Has anyone seen my get-up-and-go?

[Dawn of Hope]

Hey, all, thanks, you all have helped me. Maria, Sara, Mish, Andabelle, I really appreciate all the advice and suggestions and support. Really really appreciate it. Maria, I will have to look up that book--I have heard of it, but that is all. Sara, you are right, I do need to look into all of those things. I need to get out of the house; the weather has been lovely, instead of the overwhelming heat and humidity we normally have at this time of year, and for weeks I've hardly left my house for longer than it takes to walk to the mailbox. Mish, yes, the shelter I spoke of is a no-kill shelter, which is one of the reasons I like them.

I'm feeling a little better. I have work deadlines to meet this week so I have been plugging in to life marginally better. Not much, but a little.

I am a calligrapher, specializing in weddings, which was a fun and exciting thing when my M was healthy. I have issues with it periodically now, where I'll be working with wedding clients and just want to scream, "Don't do it! Sooner or later, your S will put you through he**!" I haven't told any of my professional contacts anything about the pathetic state of my M.

This week I have been working on invitations or save-the-dates for three or four different weddings. In addition, I'm creating a large "wedding guest book" broadside (that term refers to any kind of lettering on a piece of paper that is designed for framing). This piece will be heavily decorated (I will use various colors and lettering styles, some gilding, and will draw and paint flowers and leaves and such) and will have the couple's names and parents' names and vows and so forth, with space for all of the wedding guests to sign at the ceremony, and will be framed for hanging in the couple's home afterwards. This is based on a Quaker wedding tradition. I've done these before on occasion, and although it is more intimidating to execute than an ordinary addressed envelope, the end result is much more gratifying. The every-other-month class I was attending all last year, 500 miles away, was an intensive course in designing and decorating certificates and other items in this manner, although I had had other classes along these lines before. Wedding is this weekend, so I need to get on with it.

I vacillate between feeling kicked to death and unable to even help myself, ready to completely give up on everything, even though the actions I know I should take "shouldn't" be that difficult...and having those thoughts of "Okay, I know this is hard, but I'll just keep at it and I'll get through it." This is one of my big problems...I can't seem to stick with one or the other long enough to make a lot of progress. I go back and forth between wanting to live, and wanting to die. So I stay stuck. This was a major insight I had recently...I am trapped between life and death, unable to choose.

On the one hand, I have come to believe quite firmly that depression really is an illness, that it's not my fault, and that anyone who believes I should just be able to "pull myself up by the bootstraps" and get past it...really has no concept of what it is like. I mean, the fact that I have been struggling to find the most fleeting moments of happiness for 30 years (yes, 30 YEARS!) should clearly indicate that I can't just "snap myself out of it." This is complicated by the fact that depression makes one so discouraged about the prospect of ever feeling better that one loses the will to even try. Sure I want to feel better, just like everyone else does...but it seems like the odds are so bad that it really isn't even worth the effort at all. It is frustrating because I get the impression from a lot of people (including my H) that even though they give lip service to the idea that depression is an illness...they still blame the person who has it for not doing anything about it, because they think it is just something like a little more intense version of "the blues," which people come out of on their own. Kinda like blaming someone with a broken leg for not helping you move furniture..."If you put some weight on it, that would help it to heal!" I dunno, maybe that's not a great analogy. I fully admit that I would hate to deal with someone like me.

At the same time, I hate being a whiny excuse-maker (and I don't want to sound like I blame other people for not having any frame of reference to understand my depression). I don't like people like that, and I don't expect anyone else to like me when I'm being that way either. This is why I withdraw from society when the depression is particularly overwhelming, because I don't want to inflict my darkness on other people. This is why I hide in my house and don't reach out to anyone in my RL unless they catch me at a vulnerable moment. I went to a hairdresser appointment on Monday, and it was the first time I'd left the house or spoken to anyone in four or five days, at least. A few friends have left voice mails for me to see how I'm doing, and I can't seem to get myself to pick up the phone and call them back, as gratifying as it is to know that there are people in my RL who actually care about me.

Speaking of my hairdresser, she told me something interesting. In fact, she was practically bouncing with eagerness to tell me (and she's 50 years old, so not exactly a young whippersnapper!). She worked with H's sister, until SIL moved a couple of states away a year ago, so since SIL did the hair of almost everyone in the family, my current hairdresser got to know us all a little over the years of working at the same salon as SIL.

I had spoken to SIL about my M sitch shortly after it started, because she caught me at a bad time once. I know, not a good idea to talk to H's family about what he was doing wrong, and I didn't want to put her in an awkward position, but I thought she would have some sympathy because she went through a similar but even worse sitch with her first H, whom she finally D'd after 18 years of cheating and manipulation and verbal abuse, and who still hasn't changed his stripes, a dozen years later (she's remarried, more happily, it seems). BTW, I never got the impression that _anyone_ in my H's immediate family was all that fond of me, although they weren't rude or anything. I always felt that I was a bit persona non grata because I am of a different faith, declined to take the family name (I still use my birth name exclusively...funny, nobody ever asked H why he still uses HIS birth name!), and declined to provide the family with any grandchildren...among my more obvious sins.

Anyway, my hairdresser (C.) and SIL talk sometimes, and C. said that a few weeks ago, SIL asked her about me. She said she didn't tell her anything except that I was doing well, my business was improving and my work was appearing in a certain major international bridal publication (both the spring and summer editions this year, and summer is on the stands right now!). SIL was surprised to hear that I was doing well, it sounds like. She asked C. if H and I were going to D (I guess either SIL doesn't talk to my H much, or she wanted to get another person's take on the sitch...maybe she suspects my H has been lying to her too?), and C. told her she stays out of that line of discussion, as she doesn't want to be in the middle of it (a partial lie, as she does ask me). C. hasn't seen my H since SIL moved last year, so it's not like she has to make nice with him, but she does talk to SIL. Anyway...(boy, it sure is taking me a long time to get to the point!) ...SIL said she never really got to know me, and now she wished she had...and she asked C. to tell me that she wished me the best. That was interesting...and my response was to smile and say, "So it only took her 23 years to decide she wanted to get to know me better?" Heh, normally I don't actually say that sort of thing out loud...only in my head!

I'm not really looking for advice on the SIL/hairdresser sitch, or much of any of the rest of this, I guess, unless someone has something in particular to say about it. I think this post is mostly just venting and journaling. I do wish I knew how to deal with this whole depression-procrastination-hibernation-avoidance state without drugs, which aren't really in my budget right now and are limited in what they can do anyway.

Tomorrow I have a tutoring session with one of my calligraphy students, which is always fun. Then I have a lot of work to do on this "wedding guest book" piece.

And that's...the rest of the story. Thank you all for keeping me company on this wild ride.

Peace,
Dawn