Battling My Demons, Fictional or Otherwise
When the winter comes, the nights draw in and the days get shorter, I always struggle. Some years are better than others, but its something that I have always been aware of. I get SAD - Seasonal Affective Disorder. It is one aspect of my lifelong battle with depression and anxiety that really sucks. I can see it coming, a big bad monster looming on the horizon, but I am powerless to stop it. I just have to prepare, shore up my defences and hope that it will leave me alone. Or than the assault will last as short a time as possible.
Mental health, I feel, is something that is still so misunderstood. Suffering from depression, I have heard it all. I have been called lazy for not being able to get motivated enough to clean my house. I have been branded boring for being so down, I felt like I would only bring others down, so have cancelled plans with people that I love and want to spend time with. I have had people who claim to understand tell me that I just need to leave the house, go for a walk and it will all be better. Cheer up. Get over it. It’s all in your head.
I know that. That’s why it’s called mental illness. It’s kind of in the name.
Being a writer, I find the balance between handling my inner demons and crafting stories in which my heroes battle physical monsters difficult at times. I feel like I am more susceptible to doubt, to fear, to Imposter Syndrome and the unshakable belief that I am not good enough. I will fail. I will never make it.
While writing is undeniably a good source of uplifting my mood and spirits, giving me a healthy and productive outlet from the rubbish in my brain, it falls into that category of doing things. Which is impossible when I am deep down the hole of depression and sink into habits like binge watching YouTube videos, or playing video games that I know I can lose myself in. Be in an immersive RPG, or something as simply as Spelunky, a challenging platformer that I feel I can maybe conquer, even though my death count might disagree… It’s in the thousands, easily. God damn, I love that little game.
The battle against mental demons is one that I will be forever embroiled in and I think that having the awareness of knowing when things are bad, when it’s depression, is a strength rather than a weakness. It does not magically make things better. That is impossible. But it gives me the space to know that I need to be a little bit kinder to myself. To let myself struggle. To not berate myself for being imperfect.
A very empathetic therapist once taught me something that has helped me immensely. A thing that I say to myself and try to remember, when the guilt of being mentally ill makes the burden heavier to carry -
It’s okay to not be okay.
Since Christmas, I have not been okay. I am getting there. Slowly stepping out of my hole and making a start to the year, three months into it. This year, the demons were stronger than I had the strength for. But, as always, they do not stay around. They move on. They let me get on with my life. Get back to what I enjoy.
There are fictional demons waiting for me to play with them. How strange it is to feel excited by that.
Happy New Year.
(Thumbnail Image - Tithi Luadthong, Shutterstock)