Going the Extra Mile when you have a Specific Destination · 4:58am Jul 27th, 2014
So I've been very morbid and low this week (don't worry, I've probably written more this week than I did all of March and I'm making a new promise of one Demesne a month) and it's taken me all of the week to work out why.
You see, I'm on a good (read; toxic) level of medication at the moment that's really working for me. My mood is better than it's been since... actually I'm not quite sure. Maybe since before the switch in my head flipped, as far back is 2010. Now, I was lucky in that I'd lived with milder, inherited mental illnesses my entire life before I took that head trauma that was the last Jenga block that caused the whole stack to go thermonuclear (never play Jenga with reactors, kids!), so I'd gotten very good at making mental blocks and barriers and defences. One morbid joke I'd make for the longest time is that, if I ever had a Special Talent, it'd be in Not Killing Myself.
Anyone who's followed my blog even remotely knows sometimes, over the years, I get very bad indeed. The thing is, though, I know how to deal with that, in time. It's exhausting, it's a Sisyphusian task, but it's something I had a lot of practice in. It's one skillset I'm good at.
What makes this week so strange, then, is that those mental blockades have been fighting back full tilt, and losing, against something. Which is particularly weird, since I feel great.
Except now I didn't, because I suddenly latched onto the concept of death and, as a nilhilist, the concept of it. It had attached to my brain like a parasitic lamprey, feeding off all my good thoughts and regurgitating its poisonous bile, its vacuous nothingness, in its place. Why? I'd felt great, I'd been super productive... And yet I still had this thing suckling away.
Today it all makes sense, and it's so absolutely astounding I felt compelled to make a blog post about it. So, enough with the preamble, here it is;
This is the first time I've been truly happy enough to not have considered suicide at all, but Capital D Depression means I'm fixated, regardless, on the concept of death, which my defences fight. Only now they're convinced that the idea of dying of old age is a very slow form of suicide and are repulsed, repelling me, from the notion, constantly warning me not to do it every way they know how.
In short, until now death has always been seen as the light at the far end of the tunnel. Only now, now the tunnel's gotten a lot brighter and that end looks so close, and so much darker than the now-so-very-short tunnel.
Now all those mental barriers I had erected to protect me, to save me, are what are what I'm fighting against. Because it's so strange, being actually happy, my mind and body no longer have any idea how to cope with it. They don't know when, or how, to stop, now that they've finally achieved their goal.
And I just think that's pretty great.
So what would that cutie mark look like?
Huh.
Congratulations?
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Somone jumping back onto a cliff.
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Thank you?
It's good to hear you're feeling better, even if your body's going "the hell is that? the hell is this?"
If you ever need someone to talk to, don't be afraid to bend my ear.
Glad you're sort of feeling better. If you don't mind me asking, a head injury triggered your depression?
I'm also selfishly glad there will be more demesne soon.
Have a great day!
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I've always had it, in some way or another, just never bad enough at any given moment to really work it out as such.
Then some guy tried to murder me, beat me to death with his bare hands, and came pretty damned close but for the sake of luck before two people managed to drag him off of me. Since this was still highschool he got off, legally speaking, with only a written apology (mumble grumble), but the trauma pretty much was the straw that broke the camel's back, I believe. Officially it's diagnosed as purely PTSD - and that's probably, certainly, a part of it - but personally I think he rattled something loose that never worked its way back quite right.
God I'm just a little ray of sunshine today, aren't I?
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I have nothing with which to bother you further, but I will bestow unto you the little green thumb of appreciation to signify my acknowledgement and approval. Go in peace, my friend.
2319387 Just, wow.
I'm so glad you're alive still!
Glad you're doing better?
I'm really, really glad your mood's doing better, and also really, really glad that you're still alive. Because the way you seem to view the world, from what I've seen, is a really exciting thing and I'm glad that view is around my life, however tangentially. I'm also glad you're experiencing the kind of whacky, can't-deal-with-it-normally brand of happy, because that's a boatload of A) difference and B) giddy adventure-times, or at least that's been my experience with it.
I mean, I have lower-case, small-print, grayed-out depression comparatively, but I still enjoy those moments of completely mad happiness when they come around. I hope everything remains well and good for you, and I'm very happy you're on a treatment that seems successful.
Also, like Noble Cause, I will extend my PM box as a place to talk if you need it. Best of luck with everything!
Funnily enough, there's actually a bunch of people (including me) who take that actual line of thought seriously!-ish :-P
The idea being that as medicine continues to progress, we'll one day be able to stop the negative effects of aging (physical immortality is an actual thing that exists in the real world; some turtles, lobsters, jellyfish and other animals don't die of old age; which makes sense from a chemistry perspective, since as long as you put energy in a closed you can stave off its entropy).
Anyway, if you're interested, try googling transhumanism or LessWrong :-P
Very good to hear your feeling better, even if you don't know what to DO with that. (A feeling I can relate with, actually.)
And while I am excited to see more Demesne, let's not forget Sonnets, which left off at a MASSIVE cliffhanger last time.
But seriously, it's good to see you feeling chipper.
It's always kinda surreal when you hit that point no?
I can't give any advice on how to make this situation better, but I can suggest that you take this strange feeling, this unique bit of morbidity, and make it into words.
I've certainly never seen a story where a character's mind is rejecting happiness like it is a foreign body.
Aside from that bit of ace advice all I can offer are electronically mediated hugs, I'm afraid.
I recently developed a new philosophy on life based on some layman level understanding of science.
I find it very comforting.
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Care to share?
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Maybe the next time I see ya in chat. It's a bit convoluted and partially based on a scientific principle that turns many people into misanthropic nihilists.
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Brothers in assault-based head trauma!
I've got an old scar on the back of my scalp from a random attack on the street when I was in my early 20s. A roommate and I were walking to the store when suddenly this car screeched to a halt in front of us and three teenagers leapt out, started shouting, and got in our faces. That's where my memory cuts out. My roommate tells me that the first punch thrown knocked me off-balance, and I fell backward, split my scalp open on the curb, and fell unconscious. Head wounds being what they are, it instantly started bleeding like motherfucking everything. The teens, apparently thinking that they'd killed me, freaked out and jumped back in their car, zooming away before the police could arrive. (I thus, with my unintended noble sacrifice, saved my roommate from a beating of his own.)
I awoke in the hospital, and several CAT scans and a mountain of pain medication later, learned that there was no known permanent damage. (If there were any long-term effects, such as the theorized link between brain trauma and becoming a really awesome ponyfic author, they were on a pretty hefty delay timer.) The police interviewed several witnesses but were unable to locate the assailants. The closest to resolution I ever got was that it was either: A) a case of mistaken identity gone horribly awry; or B) I happened to be wearing the colors of a rival wannabe-wigger-street-gang and they didn't stop to ask questions.
I am not following you. Why am I not following you? Now that we have yet another thing in common I should totally rectify that as a gesture of solidarity.