It is heavy. I carry it alone. An invisible boulder that the bustling world can not see, nor understand. Sometimes I refuse defeat and carry it like the Atlas statue in Rockefeller Center. Other days, I am not sure how I can make it out of bed and carry it again. Most days the world does not see the difference in these days because I am fighting to hold it up in silence. I smile, I say positive things, I spread joy to others, and inside I am in pain.
Depression lurks like a thief in the night. Waiting to seek what other joy it can steal. It will stare you in the eye and say “I’ll take that now”. It slow maneuvering so that you don’t even notice it crept in and its to late to take inventory on what it already took.
This space is all to familiar since I was young. Days I had to will myself out of bed to enter the world, nights I lay awake wondering if anyone could truly see me or care too. The darkness whispers “nobody cares” and “you aren’t strong enough”. Someday’s I believe it.
Most cope with the heavy in unhealthy ways. Mine happens to be isolation. The world is to painful for me when I am feeling so much. I could go on living my entire life in my bed.
Recently I noticed I had arrived there again, just as unexpectedly as the other times. I lost my love of cooking. I lost my love of connecting to people outside of my job. I lost the love of writing. I lost the love of self-care. I lost my need to connect to my kids and husband. I lost my vivacious love for Jesus and seeking Him through it all. I began to live my life waking each day in great anticipation for when I could sleep again. I was feeling exhausted from living. There are an abundance of reasons for why this is, but no circumstance you are living is worth paying with your joy.
This weekend I choose to take it all back. I looked the enemy in the eye and said “I’ll take that now”. I wanted desperately to crawl into bed one thousand times, but instead I did the things that brought me joy once. It’s like exercising an old muscle back to life again. Knowing, at the very least, I need to treat my faith as less of a hobby and more of a life line.
Faith for me, is a reminder, I am never alone, even in the moments the world can’t see me, Jesus can. He will carry the boulder of pain and heaviness, on the days I can’t seem to get out of bed. I simply need to allow him too.
Other things that help me is therapy (lots of therapy – because ALL therapists need it!), diet, exercise, people that breathe joy into my life, my kids, my family, writing, and the list goes on and on. The difference is my brain sometimes does not allow me to access them. My heart wants to, my brain is like “not today friend. Today we sit with life altering sadness”.
This weekend my brain let me access the good, which means I am on the upswing! However, when I am not, please don’t ask me what I have to be sad about. I carry the worlds sorrow in my downswing. Imagine that! It is part of my make up. I was perfectly made as is. I love passionately, feel joy abundantly, but I can equally feel that abundance in heartbreaking, earth shattering pain. I know this pain and I honor it. For it is the same pain that delivers me through to the undying, screaming with fierce joy, of the other side. The other side I fought each day to get to.
Before you judge someone based on a moment you encounter them, or what they may seem like on social media, realize you have only been delivered a sliver of their truth. While so many publicly battle horrendous physical illnesses, so many are also battling silent mental ones. They can be as equally fatal. Support them both by checking in on them.
seekingup
Seeking Up 
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