Happy New Et Cetera. In case you mistakenly stumbled on this barely-understandable cavalcade of miserablist mediocrity while searching for a "Travelling Miser-List", I occasionally partake in making artistically vacuous comics to try and encapsulate various aspects of living both with depression and the application Pages®. I'm not sure how much there is to be gained from explaining these in any depth, since if I have to do this then obviously I've categorically failed in communicating the message in the comics themselves. However since they're largely monochrome doodles of stick figures I think this is probably a reasonable precaution. I shan't do all of them because honestly I should vacuum at some point. I'll start with this one because I imagine almost everyone has had this kind of experience. Whether a PhD thesis or not, having some absolutely monumental task or project that you know you have to do within some deadline. I don't get this feeling as often anymore but sometimes even small-ish tasks (like updating my CV) take on this monstrous guzzling form and make me want to hide in a bin. I hope no-one ever feels personally affronted if I deliver this kind of appallingly non-committal response but as I've intimated before, actually opening up to somebody (particularly if you've had any thoughts of self-harm) that is outside your immediate family and very close friends can be an all but insurmountable task. All that being said... sometimes I might just be tired k? This is one of the hardest ones to explain because, as I said above, tiny tasks can become all but impossible if you're having a bad day and actually achieving anything can be a huge ask. From personal experience I've had a couple of days where the sum total of my meaningful activities involved "leaving the flat, albeit very briefly". As understanding as most people are, getting anything beyond a (totally totally expected) response along the lines "so what?" is pretty unlikely. Although I guess small-talk is largely just noise, isn't it? Popularised in a book by Matthew Johnstone, although originally coined by Winston Churchill, a lot of people have come to refer to depression as the "Black Dog". One of the early things I chose to do in these little comics was represent the concept of depression as an insidious blob instead. There were two reasons for this: the first is that I think it's too easy to identify positively with a dog even if it is laying over your face. You don't see black dog owners the world over complaining about how miserable they are, at least to my knowledge. The second was that it's hard to draw a dog. So lay off, yeah? I do like the blob though: the idea of some thick tar-like substance slithering down your head conveys something of the almost tangible weight of depression that can feel like you're drowning in molasses made of sad. This one is fairly straightforward and is the first one I made. Again, there's no malice in this one towards the other party in the conversation. It'd be naive and selfish to imagine that non-depressed people can somehow intuitively mind-read your exact wishes. In any case sometimes the best meaning housemate can just trap you in a cycle of forced one-sided conversation. I miss University life sometimes, but not on a bad day. This is the WORST. If I had a dollar for every time my other half, in the most positive and understanding way a person can be, offered me this kind of conversation and the best I could manage was that I wanted to do something but every single suggestion made me want to eat myself with sadness and terror at leaving the house... I'd probably have maybe $100, if I'm being honest. Which I am. Sorry for being realistic. The last one I made and maybe my favourite? The point here might be a bit vague though. The gist is that, for me and some associates at least, the exact event or misfortune that instigates a despair-spiral can be something totally innocuous or even markedly less-upsetting than similar things recently experienced; I once became profoundly upset because I forgot one item on a shopping list. You might have a day where you fall into stinging nettles, break two windows, forget your Mum's birthday, and get a speeding ticket without so much as a frown and end up in the fetal position hiding under a blanket wishing you were dead because somebody stepped on your toe at McDonalds.
It's nonsense, and it hopefully contributes a little more to the argument that depression is somewhat more complex than just "being sad". So next time I respond that I'm "fine, just tired" maybe it's because I've become profoundly miserable at my perceived meaningless empty existence or maybe I just dropped my last grape. Swings and roundabouts.
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Author28 year old computer scientist/physicist with major depressive disorder, a need to write, and a deep-rooted mistrust of beetroot. Categories
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February 2018
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