Complexity
Things I wanted to do tonight: Heat up frozen mini-pizzas and eat them, take a shower, do two loads of laundry, write a long blog post, pack my bags for the long weekend. This doesn’t sound too hard, does it?
Things I managed to do tonight: Eat Lunchmates (using the oven and washing dishes seemed way too complex), do one load of laundry, start writing a blog post, get distracted in the middle of it because I’m trying to find a certain envelope that had stuff written on it, wander around looking for the envelope, get really frustrated that I can’t find it, think I should clean the bedroom but I don’t want to, sit back down and try to write the blog post but instead find myself rocking back and forth. I’ll pack in the morning. I’ll shower tomorrow night. No, I’ll take a bath tomorrow night. You don’t even have to stand up to do that. Scrap the blog post that was supposed to be long and semi-meaningful, and start writing this one instead.
I hate that sometimes, even when I’m not particularly depressed or hypomanic, I still can’t do things that everybody else can do. I mean I literally can’t do them. At work, I am always organized, often hyperfocused, and have no problem multitasking. In the rest of my life, though, the simplest tasks frequently seem unbearably complex. Tonight the thought of washing my hair or turning on the oven made me want to crumple into a little heap. I’m not even sad. I’m not even tired. I’m not having particularly intrusive racing thoughts. I’m not just being lazy, either. Trust me — I’m lazy frequently enough to know when I’m being lazy! I’ve got plenty of experience in that area.
I’m not always like this. Just far more often than I’d like to be.
May 15th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
I’ve been going through a similar depression lately. Even small tasks seem too unbearable to do. At least you got a load of laundry done; sometimes I can’t even manage to do that.
Just take life one task at a time. Don’t try to think of all the things you have to do at one time. If it helps, make a list of what you have to do and just take it one thing at a time. Check them off the list when you’re done, and that might help you feel like your accomplishing something. If I feel like I accomplished something, it’s easier to keep going.
May 16th, 2008 at 9:50 am
I have the same problem…but for me it’s a cognitive problem…and believe me I wouldn’t last at work for a minute…
One suggestion…eat some real food!
May 19th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Similar problem here. I think I can see stuff as a difficult mountain, when its really just a bunch of small steps. You have to enjoy the small steps. Have you ever been locked up(you may call it hospitalized) ? Can you remember enjoying that? I didn’t enjoy it, so I enjoy pretty much anything now.
May 20th, 2008 at 10:36 pm
Thanks, guys. I know I should eat some real food. My current living situation makes it difficult for me to prepare real meals, but I should still try to do a better job of working around that by making sure I’m eating plenty of fresh fruit and other good stuff that doesn’t require preparation.
Mark, I’ve been locked up four times, twice in one hospital, and twice in a different hospital. One of the hospitals was a horrible experience for me, so much so that I still find it very traumatizing thinking about it two years later. It was a very short-term thing, and no one hit me or anything like that, but it was still awful. The hospital I was in before that… while I’d never say I enjoyed being there, it was at least useful for me to have a change of surroundings, which helped me change my perspective a bit. It gave me the chance to chill out, and although theoretically I could have done that on my own, in reality it wasn’t about to happen. When I was away from school for a few weeks, I was able to realize that it was not actually the end of the world if I withdrew from some courses or got less-than-stellar marks, something that seems extremely obvious, but I honestly couldn’t believe it at the time. Getting away from my regular life also helped me realize that continuing to socialize with one of my rapists on a daily basis would not magically revise history — I’d been forcing myself to hang out with him, trying to convince myself that if he was nice to me now, that meant he couldn’t have possibly raped me before. After being away from him for a few days in the hospital, I came to my senses about that and I stayed the hell away from him. No mental health professionals were of any help to me in the process of my coming to those two realizations — it was just stepping outside my “real” life that did it. I might have been able to mull these things over just as well during a nice beach vacation, but that wasn’t an option at the time.
A change of surroundings is only helpful, though, if you don’t wind up in a worse hell than you were before, which is why I did not have any useful revelations in the second hospital, apart from This place is horrible; I never want to come back here again; I feel even worse now.
May 21st, 2008 at 12:14 am
Sorry you hated being in the hospital-jail also. I’m not wanting to be a bastard, but I’m being a bastard… if you don’t take half decent care of yourself, you might lose your freedom and end up hospitalized.
This is just obvious stuff , I don’t mean to be insulting( if it reads that way) just reminding everyone who happens to read this comment section what could happen.
Wash.If you don’t wash this would indicate to a shrink you are ill, as washing indicates you want to be around other people = social. We all must be social or we are mentally ill (joke).
Food, not enough proper food, your brain will not work right, never mind your body having energy to do stuff, if your brain can’t work (you will do stupid and say stupid stuff), it will be inevitable that you will be hospitalized.
Remembering the importance of my Freedom, is a chief motivator for me. I could stay in bed all day and mope. Once I get moving I’m alright, my problem (once moving) then is staying focused on one project as I multitask/ get distracted easy. Ten things going and none finished.
May 24th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
I too know exactly what you mean about not being able to do things and the difference between that paralysis and being lazy. I am amazed, though, that you can be so functional at work. Though it took me forever to realize what was happening to me at work, the problems of walking around in a mental cloud, unable to focus or finish a task, having trouble talking to people, or else getting obsessive and paranoid - all that stuff has been my undoing in two different work settings. That’s a huge accomplishment - you’re doing something right. Though I’m not big on advice, I might say comparing yourself to what other people can do is just another habit of depressive thinking, and it’s pure projection. I have to catch my thinking along those lines all the time - it’s another way of tearing myself down. We don’t know what other people go through, and it has nothing to do with the issues we have to face. Hard as it may be to do, I hope you can give yourself credit for all that you can do well in this state.
June 6th, 2008 at 1:22 pm
My goodness, do I relate. One thing I wish I had a problem with, but don’t, is eating. I seem to get in enough food no matter what
July 5th, 2008 at 7:37 pm
Polly,
When I drive my car into the driveway, I pass my mailbox. I get out of the car and walk toward the front door ignoring a task that I simply cannot handle when depressed. The postal carrier knows, and sometimes brings me the mail at the front door. When the depression I had (May or April, it’s so hazy I can’t remember) started to lift, I would get the mail before it was “box full pick mail up at post office”. It took months to get to the point where (just this last 10 days!) I drive into the driveway, get out of the car, and walk 10 feet to get the mail.
I often wonder if the postal carrier is relieved the depression is gone, or even knows why the box is always empty now. LOL
Hope you’re doing well, take care,
Stephany
July 13th, 2008 at 4:10 am
Hi Polly,
I could really related to this post too. However when I read your evg to-do list:
“Heat up frozen mini-pizzas and eat them, take a shower, do two loads of laundry, write a long blog post, pack my bags for the long weekend. This doesn’t sound too hard, does it?”
even today, as i’m coming out of my worst winter depression, it still seems like a lot to me. i’m not sure i could do all that.
when i was depressed post-mania and trying to return to work, i had a lot of trouble managing to eat and everything seemed like a major task. i remember when i managed to boil water and how that was a major accomplishment. and i remember thinking, maybe if boiling water is hard for me, i’m not really ready to go back to work…
so i’m amazed too that you function so well at work. i’ve been getting better, but i wouldn’t say i’m always organized - no.
i appreciate mark’s comments also about enjoying everything now compared to being locked up. i should remember that.
i guess i too find it hard not to compare myself to others and when friends talk about what they did that morning etc. i am amazed at how much they can do and think i could never do that. possibly it takes proportionally more energy for me to function half-decently at work, so that other areas of my life (self-care) suffer as a consequence…
but i do want to thank u for this post as it’s nice to know i’m not alone in perceiving everything as ‘too difficult’, at times