There are many different types of depression.
Some forms of depression can cause people to ruminate/dwell and fixate on what they perceive to be negative, making people catastrophize, blow things out of proportion, and fall into a downward spiral of misery.
Some cause people to become bitter & hate themselves, and/or others, filling them with despondency, apathy, frustration & a sense that things are so broken they’ll never be fixed so why even bother.
Some people have very deep levels of compassion & without knowing how to process & apply things properly, can fall prey to depressive thinking, too, just because the pain they sense from others can cause them to experience empathy that leads to overwhelming feelings of pain to a point where it’s too much and a person just wants to escape it all.
All forms of depression are self-perpetuating & keep the sufferer in a prison of warped and delusional thinking, distorting reality & logic to reinforce the harmful and debilitating thoughts and fears of worry, self-harm, anxiety, hopelessness, etc.
People diagnosed with the same disorders can even experience depression differently. I only know a few other people with Borderline Personality Disorder, but so far, this has been my experience with the specific form of depression that often accompanies BPD.
When I wake up in the morning, it’s never pleasant. No matter what day, no matter what the circumstance, no matter how much sleep I’ve gotten or who I am or am not next to, I never feel rested, nor refreshed nor like I want to get up and face the day. Every single morning, I wake up with difficulty and my first thoughts are always to go back to sleep. I don’t want to be awake ever really, the only thing that keeps me up is that my dreams are often worse than waking life.
When I finally accept the unfortunate reality that I HAVE to get out of bed, I sit up in bed & just do nothing but dread the day. Every morning I sit there and just deliberate… It’s all I can do to keep all the thoughts of ending everything right then and escaping life (yes, right after I wake up all day long until I’m unconscious again and then even in my dreams too) but at least now they’re just thoughts that hinder my motivation & mood alone, not something that actually threaten my safety anymore.
After I finally have started my day, there are brief pauses, momentary reprieves in the constant deafening roar of emptiness inside of my chest that is always ringing and pounding in me like I’m terrified that something’s chasing me. I always feel this way. I’m paranoid, tense, scared, looking behind me always, feeling a fog drifting over me, threatening to disconnect me further from my brain, body, and life. I feel a darkness at the edges of my perception always threatening to creep in and overtake the light. There’s a cold chill in the volatile and unstable reality I exist in. I can’t ever shake it no matter what I do. I can be surrounded by people who love me and still feel like I’m going to die in the next very moment.
I’m depressed because I live in a fictional hell that’s been constructed in my mind due to the fact that I was raised in a dark and scary environment as a kid. I could never let go of that feeling of instability, that the world and all in it, most of all the PEOPLE in it, were dangerous and unpredictable. I learned as a kid to not trust anything or anyone, not even myself, because what seemed to be a certainty, such as parents love their kids, or home is safe. My dad is dead as of about a year now, and I’m still scared. I’m still depressed. I still don’t wanna move my body or think or interact with people or even exist a lot of the time.
Sometimes I feel stupid. I’m depressed, but nothing’s so bad right now. I’m scared, but I’m safe. I’m miserable, yet happy. It’s illogical and nonsensical how my external situation and even who I am as a person have changed so much, yet I can’t ever seem to escape this childhood reality of fear I’ve created and trapped myself in. I blame my father for it and claim he trapped me, but that’s not true. Once I became old enough to realize I didn’t have to be in there, it was my choice to stay put. Now, I’m trying really hard to get out, but it’s still terrifying and the most difficult thing ever.
I wish there were an easy out, some easy fix to depression causing me to waste my life away. There’s not, so I just need to stop dwelling on the fact that I’m procrastinating since that will just contribute to the misery, guilt, and self-fulfilling prophecy. I’m sick of logical fallacies, downward spirals, and making excuses for myself. I’m so tired, I’m always so incredibly exhausted, but I believe that things will get better. For once. I actually believe it to be true ❤ Haribol!
Jax Bayne 