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Rae, I just read your"Depression, God and staying alive" article and I just want you to know that I too could have written this. I can relate to just about everything you wrote except I have not had the latter experiences in my youth. Thank you for sharing. You are not the only one.
Hi Rae...I'm going through the same thing as I post this comment. I was diagnosed in '95, so was my partner at the time. He died a year later. Unfortunately he waited too long to get help. About a year later I lost my dad to cancer...he waited too long as well. A few years after that my closest friend died of AIDS. He was in treatment, but still died. Then my cat died ... he was with me for 15 years. Shortly after that I met a wonderful man. We were together for eight years, before he left me. he meant the world to me. A couple of years before his leaving, in '07 I had come down with anal/rectal cancer...survived...but not entirely whole. the treatment itself nearly killed me. I was then also laid off from my job at the beginning of the recession/depression. It was then that I was diagnosed with major depression, PTSD, and Generalized Anxiety Disorder. I realized that I had been depressed most of my life, but had never attached the word's "major depression", to the actual feelings. I honestly thought everyone felt that way. I was just coming out of a five year long depression, and feeling motivated to get my life back on track, but my partner left...and I was newly traumatized. That was two and half years ago. I'm still trying to get past it. None of my friends want to talk to me anymore. Some of them are furious at me, because, according to them, I'm not trying hard enough to get past the break up, and my near death experience with cancer. I'm on disability now, and have a part time job. However, in all though, I'm doing okay. I see my therapist weekly. Medication is working; exercise and meditation also have helped immensely. Yet, like you, I'm tired of not feeling 100%...ever! I too have suicidal ideation, but am certain I'll never commit suicide..or at least I'd like to think I won't. I don't know how much HIV is playing into my depression. I'm sure it is...however there's one thing I do know...I'm not going to let this little bug rule my life. I fight with the blasted depression every day. I'm not the man I used to be, but the man I am is good enough. We are all good enough. Despite how we're vilified, or made guilty, or having loss so much of our vitality. Thank you for reaching out with your piece. It makes me feel that I'm really not alone in this struggle. That at least there are some people who can identify with my experience, and I with theirs. Depression is a terrible thing to contend with every day. However, I'm content with at least having the opportunity to fight it. Although I'm as tired as you are, the daily struggles are a testament to my wanting to live. That's a good thing.
Rae, Your words speak to me in so many ways,and I feel guilty even commenting on your post, since my troubles can't compare to your's. I have arguably no real issues".I am not sick, I have no chronic illness, my family members are all alive and healthy. I have a job, I rent an apartment and I can afford food to eat. I have health insurance. Having worked for some time as a registered nurse in an HIV clinic, I can easily empathize with the exhaustion of the daily regimens that come with controlling the virus. And even now working as an oncology nurse, I see that same physical but also mental exhaustion. I constantly think about how unfair life is. How are there are so many people like my patients suffering from these diseases, people who would be willing to give up anything just to spend one day of their life in my shoes. One day of my easy, perfect, disease free life where they could spend it doing whatever they want (of course including things they are currently unable to do). Whether that be hang out with their friends, laugh with their family, go out to dinner or a movie or both, pay bills, bounce their newborn grandchild on their knee, play football after Thanksgiving like they always used to, or smile a real ear to ear smile that actually resembles happiness. Little things that become so much more important once you are no longer able to participate in them. The guilt that I feel and have felt, knowing this, is overwhelming but it is not the only reason that I have to take about 15 different medications a day just to make it through. And here is where I can truly empathize with your pain. When I am NOT at work I am at home, in bed, all 3 days a week that I have off. And it is where I remain all other times I am not at work. I no longer care enough about myself to take care of my body. I rarely shower, often forget to wash my face, brush my teeth, drink aka hydrate myself. I don't concern myself with vitamins,though I get none from my diet. I haven't seen a doctor, gotten a blood test in years, I have family history of cancer yet never go, I have 2 cavities but won't make appt with the dentist, and I've had night sweats and irregular bleeding but have not seen a gynecologist in about 3 or 4 years. If I want to eat I open a bag of something because the idea of standing long enough to actually cook something makes me exhausted , and I take it into the bed with me. Then I will mindlessly eat it while I read The Week magazine so when patients or coworkers comment on what's going on in the world, there's a chance I will know about it. I have no desire to purchase a TV set or have someone come in to connect cable for it or the internet. So I have neither. I rarely get calls that aren't voiced by a recording, but when I do, I don't answer, return them, or even listen to messages. I throw all my mail in a pile and refuse to open it, which has made me late for bills etc, and decreased my perfect credit to half that. I don't text, I certainly don't look at Facebook or any other social media site, and I don't trust anyone that...Well I don't trust anyone. I lay awake all night, because the moment my mind isn't completely occupied with tasks, I breakdown. I am absolutely positive, without a doubt, that I have no purpose here on earth. I don't exist outside of work, i have literally had people try and walk through me on the sidewalk. What makes me feel especially guilty is that, while you have every right to feel exhausted and tired for dealing with your own health issues while ALSO making changes in the world around you: I do not. I complain about a family that refuses to stand by me, to support or attempt to understand the extreme changes in their child, while I am so volatile of course they have no desire to have anything to do with me. I pine over old friendships that ended because I was too depressed to answer their calls or spend time with them because I couldn't get out of bed and when they finally gave up, my cries of being unloved got even louder. My only sunshine are my two cats that I rely on day and night for company and to provide the safety and security of unconditional love. I stopped trying to be part of the world and got what I wanted. And now I'm so depressed over that choice made so many years ago, I've given up trying to change it back. It's too exhausting. I understand that I have no clue what it is like to deal with a chronic disease every minute of every day. But what I hear in your post is something I truly can understand.Being tired, forever tired . Because I too am so fucking tired. I am so tired of taking pills to make me happy especially when all they do is decrease my spastic sobbing to mostly just tearful (at least when I'm working). I'm so tired of realizing everyday when I come home there is no one there, and there is no one anywhere, and if I were to lose my key or get stuck on a train out of town, there is no one to call. I'm so tired of being so incredibly alone that for my 4 days off a week I see and speak to no one the entire time and often don't leave the apartment the entire time. Of course I wonder if I died, how long it would take for someone to figure it out, but realistically work would call after a couple missed days, and no one would feel all that surprised.because they know, as I do, that I've done this to myself. That I have the power to reintroduce myself to society. For these exact reasons I am so tired of me. I am so tired of realizing that this is all my fault, and that I am far too exhausted to bother to try and change it. That this depression has caused me to withdraw further and further into myself, to ostracize myself from my friends and from my family, so long now that I could no longer return to the person that I was. And I despise the person that I have become: that I am. I spend those 96 free hours laying in bed, sobbing and wishing for a time machine to go back. To go back to where and when I fucked things up so disastrously. To change those mistakes, that I don't even know what they were, and try and fix them. Since I know I can't, I just end up hysterically crying the entire time. And I am so tired. I cross streets at turtlelike speed, against traffic lights, often hoping that a fast moving car can make a decision for me that I cannot. Because my own intentions are unable to cross that line. I never really think about taking my own life and I can never figure out exactly why. You pointed out some perfect words to possibly explain these feelings. Curiosity. This makes so much sense to me. I think it may be curiosity and not hopefulness that keeps me from finally trying to end my existence. I gave up hope a while ago but still, the knowledge that there are other things in the world that will happen, that I will want to know how they turn out. Wars and struggles and scientific breakthroughs, I can't stifle the curiosity to see how it all pans out (or read about it, from my bed, in my magazine). Besides this curiosity, are the facts that I can't possibly think of a way to do this that doesn't scare me or, more importantly, would possibly not be completed correctly or fully. My most intense fear is that an attempt to end my misery might not do so, but instead, being a person alone in the world with no advocate or proxy, leave me even worse than now, as a human vegetable with no one taking the responsibility for caring enough about my wishes to pull the plug, and me continuing to feel and understand my continued, painful and useless existence. Or maybe, just maybe, I continue to exist because I'm too tired not to.
Rae I can't imagine how tough of a journey it has been for you being I'm newly diagnosed, 2011. You have such a brave spirit it ironically gives me hope because you've held on this long and still pushing a hard line with this wonderful thing HIV. I'm a mother of 5 and a grandmother once over. Do I have days where I just want to bury my head? yes, just give in to its ominous clutches, yes; days when even my family isn't very supportive and they act like they're in a worse state than I am, hell yes! But through God's voice and the help of a great team of doctors and counseling I know I have a purpose in life. No matter how many times I get detailed or others don't have faith in me and sometimes not want to see me fufill my purpose in life. I say my prayers and ask God to give me the strength to fight another day and say to depression, go take a long walk off a short bridge, today I'm going to live!!! :-)
Rae...Please hold on! I don't want to put pressure on you, but when I was diagnosed a year ago, I found your posts and they gave me hope! I know, I have faith that God has a plan for us...I feel it..I don't know why, but I feel that we re all going to be alright if we take care of ourselves as the Lord commanded...Do I feel tired? no doubt. I haven't disclosed to anyone and that scares the living s**t out of me, but I quickly turn to God..Yes,it has been only one year and that is nothing compared to your journey... But...I need you! HIV is not for sissies and you are one of the strongest I have seen!! God bless you.
Damn. I feel the same way. I was diagnosed close to one year ago. I keep telling myself that I need to keep going for my daughter, but now I just don't care anymore. Since I was diagnosed, I have quit 2 jobs. I just stopped going.I almost lost my house. With God's grace, I made it through. I just don't know what to do. I've dealt with Depression for most of my life. I think is so horrible for me because I've yet to tell anyone about what's going on I know I need to talk to someone. Im scared. Well enough with my mess. Rae,you will get through this mist of despair, it is fleeting, and will dissipate. I know you will. I know you will. You are a survivor. I hope one day be one too.
Man you hit the nail on the head. I have been trying to express just what you have said for 3 years now and it just seems like no one understands this feeling...i just wanted you to know that there is another woman out in the world that feels the way you do also.
wolverinex
I certainly do feel your pain and helplessness...I too think "exactly" the same things....I'm alone, no family or friends....total recluse I am...I've been suicidal even before HIV, having been abused as a kid in every way possible even having my hands held over a naked flame as punishment for my sister's wrong doing...My mom was a provider but bad parent...I've made so many mistakes, but right now the only thing driving me is that breathing is an automatic body function...I just hope my end is not embarrassing...So to you, my sister, I say: we all die, HIV or not, and I appreciate the input as do so many others through the years....I would like to say 'STAY STRONG' but I know those are only words of a stranger, but I said it none the less......XXXXXXX
November 1, 2014