The Pill in My Hand Like the Gun to the Head

Being told you have a terminal illness is something that will likely hit everyone differently. We all die. That's a fact. Fortunately, most people won't ever have to face the reality of being told they are going to die younger than they had ever imagined. That is utterly terrifying. It is a feeling one cannot ever escape. I never thought I would hear those words either, until two years ago. There are so many things in my life I never thought would happen-and they did, and I survived them, and life went on as usual. Now, this is something that is happening to me that ultimately-I won't survive. Life will, eventually, go on without me this time. Wow! Talk about a kick in the gut.


My first instinct was to ball up and hold everything inside, but that's not who I am! I am a writer-it's not what I do; it's who I am! That has been my tagline for most of my life. Writing is my therapy, and it won't matter if it is on the blog or not, I will continue to write about my experiences as I go through them. But, I also don't exist in a vacuum, and IPF along with Lung Cancer, the two potentially terminal illnesses I've been diagnosed with-particularly IPF as it is extraordinarily rare for someone my age to contract (and has a very short term life expectancy); I thought that by writing this blog and sharing my experiences, even if we are not experiencing the same things, it would help someone else going through something life-altering. I know as I have gone back over past blogs that I have written, that it has certainly helped me.


It is also my online journal or log of my health (which includes my depression and anxiety) and how it has changed over the months and years. I can get so bogged down with the day-to-day living stuff (being a mom, appointments constantly, taking care of a zoo, and being a wife), that sometimes I forget to look at what has been lost and what has been gained. This is my place to keep that all together for quick access for myself too.


So, that is what my blog is, my journal, my life, my feelings, my place to rant, my safe place, and I am sharing it all with you. Now, don't you all feel so lucky? (ha!)


Today, I was elected to be an ambassador for The American Cancer Society. This means I get to call elected officials and try to get new laws passed for the care of cancer patients, create new fundraising ideas for the Society, attend more than just my local Relay for Life and volunteer at them, and email patients in their time of need. I was on top of the moon! I also created an event for The Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation called Hit the Ball and Touch Em All Walk to raise money for new research and development so maybe I will be able to stay alive longer. The event is scheduled for October 21st. I will post the link at the end of my blog. I created a new Gofundme link for the kids and I as well. The money I raise will go towards my healthcare that my insurance refuses to cover (specifically my pulmonary oncologist and my breathing medications) as well as leave enough money so that my children are taken care of after I am gone. I will also leave that link up at the end of the blog. I know I am not popular, rich or famous...and most people have not ever heard about me, but what the children and I are suffering through is very much real. We desperately need help to continue on with a somewhat normal life. If you cannot donate, I urge you all to take the link and share with all of your friends. There are even tiers that I created which include very personalized gifts from me. Please at least read the story and share.


In psychology, you'll learn that people 'tell' on themselves all of the time. Forensic psychologists learn to hear what people say and what they don't say and use that to develop a profile of a person. My title to this post, a somewhat provocative one, I suppose, tells the reader a story all by itself. See it's MY hand but it's THE head. I don't "own" the gun to MY head-cause it never will be. I couldn't bring myself to even type 'my'. But that's all beside the point. I'm digressing and it isn't at all what I wanted to even talk about.


What I did want to talk about is depression. Depression is the proverbial gun. The pill in my hand is one of the components of a treatment, but not a cure, for the gun-the pill is the safety lock on the gun. Just like a real safety lock, it can malfunction, and sometimes the gun still goes off, but more often than not, the pill (or in this instance the safety lock) works and the gun cannot do as much damage. Sure, you could turn it around and use the grip to beat the snot out of someone, and someone can stay depressed if they really want to, but that's really wearing an analogy and a metaphor way too much.

The whole point of this blog post, that again, if you knew me and you were a forensic psychologist, you’d see the subject that I was trying to avoid, was talking about MY depression. And it was almost as hard to type that as it was to type MY in front of head when pertaining to a gun to my head.



CLINICAL DEPRESSION

The word ‘depressed’ is really a misnomer. A person who suffers from clinical depression is NOT depressed, and yet people use that interchangeably. Depression is a disorder, ’caused by the body not producing or uptaking the right chemicals when a person’s mood chemically tries to change, the way most people’s bodies will. We all get ‘depressed’ or ‘sad’ sometimes. That’s normal. Everyone has it. For some people, that depressed feeling lasts for as long as the situation that caused the depressed feeling lasts. That could be a few hours for something minor or a few days for something more major… to a few months for something devastating. But beyond that, at some point, life goes on, and so do we. We might always have some residual sadness pertaining to the thing that gave us the depressed feelings, but eventually, we get stronger, and we grieve, and we begin to pick up the pieces and move on. It’s a process. Some people go through it faster than others. Along that journey, our bodies help us by releasing certain chemicals and neurotransmitters that help use to change our mood in the direction we need to be going. The more efficiently our bodies do this, the easier it is for us to move past that depressed feeling when we are ready to do so.

A couple of things have to happen for the depressed feeling to leave us: 1) we have to want to move out of feeling depressed (ie: we are ready to move past grief, we’re ready to let go, we’re ready to move on with our lives, etc.) and 2) our body has to release and reuptake the right chemicals properly to allow us to change that mood on a biological, chemical basis. If either of these two things fails, we will stay in a depressed feeling. When one of or both of these two things continues to fail consistently, we move from being in a depressed feeling to depression.


There is a difference between depression and being depressed.



DEPRESSION, BY ANY OTHER NAME…IS NOT A WEAKNESS

And once we’ve been feeling depressed for long enough, and depression kicks in, it goes from tears and sadness and feeling blue to numbness, and void and emptiness. Darkness. Pain. Suffering. Suffering often and usually way beyond any situational depression/depressed feeling.



I hate that the two are used by so many synonymously and I hate that mood and behavior disorders are somehow considered a weakness by so many people. You’d never tell an insulin-dependent diabetic that he was weak because his body doesn’t make insulin right. You’d never tell a person with cancer that they were weak because they can’t kill the cancer themselves and need chemotherapy. You’d never tell a heart patient not to take their medicine because they are weak.

But many people don’t think a thing about telling a person who has depression (not just someone who is depressed) that they are weak for not being able to change their mood. That they are weak for needing medication to help treat their clinical depression.

This is where the confusion begins for so many: When you have a depressed feeling, doing things you enjoy (like reading, walking, exercise, sex, watching a good movie, going out with friends, etc.) or doing something physically active (like exercise, playing basketball, taking a walk to the park, having great sex (you’ll see in this list a lot–it’s a great depressed mood killer with the right person!), or changing your environment (going out with people, leaving the house, moving to another room or taking a walk)…. these types of things can help lift a depressed mood. Doing this things regularly enough and consistently enough will absolutely help a ‘normal’ non-depression-suffering person to lift a depressed mood. But for someone who suffers from depression–the clinical depression–doing these things will not only NOT make the mood better, but it can indeed make the depression worse!


The strain of forcing social interaction on someone who is already compromised can worsen depression. Pity, sympathy and love from people when someone is feeling worthless and unlovable can make depression worse. Sex can lead to feelings of guilt or sometimes worse, not feeling anything at all–and that’s devastating. Exercise exhausts someone who is depressed and can physically exhaust the body, making it work even less efficiently.

Depression cannot be ‘fixed’ or cured by doing all these things. Sure, in the beginning of a depressive episode, one can indeed TRY these things. If it’s a mild episode, it’s possible (though certainly not always) that it could help kickstart the right chemicals. But most of the time, these things won’t help–and again, could make things worse.


And anyone who thinks that depression is a weakness has obviously never had depression. You have no idea, unless you’ve been there, how hard it is to just get up, every day, to just function, even if it’s at a minimal level, to feel anything, to DO anything, when you feel the way depression makes you feel. This is beyond mood. This is beyond emotions. Depressed people who still manage to ever make it out of bed and out of the house, ever, at all, are some of the strongest, bravest, toughest people I know. It is NOT easy to function when every neurotrasnmitter and chemical in your body is skewed… and no amount of puppies, ice cream and laughter is going to instantly start making your body work right. But you don’t get a cheering squad for fighting your depression. There’s no depression-awareness groups doing free makeovers and sending folks to help you clean your house or cheer you up or read to you… there’s no walk-a-thon for you. But depression kills. It’s debilitating. It can make you physically ill on top of the physical ailment of depression itself. At it’s most extreme, it can be devastating.


HELPING OTHERS TO UNDERSTAND


It’s hard to tell your family, “I love you. I know I love you. I need you to know I love you. It’s not you. YOU aren’t the problem. You’re not making me UNHAPPY. When I say I’m not happy, I am NOT saying that you make my UNHAPPY.”


That’s the hardest part for me sometimes… making sure people know that they aren’t responsible for my depression. They didn’t cause me to get IPF or Lung Cancer. Why would they be the cause of my depression? They’re not. I hope they know that, really know that, too.

WHAT DOES ANY OF THIS HAVE TO DO WITH ME?

Can't write...

That’s when you know something is wrong. When I can’t write.

I haven’t really been on Facebook much. Haven’t been on the board. Haven’t written on my blogs. Just sort of here. Not really doing anything that makes me who I am, makes me me.

But I sat here tonight, with that pill in my hand, asking myself if I should pull the trigger. When I said that, I meant that putting the pill in my mouth and taking it was likened to pulling the trigger. And then I realized, it’s no wonder I’m having a hard time making this decision when that’s the metaphor in my head–that pill is a gun that is going to shot me in the head. Why would anyone want to do that? I had to explore within myself why I felt that way.

The reality is, logically, NOT taking the pill is actually more likened to the loaded gun at my head–so why am I so against taking this pill without even realizing it? Logically, I’m all for taking it. Logically, I see all the reasons why I should.

What’s stopping me?

Shrug.

I popped it in my mouth and said, I’m ready to get better. I’m ready to be ME again.

And there is NO SHAME in that at all. And I will be talking about this more in the future, because I believe there is such a stigma to this ‘depression’ stuff that just doesn’t need to be there and more people could be getting help and being healthier and feeling better if we could all understand depression better. I honestly think it needs to start by giving it another name. Serotonin Deficiency or something. THAT is something people can understand. It’s a malfunction in the why the chemicals in the brain work. Hypopituitarism is a malfunction in the way chemicals in the brain work. Type I diabetes is a malfunction in the way chemicals in the pancreas work. Adrenal insufficiency is a malfunction in the way the chemicals in the adrenals work… chemicals, hormones, whatever. It’s all the same.

I know many of my friends suffer from depression. If I can act in any way as a role model for someone who is going through a rough patch while their brain is misbehaving, it will have been worth it to go through this to write these posts. Depression is a disorder, a real medical condition–it’s not your fault, it’s not your life, you’re not weak… there is help.

I have seen this darkness before, but oh, I have seen the light…. I seek the light.


Now, shine a light on your own darkness.

Love you all and truly mean it and God loves you too,

Me xoxo

Here is the link  to my new Gofundme Page....please go read and donate and share: https://www.gofundme.com/fighting-for-a-cure-to-live

Here is the link to the Pulmonary Fibrosis Event: https://www.facebook.com/events/422102261510479/

Here is the link to just donate directly if you cannot make it to the event: https://www.generosity.com/volunteer-fundraising/pulmonary-fibrosis-foundation

Here is the link to my blogging page on Facebook....please come give me a like: https://www.facebook.com/shannasjourneythroughlungcancer/