August Slipped Away..
[TW: mentions SI]
This post a bit longer.
It is November and I am remembering August. It was not too long ago, but I was in a drastically different place. I want to write about this very vulnerable time I went through. Last weekend I was on a trail with my girlfriend Aly when I found myself dancing and lip-syncing down a hill. The happiness I felt was consuming me like a fire inside me refusing to burn out. I thought, “this is the feeling I wanted in August.”
It is surreal to me to see just how bright my light was on that day in the woods, when several months ago I was re-experiencing depression and suicidal thoughts.
I want to tell myself, no, that is not what it was. I want to tell myself, that was years ago. The last time I experienced suicidal ideation was while waiting for heart surgery in 2021. I felt like my body was failing me, and I did not want to continue to live that way. In the past I had been hospitalized for suicidality, and I wanted that to stay in the past. It feels weird to name it now, but that’s what it was this past summer. The difference is that this time I got through it without a hospital. That does not mean it couldn’t have helped..
It is terrifying, but when I experience a depressive episode that has no end in sight it is easy for me to have the mindset that the pain may never end. I am writing this now because it did end. It always does end, eventually. I have experienced depression many times, and I usually know how to navigate it by now. This recent time felt different because I was not able to get through it as quickly as I had times before. Depression paired with dissociation made it feel harder to climb out of. I thought, “Why am I trying to live when I don’t even feel alive?”
This year, it began the end of April. April, May, June, July, and August were never-ending months of depression, depersonalization, and derealization. May is usually hard for me, as is June- but it did not seem to end. I had done well off of medication for a while, but knew it was time I go back on it. I went to the pharmacy and picked up my prescription, and the waiting game began.
I would stare at the wall every day and feel overwhelmed because I did not feel real. Nothing around me felt real, except my cat Eloise. I could not imagine what clarity felt like, or feeling present. I was incredibly burnt.
One August evening I called my therapist during a panic attack but she did not see my call until the next morning. I did not know it was a panic attack because it felt different than times before. Something had triggered me, but I did not know what. Everything seemed far away. My head felt “weird” and that’s the only way I could describe it at the time. My mind was on a loop of negative thoughts about myself. It felt like a volcano could erupt inside me. My chest hurt, and when I looked at my hands they didn’t feel like they belonged to me. I sat on my bathroom floor for hours, and eventually curled up on the cold tile. I could not stop sobbing.
In the morning I assured my therapist that I was OK waiting until our next session to talk about it. It was hard to get out of bed that next day. I barely ate, barely moved, and it felt like I was recovering from a car accident. (I’ve been in a car accident so I feel like I can say that.)
Before that panic attack there had been months of driving to work every day crying. I was dissociating at work. I would avoid contact with my coworker who I share an office with. I wouldn’t turn around from my laptop. I was hiding the tears to the best of my ability.
I avoided taking a medical leave, and I just kept telling myself this would all end soon, and one of these days I will wake up and feel happy. Then, August came. August is my birthday month. I’m not sure why but I get really sad around the time of my birthday.
My mental health became so troubling that I was weighing my options. No, I don’t want to go back to a hospital.. I’d likely feel the same there. If I did go to a hospital I would only want to be in a specific trauma inpatient treatment. I could do a partial-hospitalization program. I could take a medical leave. I was stuck. I did not know what to do. I just knew that my birthday was coming and it was hard to look forward to another year.
At the end of the month my therapist was going to be away for a week. 1 week feels too long for me, as I have been used to my consistent sessions weekly for years. It especially felt long when I was waking up every day waiting for the day to be over. My therapy sessions helped me have something to hold out for each week, and I was terrified not having that. At the end of our last session before her vacation, I fell apart. It was a telehealth session and when I saw her face disappear from my screen I was scared. My heart ached. I felt so alone. I was ready to give in and go to the ER.
I called Aly instead. I’m not always good at reaching out to people in the moment, even her. I tried to pull myself together and the two of us brainstormed how we were going to get me through the week.
Aly and I discussed every option, even the ones that did not seem likely. She was willing to watch Eloise if I went anywhere (hospital) and she also was willing to stay with me at my apartment if I didn’t.
Something shifted in me when I was talking to her. I told her “I know how I am and I feel the worst of it right now because I just got off the call with her. Maybe I need a nap, just to reset. It’ll be less overwhelming when I wake up.”
I told Aly I know how this works. I’ve been here before. When I was hospitalized the first time in 2016 I couldn't wait to be discharged and promised myself I’d get my shit together if I was getting out. I had choices. I knew about them, but I just needed to care about them.
Stay where I was headed.
Or try. Try to have compassion for myself. Try to find worth in living. Try to find trust that my life can be different. Try to get more help.
I was still thinking about my therapist in that moment and how she felt like my lifeline. I told Aly. “She’s coming back in a week. I want to be able to tell her that I was OK and that I did things to help myself while she was away.”
After my call with Aly, I emailed a place about a virtual Women’s Trauma Group that started early this fall over Zoom. I knew that therapy couldn’t be my only lifeline and that I needed more supports I could turn to. I continued to look for ways I can get more therapeutic support as well as personal connections. After I gave myself permission seek more support, and try to find hope, I was beginning to experience more moments of feeling like my old self.
When night came it was dark and quiet and I found myself feeling sad in bed. I was starting to cry and at the same time telling myself not to. This didn’t work; I was sad again. I thought about how I couldn't go one day without crying. The week would feel so long. I took a breath. I tried to allow myself to cry, and tell myself it would be alright at the same time. I tried to be okay with having a day both happy and sad. It is better than a full day of sadness like I had been experiencing for months. I realized I could lie in bed sad and alone or I could let someone know. I had already texted Aly goodnight but I sent her another text almost an hour later. I told her I was sad, that I was ok, but sad. I told her how I was feeling and that I didn't need anything, but that it was helping me to write that to her. It was helping me to feel less alone in my sadness. I didn’t know if she was sleeping but she wrote back. “I’m glad you texted me. you’re right, it is okay to feel all kinds of emotions in one day. Nights can be hard because you start thinking about a lot. You’re so strong Haley. It’s one of my favorite qualities about you. So I know you will be okay.”
Before my therapist returned I listened to 3 audiobooks about self-compassion. One way I know to get out of my sad brain is to take in more positive and healing content. I was sucked into a poetry book from one of my favorite authors I discovered this year. She writes about trauma and depression a bit.. but not directly.. and not in a way that is triggering. It is hopeful and comforting to know she's felt what I feel.
Even though I couldn’t wish my depression away faster.. I was trying. I was trying to find a reason to be happier. I was trying to sulk less. I was recognizing my medication helping once I landed on a consistent dose. I had moments of feeling here and present. “Moments” did not feel like enough, but I know they mattered. Over time I felt inside myself again, and the moments became days.
What I realized is that trying harder to be happy makes me feel very disappointed when I start to feel sad again. I’ve been trying to take what I’ve learned and try not to place judgment on my feelings. It is a work in progress, but right now it’s more about reminding myself of it when it happens. I’m trying to simply notice how I feel. It is still discouraging to realize those shifts in emotion when I start to feel good and then feel horrible again.
I couldn’t escape my birthday, but I do have things to look forward to this year.
Even though I wanted to tell my therapist “look at the steps I made” when she came back, I also did this for me. I needed to light a fire inside myself again. I have continued my work in therapy, but I also have been participating in a 12-week support group which ends the end of this month. I also have been leaving my comfort zone to connect with others, and that has helped me to feel less isolated. I do not doubt that those positive changes had something to do with my dancing in the woods.
I still have triggers and flashbacks, and times that almost scare me where I don't feel like I’m here. This happened very recently. It makes me feel like I am rolling down the hill I just worked to climb. But I have noticed times where I do feel here. It’s weird to me, to see things clearly in those moments. It makes me think, “So this is how being alive is supposed to feel?”
April through August was dark and painful. Sometimes revisiting the lowest of the lows allow me to also revisit lessons learned.
What I know:
Happiness is worth the wait.
I can be in a “good place” and still have trauma responses.
The bad days/moments do not cancel out the good.
The pain and fear I try to fight, is fought with an abundance of strength.
