On wings of prayer, journey to hope takes flight

My problems look so small from up here. Maybe it takes 30,000 feet to get some perspective. Maybe it’s the comforting white noise of the engines. Maybe it’s seeing amber and red lights far below, moving as busy little ants in tidy lines.

Maybe it’s not any of those things at all. Maybe it’s the body of Christ and the prayers of so many family and friends at work.

That’s what I want to believe. That’s what I believe today more than I did yesterday, or maybe any other day in my life.

God’s world just seems so much more orderly up here. It just seems to make more sense. Only I know I can’t live up here in the clouds. I have to return to the valley of my despair to face my demons.

As much as I would rather live in the “fake world,” I know I have to return to the real world soon.

Tomorrow is a crossroads day for me. And by the grace of God, I don’t feel like I stand here waiting to get pummeled by a speeding train. I feel at peace.

Peace has been hard to come by for a long time. Mental illness does that to those who suffer from it. Depression is a liar, you see. And it is relentless, cunning and baffling. The black clouds come when they want to come, and there isn’t a damn thing I can do to stop them.

Yet today, on the eve of my admission to a world-class clinic where I hope to get some answers, I feel peace and serenity.

I’m holding on to the serenity prayer…for the courage to change the things I can, the serenity to accept the things I can’t change and the wisdom to know the difference.

I’m holding on to the promise that God will never forsake me. He might allow me to suffer, but he will never leave me.

He might not remove this thorn from my side as I have prayed so many times before. I’m okay with that. I’d at least like to know what species the damn thorn is, though. Maybe I’ll find out in the days ahead.

For the sake of my family, my awesome wife and my beautiful children, I pray my peace won’t be fleeting this time.

Tonight I pray for healing, spiritual and physical.

If healing doesn’t come, I will rejoice in my suffering. I will remember the countless prayers, calls, texts and acts of kindness that have been shown to my family. They have taught me the power of love in the storm of my life.

Even though I know struggles will come again, I will rest easy this beautiful night.

I will rest easy because I know how this movie ends. Mental illness might wreck my mind. 

It might spoil the good seasons of my life. It might even make my quite miserable again.

Whether it’s now or in the end, I will win and this illness will lose­­.

And that is all that matters.

Today I feel empty

Today I feel empty. Empty and listless. I wouldn’t even use the word frustrated, because being frustrated implies feeling something. I wish I had the energy or the desire to care enough to be frustrated or, heck, even angry. Being angry would be more purposeful than feeling like I just don’t care anymore.

Maybe it’s the new meds. Just a few days ago, I felt ever so slightly more hopeful. The doctor changed my meds again since my last blog. I know the antidepressant hasn’t had time to do its thing, so my guess is a placebo effect made me feel a little better for a brief time.

I am so uninterested in life outside my family right now that it’s extremely difficult to stay focused or be motivated at work.

My therapist and I had a good session yesterday, but that positive energy I felt after leaving her office has all but vanished. It’s been sapped by this dreadful disease once again.

She encouraged me to think about things I’m grateful for each day, especially when I’m reeling at work. She told me to literally write down even the smallest achievements so I feel some sense of accomplishment. It isn’t working so far, maybe because I haven’t done it enough yet.

My anxiety is so severe at times it borders on paranoia. My self-confidence is so shaken that simple tasks seem overwhelming. My fear of mistakes is so paralyzing that I want to just crawl in a foxhole and do nothing. Only that’s not a viable option for a career…at least not for long.

So here goes. I will celebrate one little victory that on the surface seems quite pathetic. I had to craft an email yesterday for an important group of stakeholders. My fear of making a mistake, perhaps a typo, was so great that I put it off all day. Then I finally got the courage to draft it, prayed over it and hit the send button.

How ridiculous is that?

My therapist doesn’t think it’s ridiculous. She said following through and doing it despite my anxiety was actually “courageous.” Only I don’t exactly feel like Braveheart. I feel puny.

That’s what warped negative thinking does to us over time. We are working on my negative thought patterns, but they are so engrained it almost feels like a hopeless effort.

I will keep trying. I will think of a STOP sign every time the negative thoughts start.

What other choice do I have?

Changing Meds Makes for Difficult Days

My patterns of depression are so familiar now, I may as well copy and paste my last blog post into this one.

Major Depression struck again a couple weeks ago. And it was pure hell. I missed one day's work and struggled like crazy to make myself keep moving for several days afterwards.

My doctor and I decided we needed to be aggressive in trying to stop it, so he changed my meds. I'm now taking Effexor along with Abilify.

The change from Cymbalta to Effexor proved to be a cautionary tale. I had been taking 60 mg of Cymbalta, which I had some success with after a mental health meltdown last summer. To transition to the new drug (Effexor), I was instructed to drop down to 30 mg of Cymbalta for three days before starting out on a small dose of Effexor. 

Only I didn't do that. My Cymbalta pills weren't the kind you can split in half, and I never got new 30 mg pills for the three-day transition period. So I just stopped the Cymbalta cold turkey. I won't do that again.

Wrenching anxiety, stomach aches and feelings of utter hopelessness soon came. 

It was a brutal stretch, probably ranking in my all-time Top 10 list of major depressive episodes.

I'm not exactly copacetic now, but I'm much better. The suicidal ideations that haunted me have subsided. I feel more hopeful than I did even a week ago.

I've now ramped up the dosage of Effexor as the doctor prescribed, and I think it's beginning to pay off.

Those who suffer from depression can relate to the difficulty of changing meds. We often get worse before we get better. And that's really frustrating.

I haven't figured this thing out yet, but I'm trying to remain optimistic about the future. It generally takes 2 to 4 weeks for a new antidepressant to really help. My doctor says it takes much longer—maybe six months—to get the full payoff.

So I wait patiently, doing the other things I know help (exercise, eating less junk, etc.)

I only wish Punxsutawney Phil hadn't seen his shadow. I hate darkness and winter and am ready for it to end.

My guess is many of my fellow depression sufferers feel the same way.

P.S. I hope the few of you who know me understand the difference between the sort of fleeting suicidal ideations I occasionally have and the more serious suicidal thoughts that others experience that involve plans, etc. I've never gotten that far before and don't plan to. I have too much to live for and a burning to desire to defeat depression. I share the brutal realities of depression only so others who feel them like I do don't feel so alone.