When I heard about Robin Williams’ death, I refused to believe it. I heard about it while playing MechWarrior Online and, to be honest, you can’t always trust what it is that people put out there, especially when that sort of stuff is spouted in an attempt to get a rise out of others. So yeah, I called bullshit let it alone until after the match, then I hit up Google (Google pretty much knows everything) and I found the early release articles that were published hours after he was pronounced dead.
I wanted to call bullshit…
…I still do…
…but reality has since sunk in and one of the greatest men on the face of the planet has passed on.
Since then, I have noted some of the tributes, well-wishes and stories of others about the news. I have read a fair number of articles on the matter as people tried to understand what could drive a man to take his own life.
For anybody that spent more than 5 minutes actually paying attention to Robin Williams, his various acts, how he carried himself (even with the genuine, warm smiles), you could see the pain just beneath the surface. Spend a little more time watching the man and you realize that he had always battled depression and suffered from both alcohol and drug addiction.
Robin Williams is the perfect example of what is known as a Sad Clown. That is, someone who suffers from deep depression, but they mask and cope with their pain by bringing joy to others. Among comedians, this is a very, very common thing. Many comedians are very depressed and sad individuals, believe it or not…and believe it or not, they are actually very good about hiding behind a mask; they have to be because of the stigma that surrounds people who are depressed or otherwise mentally and/or emotionally suffering.
…and that brings me to the topic of this giant wall of text that this will inevitably evolve into.
The various articles I’ve read and the accompanying comments from folks (with some even providing their own stories and anecdotes) struck a chord with me…a very familiar one.
In light of this, and the descriptions of the challenges that others face and have faced, I want to describe my own experiences with depression:
I will be 36 in November. For the vast majority of that time I have been battling a very similar beast that many people fight. While I cannot ever know the depths or details of the beasts and battles that so many other people do battle with on a day-to-day basis, I know that mine is a special kind of monster.
Mine never leaves me. It is always there, lurking just at the edge of my mind’s eye. Watching. Waiting.
It can sit there in the shadows for months at a time placid to the point that I almost forget that it’s there (you never forget that you are carrying around a 10 pound weight…you may become used to carrying it around, but you never forget you have it with you). Sometimes it will reach out and pinch, poke or nibble. It causes me to question things, or casually remind me of any number of truths that I have come to accept. Sometimes it doesn’t say anything it all. Sometimes it just sits there and smiles, and then shows me the chains that bind me…just a reminder that no matter what they’re still there and they aren’t going away.
…no matter how hard I try to remove them…
Those are the times that are easiest. They are the ones that I can most easily cope with, because I am used to it. Yeah, I may be lugging around a 10 pound weight, but I can still tread water easily enough.
Sometimes though, it gets ornery. Or bored. Or both. Sometimes it just wants to pour some salt in the wounds and do more than simply remind me of my place. Sometimes it decides that it wants to make itself known.
Sometimes, it just wants to break me.
These times are the worst. They are the hardest. These are the times where in addition to carrying that ten pound weight everywhere, the ground gives out underneath your feet. You struggle, you try to climb back up, but you keep slipping as the dirt crumbles to sand that constantly gives out underneath you. You fight harder but the sand continues to carry you inexorably downwards, eliminating any progress you have made instantly. If you’re lucky, you are able to maintain the status quo, you are able to postpone the inevitable descent a little longer.
Unfortunately, you can’t keep this up forever. You know it. As you fight, you become tired, fatigued. Soon, the effort required to stay in place exceeds your ability and now all you can do is just slow the descent. As you sink deeper and deeper, it becomes harder and harder to sit up, much less fight. The climb has become too steep and the weight too much. You are up to your waist in sludge that is puling you down and you just can’t fight it. You want to NEED to, but you can’t. The effort to just lift your hand through the mire and muck is just too much, especially now. Even if you don’t give up, you are either just too exhausted by this point or any efforts you make serve no purpose.
…and so you sink…
The deeper you go, the harder and more painful it becomes to resist, so you stop. You also realize that nobody actually cares. Oh, they say that they do, but it’s a lie. They never cared. At worst, they completely ignored you, at best they just passed on by after a smile and ‘how-you-doin’?’. Of course you told them ‘fine’ because that’s what’s expected. Couldn’t they see past the obvious lie? See the pain you were in? If they truly cared, they would have noticed long ago and done something then.
…you sink deeper…
You are in a deep, black pit; surrounded by oppressive darkness. The ten pound weight now feels like a thousand. You aren’t sure if it’s the weight itself or if it’s just all of that sand, muck and mire. The pain goes from mental to physical. You feel a stabbing in the center of your chest. Your joints refuse to cooperate. It is physically and mentally draining to just stand up and go to the bathroom. You shut out the light and avoid going outside because it’s just too painful. Everything hurts inside and out. Its torture and you just want it all to end.
But it can end you know...the pain, the sorrow, the helplessness.
It can all be over in an instant. If you just pull the trigger. A fraction of a second and not only will it all end, but you will never have to worry about it tormenting you again. So what about everyone else? They didn’t care then, why should they care now? What about your obligations and responsibilities? Irrelevant. They won’t follow you; they can’t.
It can all end. Right here, right now. It is just. That. Easy.
….and then the feeling passes.
Just like that, it’s over. You don’t know how, or why you are suddenly near the end of a dark tunnel, but there you are after stumbling out of the darkness. In the murky grey that surrounds you, you can see the light at the end of the tunnel easily enough. Not too hard to keep walking forward really. For a moment, you think that the darkness that you were in was just a dream, some sort of hallucination or something, but you look over your shoulder and see from where you had just come. It is a dark, terrifying place and you genuinely wonder how in the hell you ended up there to begin with.
You pick up your pace a little, walking towards the light and more than a little eager to be on your way…there is so much to do and you don’t have time to dawdle. That ten pound weight is still there, but you don’t really notice it; its weight seemingly negligible, especially after what you had just gone through. You step out into the light. You feel better. Not quite totally relieved of everything, but still, you feel pretty good though.
Something catches your attention out of the corner of your eye and you see it, sitting there watching you. Waiting. It smiles. A shudder goes down your spine as you realize that this will not be the last time it puts you through that hell. Worse, you don’t know when it will happen again, or how bad it will be…only that it will happen again and when you least expect it.
If you got this far, thanks, I really appreciate it! If you also got this far, I think some things also bear explaining as well:
I exist in a constant state of minor depression. That is, I am always slightly depressed. If, on a scale of 1-10, the average person sits at 5 as their day-to-day feeling, I tend to sit at about a 4. I have to actually make a conscious effort to look, appear or otherwise sound cheerful.
I am not currently contemplating suicidal thoughts, but I have in the past and there is a non-zero chance that I will in the future.
This is me putting my emotional state to paper (or, rather, pixels) when things get bad. This is not a cry for attention, rather it is an attempt to let others know what’s going on in my head.
Reading similar perspectives from others helped me identify and better nail down the things I have been feeling, so it is my hope that by reading this, others will be inspired to do the same.
For those that do not suffer from chronic depression, but have heard about it and/or know folks that do, I hope that this gives them a bit of insight to what is happening their friends and loved ones