SENS Self-Esteem Net Site-Print depression and disability

Disability and Depression.

Depression is a natural defence against the stress of living. When there is little we can do to help a situation, we become immobilized in sheer self-defence.

Like mourning, it is a necessary part of our recovery from trauma, a time to be still, to heal and re-evaluate.

When we are depressed, we are in less danger from ourselves than when we are recovering our energy, but have not adjusted our balance. It is when we begin to emerge from depression that we are in the greatest danger. At such times, we are regaining the energy to act on our despair. So it is as we begin to emerge from any period of grief that we may be tempted to try to escape an intolerable situation by harming ourselves.

These swings can be exacerbated by medical intervention in cases where the problem is not one of clinical mental illness, but of unhappiness and discomfort during a period of necessary adjustment. We are efficient machines, programmed to survive and to learn. Left to our own devices, we indulge our lethargy and revolt, explore and reject avenues we find unacceptable. We recover our balance with new understanding and new goals.

It is a form of growth and development which follows the pattern of any other growth, a stretching and a retrenchment, over-reaching and recovery, two steps forward and one step back.

Periods of depression are natural breaks for evaluation in the process of self-development. They are not something we need to fear. Left alone, most people recover their balance in three months or less and start working on new directions in life.

The period is longer when there is serious loss and life-changes, as in bereavement, injury, chronic illness or redundancy. Then we need time to re-evaluate our options, to come to terms with what has happened, to seek out new directions and possibilities.

It is a painful and difficult process. We may need to accept help in the form of counselling, medical and community assistance, comfort from our peers and encouragement from others who have been through the same process before us.

Above all, we need to allow ourselves space and time to grieve, to rest, to decide what we do or don’t want and where we want to go next. We need to be as loving, as gentle and as understanding with ourselves as we would with anyone else who came to us with a similar problem.

We need to realize that pain is a natural response, something we need to experience in order to make informed choices. Of course, we can accept help with acute physical pain, or the support of short-term sedation in unbearable emotional upheaval, but oblivion is not the only answer. Often we can learn to deal with pain in new ways, accepting responsibility for setting our own boundaries and deciding just how much we are willing to endure as a trade-off for achieving the things that are most important to us.

Most pain-relief has a price. Many chemicals have unpleasant or inconvenient side-effects. Other stratagems also have their costs. It is up to us to decide what we want and what we are willing to give up in order to achieve it.

We need to realize that rebuilding a life is a process that takes a great deal of effort, insight and time. It will not happen easily, but it may often result in a far better quality of life than we had ever imagined possible.

It is a lesson we can remember as the three ”A”s: - Accept, Adjust and Achieve.

First, we learn to ACCEPT what has occurred. Accept our feelings, our experiences, our limitations, our frustrations and our desires. Accept our anger and our grief, and realize that these are sources of primal energy we can use to build a new life. Depression protects us from the misuse of this energy. But when we have had time to explore and redirect these emotions, we can harness rage as determination to reclaim as much as we can of our former worlds. We can change and rebuild them into something we can respect ourselves for creating.

Next, we test out our new boundaries, learn and ADJUST by trial and error until we decide what we really want to do and how we are going to proceed.

When we are tired of the retrenchment process, we can move on and begin again to ACHIEVE.

The process is not linear. It is more of a spiral in which we sometimes find ourselves back again in almost the same place. But always, there is something different, some progress we have made, a slightly different perspective and a new incentive to go on.

People come to this site looking for a way to deal with a particular form of loss. They search for words like “depression, bereavement, ileostomy, adult diapers, effects of cancer surgery, neuropathy, back pain, impotence and so on, and may be disappointed that I have not dealt specifically with their particular source of humiliation, frustration, grief, disappointment, anger or pain.

On the links page there are guides to places where you can discuss these separate forms of loss, or I will be happy to talk to you direct in the forum or by email if you prefer. But I deal with individuals and their potential, not with particular causes of despair. No two people will experience the same situation in quite the same way, and what is right for one may be totally wrong for the next.

Your problem is not you.

I am not only Sylvia who has Multiple Sclerosis, Arthritis and all the other symptoms of advancing age, who lives in a state of chaos and is barely solvent. I am Sylvia who loves life, creates beauty, is a greedy, sensual beast and a gentle, self-controlled philosopher, lazy and industrious, cruel and kind, generous and selfish, lonely and surrounded by friends.

Harmon is not only a black, alcoholic, womanizing bankrupt. He is beautiful and intelligent, a master of words, self-indulgent and ascetic, brave and hard-working, full of love and laughter, optimism and despair.

Annette is not only a deserted wife and mother, a proud, beautiful, foolish, vengeful, promiscuous child-woman trying desperately to prove that she still deserves love in spite of losing an arm. She is still a talented artist and musician, a reckless, miserly, controlling, spiteful, spontaneous, generous coward and visionary.

Jonah is not only a 7-year cancer survivor weighed down with the seeds of his own destruction, a frightening and frightened victim of a terrifying disease. He is a joyful child, an angry warrior, a weak, strong, handsome, ugly, charming, troubled human being, a nature-lover, with a powerful imagination and a boisterous sense of fun.

I cannot change any of us. No-one can ride to our rescue. None of us need to control each other, nor to be controlled. We may be able to tolerate and accept each other. We may be able to offer each other comfort or support, or we may not. But we can change the way we see ourselves and each other. We can decide, realistically, what, if anything, we want from each other and what we are prepared to give in exchange. Most usefully of all, we can simply look at ourselves and each other, recognize our similarities and our differences, our weaknesses and our strengths, our common humanity, our hopes, desires, fears and forbodings, our ploys and stratagems. We can accept who, where and what we are. We can understand each other, forgive each other and move on.

Once we have accepted and forgiven the worst in each of us, we can get on with letting ourselves be the best that we can become.

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