What I Wish People Knew About Depression
I wish the stigma and pain that come with depression were more understood by people who don’t have it. But this piece is not for them. This is for people going through the waves of an illness that is often hollowing, horrifying, and painful.
This is what I wish people with depression knew.
Radical Acceptance
I learned the concept of radical acceptance through my many years of treatment. Radical acceptance is based on the concept of accepting pain to free yourself from a suffering-focused response. It means telling yourself “it is what it is” and starting to believe it. There is nothing I can do to change my situation, but I can try to change how I respond to it. I learned this distress tolerance skill during the heaviest, hardest parts of my life, when things seemed so dark and hopeless. When my therapist first told me about it, my instinct was to scoff and resist embracing it. What do you mean I have to just accept this? Why can’t I change this?! I did not believe radical acceptance could possibly work in my head, so I continued to suffer through my episodes, screaming why, why, why? Trying to resist the depression and falling into a pool of suffering made me believe this was in my control and therefore made me feel worthless and a burden.
One day, however, radical acceptance clicked in my head. I thought, “Wait, why am I fighting this? Depression is something I will most likely live with for the rest of my life. It’s time to allow myself the freedom to not continue to fight against it and suffer.” Once I halted my willfulness and instead accepted, it was freeing.
Facing Shame and Guilt
With depression, I frequently feel shame and guilt. I feel awful for canceling plans last minute when I don’t feel well. I feel guilty when I can’t complete basic tasks or am too tired to run errands. I feel ashamed that I can’t function like other people, like my best self, knowing I am usually an organized, bubbly, focused, and energetic person and hard worker when I am not in the midst of an episode.
You are not a failure or a burden. You are not broken, you are whole.
