Reflections On Depression

First off, let me say that I have been very fortunate never to have really faced profound depression the way so many have.  I have been depressed, I have felt hopeless and overwhelmed, I have been close to that state of feeling that it will never, ever get better.  Something has always helped me hang on.  I have no answers for those who are consumed by that darkness, only that they should know there are lots of us out here who love them, who need them in our lives, and will help them, if we can only figure out how. 
I have lost friends and family members to depression.  It is an illness, just like cancer.  There are some treatments, but they don't work for everybody.  Just like with cancer, sometimes the disease wins.  Doesn't mean they gave up, doesn't mean that on many levels they didn't want to live.  It just means that the pain became too much, the darkness too dark, the battle too hard to fight anymore.  Their resources were all used up.

I have felt helpless when seeing others in dark despair.  I don't even know how I have gotten out of the dark places I have wandered in.  Not really.  I know that on some level, it never got so dark that I couldn't see and feel the light of Love reaching for me.  It got close to that dark a few times, but somehow, I always found the light to see the path out.  There are still times when I feel like I am not worth the space I take up in this world, that all I am is a pest and and a drain on others.  I feel overwhelmed by the things that I *SHOULD* be doing and feel I have no emotional strength to do.  It seems sometimes like it isn't WORTH trying to keep going.  The feeling that the big dark ugliness is right behind you, and just waiting for you to stop running is truly scary. 

The only explanation I can give for the fact that I have not fallen too deep into that darkness is that there is light in me.  (There is light in ALL of us, but sometimes, it gets really hard to see.)  There is a purpose worth living for.  There are people who love me, who need me in their lives.  And for me, there is my faith.  There is a God who loves me, who understands how hard it is sometimes to go on, but whose love reaches me in that dark place, dries my tears, takes my hand, and leads me back to the light.  I have no other explanation.  I hear the words to old hymns playing in my head, I see the faces of those who I KNOW love me, and hear their voices, and realize it would be horrible to be apart from them.  Even worse than the pain of trying to deal with my personal darkness.  I believe that is God's Spirit at work.  Reminding me that I have value even when I feel worthless, that there IS light in me, even when I cannot find it in myself. 

There is an old and rather sappy hymn that I hear at times like this. 
O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go
(words by George Matheson, 1842-1906)
O love that wilt not let me go
I rest my weary eyes on Thee
I give Thee back the life I owe
That in Thine ocean depths its flow
May richer, fuller be.

Those ocean depths bear me up, carry me safely to the shore, and help me stand again. 

Another verse is also one that I have heard when I seemed to need it:

O Joy, that seekest me through pain
I cannot close my heart to Thee,
I trace the rainbow through the rain,
And feel the promise is not vain
That morn shall tearless be.

I am pestered with this hymn, and others, and with scripture, and with the evidence of past experience, until I have the strength to try to keep going.  I am better at it some days than others, and it has been a LONG time since I have been in the dark enough to feel that I should not go on. 
My husband's love has a lot to do with that.  So do my friends. 
Depression, like any illness, can run in families.  My mother has suffered from bouts of it, and she always told me I was like my aunt, who died before I was born, who also had dark moods.  She always said I was moody and broody like Aunt Lorene, and I wrote poetry like my aunt.  As far as I know, my Aunt died as a result of a heart defect she was born with, and did not end her own life.  I think the poetry helps.  More than likely, the illness isn't as strongly present in me.  I know it took my cousin.  He tried to drug it away, drink it away, but he finally drank himself to death.  There have been others, and I don't know what demons inhabited their darkness, but I find myself wishing there had been a way I could have shared my light with them more effectively.  Could have pushed that door open and let the light in, just a little.

For those who suffer with this illness, I pray you are always able to find the light again.  I pray that you will be granted strength and light for the fight, that you will hear and see the love that truly is all around you.  And that you let the light in, let it banish the darkness, reach for it, and KEEP REACHING.  You ARE loved, you ARE needed.  You MATTER.  You are not in this fight alone, no matter what  you think.  Don't listen to the darkness of depression, it lies.  It tells you there is no hope, no light, no love, but there IS.  There IS light inside you.  Please, please ask for help when you need it. 
Those that have lost the fight are not lost forever.  I believe this.  The light that was in them, that they managed to share but not see in themselves, lives on.  Love lives on.  Always.  Love can never die. 
And I firmly believe that God, who IS Love, will not desert those souls so lost and in pain.  He will find them and grant them peace and comfort.  I know this.  I do. 
Doesn't make it any easier for those of us left behind, who can only remember the light our lost ones brought us, and try to keep reflecting it in our hearts forever in their honor. 
We must never forget them, or their struggles.  We must also try to find a way to share the light we have with others, a way to really hear and listen to what others say.  We're in this boat on this stormy sea together, folks.  In the end, all we have is each other.