I absolutely without a doubt in my mind know what it is like to always be about ten steps ahead of depression.

I went out this afternoon to just be outside and write and be around people but not be with people and not let myself sit in my house or my room for hours on end. As I’ve established prior; it does my soul well to sit in spaces with others where I’m alone but not actually alone.

And as the beer garden I sat in filled up for trivia I just knew deep down inside that going home and being home wouldn’t be something that would sit well with me. I wouldn’t eat dinner, Iwould  just scroll or read or stare and the depression that I’ve been about ten steps ahead of might catch up and I might trip over a pothole or find myself closer to that depression monster trailing behind me then I wanted to be.

It’s funny because I wouldn’t say that I’m “struggling” persay. I wouldn’t say things are bad or dire.

I wouldn’t say that I’m straddling the line of light and dark.

I would just say that things are just things.

In reality I know what’s happening.

The cliff I sense in front of me isn’t one of jumping into darkness. It’s not one where I feel like I’m taking a leap that’s far down.

I’m not jumping because I know something will catch me.

Honestly, the cliff is probably more just a step. Not a step down or up. I’m just crossing over a line that I swore I wouldn’t cross to again.

But, I believe because of that, I am also ten steps ahead of depression.

To me depression isn’t a proper noun. It doesn’t deserve an uppercase letter or a characterization. Depression doesn’t deserve to be given a chapter title or even be a section.

Because at the end of the day depression doesn’t always show up the same.

Sometimes it’s a thing in my body that is like a one of lava lamps that doesn’t plug in that makes it’s decoration by combining an oil-based color and a water that will never combine. The place where the oil meets the water is a little fuzzy. It does something but it ever fully changes the water. Just colors the edges and makes it blurry.

Sometimes depression is simply the absence of light. It breeds in the darkness and the lack of sunshine and turns off parts of our brain that remind us we can create our own light.

Sometimes depression is a small voice that finds it’s way through a crack in the armor. It shouts and shouts but is actually just a small whisper telling us the dark will never become light, that we aren’t enough, that we aren’t good.

That we can’t have hope.

And sometimes depression is just a flashing sign to remind us that one time, long ago, we were friends.

So, with that in mind, I decided to go sit around more people and eat dinner and write words that remind me that I am more than the depression that is ten steps behind me.

Lately I’ve felt like I’m actively running from it.

I’m running from the grief and the depression and the anxiety.

I’ve had a few more nights than I care to admit wherein I felt it creep closer than ten steps away.

Where I let it creep closer than ten steps away.

Because sometimes that’s easier than choosing the weapons and things I need to defeat it.

I know all those things are real. I spent a lot of years in a lot of churches being told that I should just pray away the things that felt heavy. I spent a lot of years in a lot of churches feeling like something was wrong with my brain.

I spent a lot of years in a lot of churches believing I was less of a Christian because I dealt with strong thoughts of suicide.

But, what I’ve come to realizing is that I wasn’t less of anything.

The places I were in was less like Christ for telling me there were things “wrong” with me.

So, yes. Sometimes (like right now) it absolutely feels like depression is about ten steps away from me.

Sometimes it feels like I’m peering at it knocking at my door on my doorell camera.

Sometimes it feels like I have to lock my door at night to keep it away.

And I’m not here to say that it’s normal or that we should be ok with it.

We shouldn’t.

Depression (pardon my language) can fuck off.

But it doesn’t always listen. It doesn’t always stop creeping up.

It joins forces with grief and anxiety and stress and it mounts an attack because it’s sneaky like that.

So, sometimes we have to go sit in restaurants or bars by ourselves.

Sometimes we have to choose to work a little later on something.

Sometimes we have to choose to keep walking so it can’t catch up.

And sometimes, (like right now) we have to write words to remind others that they aren’t alone in the feeling that depression is about ten steps behind them.

Because you aren’t.

Let’s keep moving forward.

Together.

With love,

Meg