Commentary from January 1, 2017
When people don’t understand that just getting out of bed is a major accomplishment when you’re in the depths, talking about exercise and volunteering sounds like goals for other, very different people.
It isn’t to slag exercise or volunteering, but the deeper your depression goes, the more those kinds of goals become out of reach.
After posting this, I did get the usual “but exercise worked for me!” posts that kind of missed the point. There’s a scale to depression that I think exists and not only are people on different places on the scale but their place changes from moment to moment as well. I enjoy running, but I also have times where it takes all my energy to lift my head. So advice like this isn’t particularly helpful when I’m in the darker side of the scale, when managing the essentials of my life is a challenge in itself let alone going for a run.
As for the strip itself, it was nice to return to this kind of comic, it’s the kind of comic that depcom started off as being, and it returns to the two characters that started the strip. One person mentioned in the comics that they’d like to see these two get together, but that will not happen because she just cannot understand depression. She believes that if she says the right thing he’ll snap out of it, which we know isn’t going to happen. He has a strong tendency to shut people out which is not exactly great for relationships. It’s really based on a totally platonic friendship I had in university that dissolved itself.
It isn’t to slag exercise or volunteering, but the deeper your depression goes, the more those kinds of goals become out of reach.
After posting this, I did get the usual “but exercise worked for me!” posts that kind of missed the point. There’s a scale to depression that I think exists and not only are people on different places on the scale but their place changes from moment to moment as well. I enjoy running, but I also have times where it takes all my energy to lift my head. So advice like this isn’t particularly helpful when I’m in the darker side of the scale, when managing the essentials of my life is a challenge in itself let alone going for a run.
As for the strip itself, it was nice to return to this kind of comic, it’s the kind of comic that depcom started off as being, and it returns to the two characters that started the strip. One person mentioned in the comics that they’d like to see these two get together, but that will not happen because she just cannot understand depression. She believes that if she says the right thing he’ll snap out of it, which we know isn’t going to happen. He has a strong tendency to shut people out which is not exactly great for relationships. It’s really based on a totally platonic friendship I had in university that dissolved itself.
“Just do the things that you try to do and fail at every day”
As someone’s that’s been there in that bed — The hell those aren’t goals.
my bladder was the main reason i accomplished one of those goal in some cases
’tis a life-saving organ, some days.
Getting out of bed is absolutely a goal.
When people don’t understand the level at what you’re functioning, they don’t understand that even the “smallest” of goals remains a challenge.
I did all those things. Still wanted to die.
I go to work everyday. I even got a second job. I try to walk to places that are close by. I’ve gone out and seen friends, went to a party recently. People don’t understand that when you’re in the throes of misery, or worse (imo) absolute emptiness, nothing helps.
I can’t have a “good time” when I’m with people I supposedly love and can’t feel a fucking thing. It’s even more isolating. Laughter feels completely foreign, but you fake it so that you don’t bum people out. Literally everything bores you. Why do things that are supposed to help you feel better when, 1) they often don’t, and b) when they don’t they end up making you feel worse?
I’m so tired of faking it. I’m tired of people treating me like I’m made of glass. I’m tired of having to comfort other people about MY struggles. What’s worse is I feel like I deserve to feel this way.
I’m right there with you. Work two jobs, have a hobby, son makes me go for walks with him and I still have to take a lot of meds. My second job I have to deal with the public (retail work) so I have become good at acting normal.
I have heard the line, “fake it until you make it” way too many times. What do you do when you have been faking it for 40 years and you still haven’t made it? Beside the meds and therapy, the thing that has made the biggest difference is having a few people I can talk to about it without them getting uncomfortable.
I also feel like I deserve to feel the way I do.
I hear you on this. I am often criticized as being quiet, when in reality I’m so focused on trying to look like I’m enjoying myself I’m afraid that if I open my mouth I’ll reveal how absolutely numb I feel. So I agree with everything and just try to be a human being that people would be around because that’s what I’m supposed to do. The act is exhausting.
Sorry to hear you’re having problems with the Mask. I don’t think most people without the disease really understand that socializing, something as natural to them as breathing, is the equivalent of running a marathon with an asthma attack when you’re depressed.
Hiya Jingles! What a cheery name for such a depressed person (jk.) Honestly though I know what you mean! Sometimes I feel like us with so-called “mental illnesses” are actually more switched on than those around us. We dont buy the moronic zombie-like 9-5 existence. Do what youre told and question nothing! We’re fed up and sometimes depression is really just waking you up to something thats not right within you. Maybe try looking deeper to find out what that is? Therapy, meditation, singing, mindfulness, poetry, music, buddhism, blogging, art, selling cosmetics and other things as a flexible self employed job I do, vlogging…i find these things can be highly therapeutic and confidence inducing! I still have bad days but these things help shine light into the dullness and humdrum. Maybe find your passion, what makes you burn inside with joy and stick to it like glue!
“So-called ‘mental illnesses'”? I know you’re trying to be helpful, but you’re honestly undermining an illness I’ve been struggling with my whole life. You’re underestimating how much it sucks the joy out of everything, even your passions. You’ve made many assumptions (that I don’t have a passion, that I hate my job) and haven’t processed what I actually said in my comment.
Oh sorry! I didn’t realize my comment made you feel bad. Maybe its best to delete it. Take care ☺ xx
So glad I chose to read the comments on this one! (Generally I try not to read comments on the interwebs, as a rule 😛 ) But the second paragraph especially resonated with me. I’m the same. I feel like I have a higher-than-normal sense of responsibility to whatever I see as “authority” at the moment. I credit my perfect attendance in junior high and high school to that. And now I feel that’s what keeps me going to my job every day even though there are a lot of days I wake feeling incapable of moving at all.
But the middle part you talked about really helped addressed a spot where I’ve been feeling ‘broken’, even by depression standards. Because to me it seems like most people feel some connection to their friends and family that I just don’t have. (Or most people who had a similar upbringing as me I guess. My family was…. fine. Sure, they made mistakes, but I was never abused or neglected or made to feel I was unloved.) It just feels like everyone I talk to thinks it must be ‘tough’ being away from my family. I must ‘miss’ them. It must be ‘hard’ that I usually only see them once or twice a year. It’s not though. What’s tough is my mom calling every week or so and saying “I just called because it’s been awhile since I talked to you!” Great. And now I need to come up with something to say…? Add to that I’ve recently had friends just flat out stop contacting me, no explanation, nothing. Probably sick of putting up with me and my moods. But that’s fine. I’d rather my parents DIDN’T call unless they had a specific reason to. When I go back to see them (usually for Christmas) I generally just want to get it over with so I can get back to my dull but predictable existence. I’m fine with my friends pulling out of my life because now I don’t feel obligated to go out with them and fake like I’m having fun so as not to ruin THEIR night. I honestly feel like I wouldn’t care if I didn’t talk to friends or family for months or even years. And I was a little afraid this made me sound like a sociopath. It didn’t seem to fit into the depression that I already knew was an issue until I read your response. It’s just another way of illustrating to me how this disease really sucks, but it actually gave me a little relief to recognize it’s just a bigger part of “the monster I know” instead of a whole different monster.
Jeanette Richardson this tho
I hate to sound like a shipper but I’d love to see these two get together.
They probably won’t, because she lacks the understanding necessary to be with him. I think she feels if she says the right words he’ll snap out of it, and to him this is his normal, there is nothing to snap out of.
Too true. Other people can’t understand how this can be normal for us, and we can’t understand their version of normal. (I think you have covered that a couple of times in the past)
ah bill, it’s nice to see a reply to the comic about the characters and not someone talking about themseleves. It’s nice to be able to enjoy these comics as comics and not just as a mirror for self discussion.
I feel you, bill. I have been following these two for way too long now. But ah well, Clay knows the best.
When I first started depression comix, one of the things I decided early on was that depression would be the main focus of the strip, and character development would only happen if it furthered some kind of understanding of the illness. Depression, not the characters you see, is the main character of the comic. The characters you see only exist as conductors, so we can see depression at work. Every comic must show something about depression, and that has been the way I approach every strip since #1.
It might be an idea to have a secondary strip to flesh out the characters that appear in the comic, but unfortunately depression comix takes precedence right now.
This is the most novel and original strip. I have learned a lot about how I have felt in the past. But now with the help of the Lord, His patience and love I am functioning OK. Not working and taking meds but on the other side of the depth of this guys paralysis. Being married is a real test and after 50 or so years of schizophrenia and depression I am functioning. But the Lord got me over the top.
The two goals I have been able to achieve every day are getting out of bed and bathing. Anything beyond that is a bonus. The one long-term goal I have is to get a service dog so I can begin to build a new life; very slow progress on that one.
I once talked to someone who tried to convince me that all I had to do to improve my life was to set some goals. When I tried to explain that I wasn’t capable of doing that, he assumed I was lying just to confuse him and gave up on me. I guess he failed to notice the almost catatonic state I was in at the time: sitting motionless, staring at a fixed point unblinking, needing a minute or more to respond to questions, and speaking in a monotone.
Hmmm. Maybe I am starting to get better. I lay in bed for a long time but once I get up, turn on lights, and turn on loud fast music I feel better. I just have to remember that every morning.
This resonates with me so much.
my own personal experience with getting out of it, is that it’s exactly as simple as happy people say.
except that the form of simple is more like a needle. and if all i need in order to get happy is that needle, and depression has hidden it in a haystack…
it’s not exactly easy to find.
there was a switch to turn off depression and despair.
but it took me over a decade just to find it.
and finding it sort of required stumbling into a place i didn’t even know existed.
but it really was as simple as happy people insist, when i could just find that switch.
and that was what took so much work that no happy person will ever understand.
i’ve also found that the way i am now, the only real difference between myself and a naturally happy person, is that i have knowledge of the perceived impossibility of finding the way out. and by that i mean i now often have to add an acknowledgement of the difficulties when i talk to people who are less lucky than me, or i’d be giving as hopelessly annoyingly horribly tailored advice as any other happy person.
it seems to be s symptom of happiness that one forgets about all the details which are so important to less happy people.
which also means i should watch some really sad videos before engaging in any activity that requires serious attention to detail.
though it often works to just empathize with a sad person.
I appreciate your taking the time to write but there is no “switch” for turning depression off, like there is no “switch” to turn any illness off. This metaphor is incredibly unhelpful.
Ugh, it’s so annoying when people act like what works for them will work the same way for everyone. “You should exercise because exercise always makes me feel better!” Well, good for you. For me, the emotional effects of exercise (or attempting it) vary, and I don’t completely understand why just yet. Thanks for not asking.