Dips and Devastation

Here’s a little take on Christians and depression I felt led to type up today. Contrary to popular teachings (probably from the same evangelists who punt the health, wealth and prosperity doctrine that God takes no responsibility for), the oxymoron “depressed Christian” is very much a reality. Elijah could fill you in on that one. We just want to find a juniper tree and die beneath it, really.

The thing with depression is that it’s not just feeling miserable and “snapping” out of it, as the perky personality types would suggest. The overall consensus in the mind of the melancholic is that there’s no escaping here. Nothing heralds joy. Your cogs and machinery slide to a weighty halt. And stop there for days at a time sometimes.

What are the triggers? Too much stress, for starters. Those are my perils right now. An uncomfortable living arrangement, feeling financially not only hopeless but trapped here for life (both in this house and with a pile of debt collection papers) and two ways to keep my mind occupied pragmatically. I can work. Or I can sleep. Neither really works that effectively and when I’m unable to do either, I’m lost and restless and start to panic.

The obvious is spending time with God. In His Word. Seeking His heart and mind on my matters. Praying constantly. Any suicidal depressant knows this is virtually impossible on any given day of zero coping mechanism. Thankfully, I can leave it to God and ask for the grace to plod through it. Still, the emotional strain is easier levelled with a Xanor some days. I’ll admit to that. That edge that rips at your headspace like a razor blade is so much nicer when a chemical turns it to cotton wool. That ought to stir up the fundamentalists who have no empathy for the darkened, serotonin craving mind, but unless you’ve been there, the depressant will always be distanced as the leper.

I should point out the difference between the manic and the suicidal. The manic leans towards extremes and is alternatively referred to as bipolar. I know several. I’d rather be in the suicidal division, actually. You know what to expect and you know what to avoid. And it’s pretty much one route...down. What you have to do is focus on making your way back up. At the very least to a functioning level.

What are the remedies? Doctors recommend less stress. In an ideal world, we would have tapped into that one years back. It’s not an option. But we can assess the load we can carry. And learn to say no. We can prioritise the important versus the allegedly urgent. We can’t afford to speculate on the big picture some days. Minutes at a time are much easier.

With regards to the depressed Christian, God gets it. Staying there for too long is not His ideal, but He gets it. He feeds us through it and tells us to rest up. It’s all good. And another contradiction in terms of the fundamentalists who believe science is evil is that medicine is good. Abusing it won’t resolve anything, but thank God He created science. I wouldn’t be a living diabetic if it weren’t for insulin and I wouldn’t be a reasonably functioning melancholic if it weren’t for anti-depressants.

Politics Den

Busy with my first political toon for a kids' history book. Big, bad Britain oppressing little Swaziland here. Haven't finished SZ chick yet since I'm still to find out whether I can use the abbreviation on the chick. I mean, Swaziland is a big word to fit on one small chick here!

Skater Boithdays

Birthday presents and cards all into one for skaterboys special day. Just a quick 20 min toon to keep the fingers flowing and the style loose. And yes, he loved it!