  It chooses for me weightiness, disapproval of myself, and the desire to isolate myself from those around me.  I cannot choose to push those feelings away.  I can only choose how I look and sound to others.  I can only choose to look how I wish I was feeling.

I don't choose to pretend my way through a happy and satisfying day because I want to fool everyone.  I choose to act like the person I know I really am because I am trying to fool myself.  I don't want to have this problem.  I don't want to feel the shadow on my back.  I don't want my positive thoughts to be pricked by gloomy claws, leaking the great, gleaming drops of sunshine from my mind that I work so hard to restore on a daily basis.

For the most part, those glistening drops never fully leave me.  I wish to believe I am too optimistic a person and fighting too fiercely for happiness to ever let that happen.  But I don't know if that is true.

Depression whispers vilely in my mind.  The shadow tells me things that reflect my deepest fears.  "Your children deserve a better mother than you,"  "Your husband couldn't possibly love you as much as you need him to,"  "You are not living up to the person you should be."  I know these are untruths, and I choose to ignore them--to give them any credence whatsoever only serves to grow the depression into something I can't control.  But those barbed needles don't fully unstick themselves from my conscience, and I trip over them when I think too hard.

The only thing I can do at an emotional level that helps in any remarkable measure is to stop focusing on how I am feeling.  The depression is real, and the feelings it creates in me are real, but they are also false.  The more I pay attention to my false feelings, the more I get stuck in a wallowing, tarry pit.  The real feelings I love to have are still there, but they are smaller, and they are flat.  The nuances are gone, the depth has dissipated, the flavors are hollow.  They feel frustratingly forced.

As cheesy as it sounds, looking at and smelling my little babies gives me the best rush of true happiness I know of.

Small acts of kindness are gifts I can give to others, which in turn give me the gift of heightened happiness, if only for a short time.  But infrequent, large acts are not as helpful--the rush of joy still leaves quickly; remaining focused on the needs of others is the balm that lasts.  It is also helpful when I stay busy.  Even though my weighted body is physically fatigued and cries out for a nap or any other means of disconnecting my mind from the world, the adrenaline of activity keeps me powered.  The rush of endorphins from completing a difficult task gives me strength to do more.  When I stop moving, stop doing, stop creating, the dark shadow invades me further.

Even though I know my postpartum depression will abate before my baby turns a year old, that one day I will wake up and my heart will feel lighter, fluffier, more energized, and it will keep improving from there, I still fight feelings of bitterness and fear that I am being robbed of enjoyment of these tender years.  "Kids grow so fast," people say, "Hold tight, before you know it, these years will be gone."  I smile, and nod, and agree.  And inwardly, I cringe.  The worst part of depression is that you can never go back and re-experience those moments lost--you can never feel them in the lighthearted way you know you normally would.  And so you have to manufacture your memories, building them around the way you know you would have wanted to feel.

I am taking advantage of various available treatments as a bridge until the postpartum depression resolves itself, and I am grateful for the ever-increasing amount of knowledge we have about it.  I have learned over the years what helps me cope and what doesn't, and so far this recent bout has been very manageable.

You may think I am writing a tragedy.  I am not.  One of the most beautiful parts of this life is learning to appreciate the joys.  I think I am learning to do that.  And the story of my Black Dog is not my only story--nor is it my biggest one.  I have spent much more of my life without its companionship than with it.  I am a wife to a wonderful, loving man.  I am a mother to five children I will always view as extraordinary.  Even more, I am a reader, a writer, a dreamer, a baker, a scholar of humanity.

I am a person with depression.  And that is okay.