{"id":12325,"date":"2014-04-08T06:33:46","date_gmt":"2014-04-08T06:33:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/04\/08\/depression-is-hard-to-understand-because-it-is\/"},"modified":"2014-04-08T06:33:46","modified_gmt":"2014-04-08T06:33:46","slug":"depression-is-hard-to-understand-because-it-is","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/2014\/04\/08\/depression-is-hard-to-understand-because-it-is\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"
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Depression is hard to understand, because it is not a consistent state. Depression is rather like a virus, but like a virus, it has its manageable days and its acute, life-threatening flare-ups. You can be in a depression and still laugh at a friend\u2019s joke or have a good night at dinner or manage low-level functioning. You grocery shop and stop to pet a puppy on the corner, talk to friends in a caf\u00e9, maybe write something you don\u2019t hate. When this happens, you might examine your day for clues like reading tea leaves in a cup: Was it the egg for breakfast that made the difference? The three-mile run? You think, well, maybe this thing has moved on now. And you make no sudden moves for fear of attracting its abusive attention again. <\/p>\n

But other times\u2026<\/p>\n

Other times, it\u2019s as if a hole is opening inside you, wider and wider, pressing against your lungs, pushing your internal organs into unnatural places, and you cannot draw a true breath. You are breaking inside, slowly, and everything that keeps you tethered to your life, all of your normal responses, is being sucked through the hole like an airlock emptying into space. These are the times Holly Golightly called the Mean Reds.<\/p>\n

I call it White Knuckling it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\n

Miles and Miles of No Man\u2019s Land<\/a>, Libba Bray (via babybirched<\/a>)<\/p>\n

“But the stigma of depression is that it comes with the sense that you shouldn\u2019t have it to begin with. That it is self-indulgence or emotional incompetence rather than actual illness.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

(via sonchorizos<\/a>)<\/p>\n

whoa.<\/p>\n

(via keeperofthehouse<\/a>)<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it\u2019s White Knuckle Time, you will have to remind yourself to stand in the middle of the subway platform, well away from the edge.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201c<\/span>There is an undertow to depression. It doesn\u2019t take you all at once. It leaves you with some false sense that you are coping. That you are in control. That you have the shore still well in sight, until, at some point, you raise your head to find yourself all alone, battered by rough seas with absolutely no idea which way you should swim.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Jesus, every damn word of this post. It\u2019s remarkable.<\/span><\/p>\n

(via foulmouthedliberty<\/a>)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Depression is hard to understand, because it is not a consistent state. Depression is rather like a virus, but like a virus, it has its manageable days and its acute, life-threatening flare-ups. You can be in a depression and still laugh at a friend\u2019s joke or have a good night at dinner or manage low-level … Continue reading <\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"quote","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[33],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12325"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12325"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12325\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.firechildren.net\/lightfire\/iamthefirechild\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}