What does Depression feel like? : Part 2

My days go like this:
I wake up. The depression is a tiny seed again, something manageable. I brew coffee, I feed the cat, I feed myself. I am currently unemployed and not in school, so the content of the day - and whether I have plans - is entirely dependent on the availability of the few people I have in my life.
I make sure to get out every day. On many days, I have appointments - therapist, dietitian, psychiatrist, doctor...they help sometimes, but always temporarily when I'm in a depression.
I try to give my cat the attention he deserves and I do my best to connect with other humans. I have learned that this is vital for my mental health and my will to be alive. My relationships are my highest value, and they are the reason I choose to stay alive, even when my brain turns on me.
Which it always does by nightfall, when I'm in a depressive episode, as I currently am. That seed grows into a worm, and then a tumor until it takes up almost all of the space inside of me. Sometimes I can't cry - that's how it was for years. Lately sometimes it feels like crying is all I CAN do.
I curl into the fetal position on my couch with my computer and cell phone visible and within reach on the coffee table, hoping to hear from someone. Sometimes I reach out myself, but I rarely communicate what demons are overtaking me. They have no names and the majority of the time there is no rhyme or reason to them. They simply come; roaches in my skull.
Tonight I was brave. I dragged myself into the shower, holding onto the curtain for support, and somehow managed to get dressed and drive to the only open coffee shop in my neighborhood at this hour. That's where I am now. I am waiting to feel tired enough to go home, type this up, and (hopefully) fall asleep within a few hours.
Because as though the depression weren't agonizing enough on its own, it is often accompanied by unresolvable insomnia. For many chronic insomniacs the sleeping meds stop working as they develop a tolerance, as I apparently have, yet again. Add that to the mental checklist of things to tell my psychiatrist next week.
Years of depression have dulled my ability to hope. Years of treatment have somewhat revived it, but when I am depressed I also become incredibly irritable at times, which makes it very difficult to Stay Positive.
I have, like many who struggle with mental illness, read endlessly about it. I have read that Resilience is the difference - to oversimplify things - between those who Make It Though and those who don't. My personal experience, though, has shown that even some of the most resilient people I have known lose their lives to mental illness in some form or other. My best friend joined their ranks in July, and I have many friends whose lives I fear for.
When you have been sick for as long as you can remember, you know (and love) a lot of very sick people, which is further depressing. My personal belief is that this does not mean a person should stop loving or caring for their also sick friends - but perhaps, as I have to decided, to not make any more as much as is possible, and to attempt to make some healthy friends as well. I'm lucky. I have a few.
But most of the people in my life that I love, value, respect, and trust are extraordinarily busy.
The harsh truth is that people don't always have time for you - even when you need them the most. Your mental illness is not their responsibility. This is not to say that they can't or shouldn't love, care for, and support you - or that you don't deserve it - it just means that at the end of the day it's you and yourself and your demons, whenever they may choose to show up.
There's a sense of injustice. For me at least. I am a good person and I know it. Andrew Solomon stated in his TED Talk on Depression (see the previous blog entry) that "Our needs are our greatest assets. It turns out I've learned to give all the things I need."
I love that and it rings loud and clear and close to home. I am the person who will show up for you when you need someone but can't ask. I am intuitive in that way.
And this comes from my intimacy with my own unmet needs.
In the car on the way here I recalled something stupid I said to someone whose opinion I highly value over a YEAR ago and I flinched and my entire body tensed. This is not uncommon in depression - obsession and rumination over insignificant past interactions. I've had enough therapy that I quickly remind myself that I am powerless over the past, that I am human, and that the other person probably doesn't even remember it.
So how to wrap this up? I haven't expressed even a fraction of what I hoped to, but I guess this will have to suffice for the moment.
Part 2 of "What does Depression feel like?" is complete, and I am going home to type this up soon.
Thank you for your time,
Sofia