The depression project

Those that have been reading this blog will know that I have a Bipolar type illness.  My exact diagnosis seems to change depending on what psychiatrist I see but it goes between Bipolar type 1, to Schizoaffective disorder which is like Bipolar but with added psychosis during the time moods are stable.  In summer of 2015 a bad Bipolar psychotic depression hit me.   I often get depressed in summer in particular July because it's the anniversary of when I lost a baby and my mood usually dips as the anniversary approaches and stays low for a period of time after that date.  I've spent those dates in hospital twice.  In the summer of 2015 I didn't go to hospital (though I probably should have because I was bad enough and suicidal).  I managed to stay at home and by late August I had mostly recovered.  I think the severe part of my depression lasted just under 2 months.  The difference between Bipolar depression and Unipolar depression is that with Bipolar you tend to feel really tired and sleep a lot and with Unipolar you tend to have insomnia and be unable to sleep.  I tend to sleep and sleep when depressed.  I can take myself to bed and stay there for days.  I don't wash, brush my teeth, I might not eat unless someone really encourages me to eat and at times I don't even take in enough fluids.  I'm very lucky that I have a partner who will encourage me to do things like eating, washing, and getting out of bed.  Along with that I hear frightening voices during the time that I am awake and I am very suicidal and wanting to hurt myself.  When I am awake I'm usually thinking about or planning a way to end my life.  I remember writing suicide notes (I think I still have them on my computer somewhere) and researching ways to die and the best most efficient way to end my life.  It's basically like living in hell.  I really would rather have almost anything else other than depression because there is a very real risk to my life.  I've attempted seriously once, and not as seriously another time.  I'm honestly not sure I could survive that level of depression again.  It's my worst nightmare.

For some reason during the time I was depressed in summer I decided to take some photos.  I didn't take one every day because realistically I wasn't capable of doing that.  Many days were spent in bed without really getting up at all - maybe only to go to the toilet and then crawl back into bed.  I did take some photos in key moments though.  A few very psychotic moments and a few moments of utter despair.  I took them at the time because I was sure I was going to end my life and I wanted people to see how bad it had been.  That it really had been unbearable and that I wasn't being selfish by committing suicide I had just been in unbearable pain.  I wanted the people I left behind, people I knew would feel hurt by my actions to understand in some small way.  I thought if people could see the suffering they might understand.  I kept taking photos though because I realised having a record might at some point be useful.  I haven't known what to do with the photo's until now.  It's painful for me to look at them because I remember emotional agony I was in when each photo was taken but I decided today that I would share the photos here. Please note they are not pretty, depression is ugly. They are also not artistically done.  I wasn't thinking artistically when I took them but they show moments of what its like.  Moments the world rarely sees because I know that I hide away when things are that bad as do many people in that position.   So this is me at my most vulnerable and I'm sharing it here to show what its like.  So maybe the next person who thinks suicide is selfish or depression is indulgence will think again.  It's an illness like any other.  I have very little control over it.  I work very hard to stay well.  I do everything the professionals tell me but sometimes it still hits me hard.  I'll try to give a brief explanation under each photo...

This was taken during a very psychotic moment.  I think I was feeling very afraid about what voices where saying and upset because I couldn't make them stop talking to me.  I was pretty much feeling desperate. 

Taken during the same moments as previous.

A rare moment up and out of bed after having been in bed for a few days.  I think that Rick encouraged me to get up for a while.  I remember feeling really numb and just exhausted and all I really wanted to do was go back to bed.

Sitting up again but feeling like I could hardly move I was so exhausted.  Rick was often kind enough to encourage me out of bed.  Usually by threatening to phone my mental health nurse and have me sectioned so to avoid that and appease him I'd get up and sit on the sofa staring into space.

A common theme is just lying down and staring into space.

I can't be sure because my memory is not brilliant but I believe I was sitting by the laptop writing out suicide notes to the people I love.  Thankfully I love a LOT of people so the process took a while and distracted me from making an actual attempt.

Sitting in bed, which was a place I spent a lot of time.

In bed again feeling too tired to move.  I believe in this photo I had been in bed for more than 24 hours.

A brief walk to the shops, trying to look normal.

Feeling afraid of voices.

Completely had enough really at this moment.

Lying in bed with curtains closed (common theme)

Attempting to be up and about and acting normal

I'm pretty sure that this is a voices hearing moment.

Honestly?  Utter fucking despair.

Psychotic again.

I remember this one.  I'd sat on the sofa for the entire day just staring at the wall.  

And I'm going to do a photo of me now, to show people that I actually got through it and I'm not depressed anymore.  Light at the end of a long tunnel!!

By September I had started to properly recover.  By the end of September I was pretty much back to normal and from then on things have been mostly good.  I still have the mental health stuff going on in the background but I can feel happy again, I have good people around me looking out for me.  I'm so glad I didn't end my life because some pretty amazing things were about to happen to me.  I still had people to meet and learn from!  Sadly I'm almost certain depression will hit me again.  I have Bipolar it's part of the course but I hope reminding myself I got through it last time will help me get through it again.  I am a little anxious about posting this particular blog because its one thing saying in words how things are but actually showing people myself in that state is a little bit scary.  I am really really vulnerable in these photo's and (vanity speaking here) not exactly pretty!  

A record of one of the most profound experiences of my entire life

I wanted to share something here that happened to me when I was manic that I think I told some of you about but not all.  Anyway it was an amazing experience one of the most profound and thrilling of my entire life and so I wanted to share it so I have a record of it and so people can understand what the good side of mania can be like.  Please don't get me wrong there are a lot of down sides, tons of downsides, but this was something wonderful and I don't ever want to forget it!

Those of you who know me well will know that I have a favourite star in the universe.  I learned about this star from originally from Rick.  (When Rick and I tell each other we love each other we often say as much as V Y Canis Majoris!) its a red hypergiant sitting in the consolation Canis Major.  I love this start because it's so bright (it's known for how luminous it is), and so so so very big! one of the biggest that has ever been discovered so far (though I am sure there are bigger out there somewhere!) but V Y Canis Majoris has really captured my imagination and I think about it a lot.  I imagine how big it is and how bright and awesome and when I'm stressed when I think about V Y Canis Majoris I feel calm again because I realise that compared to this gigantic star I am so tiny, not even microscopic compared to it and it makes my problems and worries seem insignificant which I find comforting.  To put it into perspective our Sun is just a tiny prick compared to V Y Canis Majoris!!! It's huge!!

I thought about Canis Majoris a lot when I was manic and sometimes I would close my eyes and imagine that I was near it.  This imaginary fantasy at the time became for me much more than imaginary.  I would close my eyes and feel my body become a huge comet and this huge comet was zooming around Canis Majoris.  I could feel myself speeding through the air and I really believed I'd become part of the universe away from earth and away from this solar system.  When it would happen I'd just stand there with my eyes closed and my heart racing and my manic mind believing that I was out there in space seeing my star up close.  In my mania I was somehow able to comprehend the enormity of the star and the enormity of the universe in general.  I am incapable of comprehending it now in a normal state of mind but I know that I grasped something fairly profound in that mindset. 

That feeling you get when you are just about to go to sleep and you start falling it felt like that only I didn't startle and stop it I just kept falling and flying and I didn't have a body anymore, I didn't need to breath I was just hurtling along in space beside the star and it was completely exhilarating but with a very profound sense of oneness with the universe at the same time.  I'm frustrated because I can't put this into words the exhilaration and speed and intensity of it where just incredible. 

These moments would last for perhaps 30 or 40 seconds at a time and then I'd open my eyes and be back on earth and back in reality but with a profound sense of awe that would last for hours in-between.  I believed 100 percent at the time that I was becoming a comet and travelling through space and time to Canis Majoris and I think I believed eventually I'd be able to stay there and I wouldn't' be human anymore.  It was amazing and what's amazing now is even though I'm sane enough to understand on a logical level that this was mania and this was not real I am still left with the intense memories of it.  So I have memories of being a comet and travelling around Canis Majoris.  To some that might sound insane but to me that's a gift.  Nothing will live up to that and as much as I hate having bipolar I'm glad I experienced it.  It's my most vivid and intense experience of mania ever.  As I came down from my high the experiences stopped but one day I hope I get even a glimpse of that again.  It made me see the world in a different light.  It made me see that there is no difference between rock, tree, cat, chicken, human we are all just tiny particles in space.  I often complain about being mad and tell people the downsides but to balance it out I thought I'd share this.  I'm always wary of making bipolar out to be sexy or "creative" because the reality of bipolar is usually hell but I cannot deny that there are moments of beauty.  I feel like I've seen something, experienced something that nobody else on earth has or will.