“Do you WANT to get better?” a family member asked me a few weeks after I graduated from the psych ward in 2005.
I was furious and hurt.
Because it was just one of many insensitive comments that seem to imply that I was causing my illness.
So when a woman in the online depression support group that I moderate recently said that HER THERAPIST asked her that same question, I immediately consoled her and told her that I thought that was WRONG, WRONG, WRONG for a mental health professional to ask that.
But my opinion wasn’t unanimous in the group.
Some thought the question was reasonable to ask, as it prods a person to the appropriate steps of action.
One woman cited a blog post called, “It’s Easier to Stay Depressed?” which argued that it takes an incredible amount of drive and energy to do all the things a person has to do to get well, and sometimes it’s easier to stay depressed. Another person confessed to hiding behind her illness at times and thought we all do to a certain extent.
All good points.
I fully admit to some lazy streaks tucked away in my DNA.
My messy house is proof of that. And when I was in public relations, I almost sent in a picture of my boss with half of his head cut off for some award I wanted him to win. I was too lazy to find one with his whole head.
But I am not lazy with my health.
Maybe I need to allow you a peak inside my brain in order to understand why I am so repelled by that question: Do you WANT to get better?
Everything I eat, drink, think, say, and do is under extreme scrutiny by the depression police, aka my conscious. My diet, conversations, physical activities, and mental exercises are under a microscope because I know if I get just a tiny bit lax in any area, I will bring on death thoughts.
Yes, “I” will bring them on. Because “I” didn’t do whatever was required to have good mental health.
Let’s take this weekend.
On Friday I ate salads, drank kale smoothies, and took all my vitamins and fish oil and my probiotic; I meditated, exercised, worked, laughed, helped people, and did everything else I do on any given day to beat depression. But at lunch, I was handing out barbequed potato chips to my daughter’s friends, and they looked really good.
I did the unthinkable.
I put a handful of them on a napkin and ate them.
I immediately heard: “Do you WANT to get better?”
“Processed food causes depression. For you, death thoughts. How could you be so careless?”
On Saturday morning, I hopped on our stationary bike for 55 minutes, clearly not enough for the depression police.
“Do you WANT to get better? You know that the best therapeutic effects come with 90 minutes of cardiovascular activity. Why would you stop at under an hour?”
When I put a little cream in my decaf: “Do you WANT to get better? You are supposed to be off dairy. WHAT are you thinking?!?”
On Sunday I was walking with my daughter when the death thoughts came. I was trying so hard to live in the present moment, to practice mindfulness, and appreciate the sweetness of our being together, but the painful thoughts were loud and pervasive.
I started to tear up.
“Well, this isn’t a surprise, given your horrible diet, lack of motivation, and inability to practice mindfulness the last 24 hours,” I told myself. “You caused them, you’re going to have to get rid of them. Run eight miles or however long it takes.”
I ran and ran and ran. I ran until the sharp edges of the thoughts finally softened. Around mile eight.
The thoughts returned Monday morning. I know what caused them. We celebrated the first week of school with a dinner out. I splurged on some hot pumpernickel bread and a few bites of my daughter’s cheesecake.
“Do you WANT to get better?? Really, do you???”
I swam 200 laps and then tried to meditate at a nearby park. Unsuccessfully.
“Do you WANT to get better?”
I cried on my way home.
I realized that on some cellular level—somewhere hidden in my neurons—I don’t believe that depression is an illness. Sure I can spout off the latest studies in genetics: that new “candidate genes” have been connected to bipolar disorder, specifically gene “ADCY2” on chromosome five and the “MIR2113-POU3F2” region on chromosome six. But I have lived in a community that mocks any kind of mental anguish for so long that those judgments are now a part of me. I have absorbed them.
Depression, to me, is an imaginary stone.
A few days ago my husband and I were walking around the Naval Academy when I felt a stone in my shoe. For the next mile, I tried all kinds of mindfulness techniques to think the pain away because I was sure that I was exaggerating the discomfort caused by it.
“Concentrate on the beautiful water, not your foot,” I told myself.
Finally I asked Eric to wait for a minute, while I shook the thing out of my shoe.
He laughed out loud when the meteor flew out because it was the size of my big toe.
“You’ve been walking around with that thing in your shoe all this time?” He asked. “Let me guess, you were trying to think it away.”
“As a matter of fact I was,” I replied.
I am so used to second-guessing any kind of discomfort in my life—and trying mindful techniques to minimize its impact—that I no longer trust my experience of pain.
When my appendix burst, I didn’t tell anyone. I thought it was a mild cramp that would go away in time, that the pain was all in my head. I tried to think it away because that’s what I do when something hurts. Finally Eric made me call the doctor, and she told me to get to the emergency room right away. If I had waited another day, I’d be dead. But even on the operating table, I felt some disappointment in myself for letting it get that far.
The question, “Do you WANT to get better?” hurts because on some level, I do think I have brought on all my symptoms. By not having the discipline to eliminate dairy, gluten, all processed foods, and sweets from my diet with NO exception. By my pitiful attempts to be mindful and meditate. By not exercising for 90 minutes every day.
I suppose that question reminds me of a very deep shame I feel in being depressed.
A friend introduced a Hindi word to me the other day, “Genshai,” which means “charity,” or more precisely, “Never treat anyone in a manner that would make them feel small, and that includes you!”
“Once we start to embrace the concept of Genshai and treat ourselves as we would treat others, we stop feeling guilty about some things,” she said.
This morning I did everything right. I drank a spinach smoothie and ate fruit with my vitamins and supplements for breakfast. I ran eight miles. And I meditated for 20 minutes. Still the death thoughts came and didn’t go away.
So in the spirit of Genshai, I did two more things.
I wrote on a piece of paper: “Do you WANT to get better?”
Then I scribbled: “Yes. And please don’t ask me again.”
I ripped up the paper and threw it in the trash.
I also read my blog post “What I Wish People Knew About Depression” aloud to myself in the spirit of compassion, not only for me but for anyone who is fighting the imaginary stone.
Published originally on Sanity Break at Everyday Health.
Great article. Only people who do not live with a mental illness, would ever thing, You would want to have a mental illness. Keep educating the world, Therese. Maybe in your children life time more people will understand mental illness.Praying that death thoughts will stop haunting you. You are awesome and I am grateful you are part of my life. Have a blessed Thanksgiving and keep taking care of yourself. God Bless You.
We can be our worst critics
Happy Thankgiving. You are a blessing. Thank you for educating us.
Thank you so much. You too, Ammah!
Dear Therese,
As I think you know, you are perfect, loved, and made “very good” just the way you are, despite feeling the opposite, and the reality of your struggles, challenges, and misery – as each of us are. I don’t understand the concept of the value of suffering, but I accept it and want to understand, for my own sake and others’. It seems you are harsh in judging yourself, listening to and giving credence to the thoughts originating from outside you, from the evil one, as some say. Be kind to yourself. I don’t know how to corral and eliminate the death thoughts, but they are not you. Don’t let the beast beat you. You have so much goodness in you, and selfishly share it with everyone who asks. You make this temporal world a far better place than it would be without you in it.
Peace,
John
Ooops, I intended to write “selflessly” instead of “selfishly”. So sorry for the unfortunate typo.
Haha,
For a split second, i got “depeessed” from not understanding why you wrote “selfishly” and wanted to search that. I even feared and were almost sure I would not find an explanation of how this term might be used sarcastically (as I thought it was).
This is all because I am no native speaker of English.. and at many times.. ahhhh.., i feel depeessed and annoyed at not being able to understandly many weirdly-fit words and phrases in articles and comments. I often cannot understand the choice of jargon, and it takes so much effort to find out answers when I try to search (sometimes, no answers at all), so this makes me doubt my understanding and feel low..
Thank you, John!
Dear Therese, you have a large group of followers who adore you and are so grateful for you and all you do. They all wish as I do that you would not succumb to this belief that you are somehow causing your own illnesses and disorders. You are not. You try, you live, some days you can do better than other days, just like someone who is struggling with cancer or a migraine or a chronic condition, you are human and not perfect. You are kind and generous and very talented to boot. Maybe when those doubts strike you that you “caused” a thought or feeling or it is a weakness in character and you are just not trying hard enough, maybe you can remember that you are a human being, and it’s ok to not be perfect, and that you in fact are pretty super because you have a gift in being able to share so much knowledge and compassion and truth in your writings that gives so many people relief and comfort. Sometimes when we get wrapped up in a depressive episode we forget and our thinking becomes distorted – we lose perspective – that’s why support and therapy is so important I guess – anyway, wish you the best of health always
Popsie
Thank you.
Well written…I’m all too familiar with the ever-present critic within.
I love all the comments here! I really enjoyed this entry too.
Gosh, I have to admit, the stress of worrying about every morsel of “sub par” food I put in my mouth, and judging it as good or bad, would really put me over the edge. Its sounds like trying to be a perfectionist, which is always so stressful to achieve 24/.
I suffer from mild/chronic/ sever episodes of depression, and it’s in forgiving myself for sometimes eating the ‘bad’ foods or crying in bed all day, that I was able to get better.
Perhaps it is that I am not as sensitive to food. Do you notice a physical/emotional difference in those small moments that you’ve described? Such as exercising 60 minutes rather than 90? Or having a small bag of chips? Or is it just the idea that you are not doing what you should?
I must concede, when I don’t exercise, I ask myself the very same question as this article “Gosh darn-it girl, are you trying to do this to yourself? MOVE, go on(!), get out there and move yourself!”. However, if I set a goal of 90 minutes of exercise, I’d never get out in the first place! Sometimes I pat myself on the back for just getting outside.
I say be proud that you are able to meet the really regimented healthy routine you follow so much of the time! Holy cow, most people do not have the strength and motivation to do so!
I agree that I could not manage to do 90 minutes of exercise per day. I struggle to make myself do as much as I do, even though I know it helps.
Also, I have never managed to give up the “junk food” even knowing that it might help. So I kick myself for that.
[…] Borchard, author of Beyond Blue, recently headed a blog post with this question, “Do you WANT to be depressed?” Do you, dear reader? Does anyone want to be injured or […]
Wow. So powerful, so true. Thanks for bringing clarity to this topic.
Please don’t be so hard on yourself, it sounds like torture! That family member did you a huge disservice; I hope another one comes along to tell you to Treat Yourself once in a while!
: )
I clicked for a somewhat different reason. After reading this it seems we differ on our levels of depression or well feelings. I clicked because Ive been shaming myself all dayit’s late at night so this is usually when my sadness gets ahold of me and I wish I could talk to aomeone about it but I have no one. My problem is I have no one and feel alone and replaced a part of the emptiness with hate and self loathing and self hatred. A really confusing mix indeed. I too keep thinking of suicide, all of the time for a million different reasons. Not just when Im sad, but when Im angry, hopeless, jealous, and sometimes for no reason at all. I think a lot actually maybe people would give a shit about me if I died. And after all this whining I do to myself I wondered if this disease called depression is something I had or something I wanted. Do I want to make people feel bad for me? It sounds stupid considering I never have the nerve to say anything about it but I thought maybe I did make it up. Ive been dieting and exercising and I still feel like garbage. I have found no peace and well my life at home sucks too. Im stuck with a family I try my hardest to always be away from, hiding and sleeping in bathrooms etc. I know I often overdo things so it makes me feel like such a whiny baby but I cant help it. Something about your post touched me though so I thought Id comment. Plus I needed to get it all out. An eternal conflict with ones self? That we share..
My therapist asked me this last week, and didnt understand why i was hurt. I started to gaslight myself and tell myself there was no reason to be upset, i just felt worse. Im so glad i found this artical, thank you x