i thought it was purged from my life forever until the heavy nameless weight settles in, cuts my joy in one swift blow and the thick suffocating darkness begins to cloud my eyes. my face loses animation - the mask replaces expression - separation from all that is living and moving. loneliness - sadness - with no identifiable source. like falling into a well that is deep and cold and dark and i know i am drowning but my mouth is powerless to call out - the nightmare where the voice cannot produce sound - the legs cannot move - the hands and the soul too weak to pull myself out of the quicksand - going deeper. the little blue pills - my life blood - seem to lose potency for a while - but it seems like the while lasts longer than a life.

this is what depression feels like. it feels like smooth cold rocks tied around my heart - stomach aching with longing - like the world has changed overnight and become a friendless, hopeless place - a place too difficult to navigate in my aloneness so i shut the door - close my eyes - wish i could sleep until it passes. it feels like if i could only find a jagged edge on the heavy rock i would know where the hurt is coming from and pull it away from myself - ease the sadness - but it has no cutting edges, no open sores, no bloody gashes to name the source of the suffering. it is an insidious hopelessness that seeps in quietly and holds on from the inside - irrational heartache - foreboding that sits in the edge of my awareness and colors everything black and gray - and no matter how tight and knotted my stomach becomes it cannot keep the desperation at bay. it is knowing in my rational mind that nothing has changed but my mind - life is as it was yesterday when i could laugh - as it was last week when i was happy to be alive - but the knowing doesn't erase the pain.

these are days i wish i could be someone else - someone who is stable and constant - someone who has never experienced depression so ugly and life altering it cannot ever truly be gone for good. these are the days i have to gather all that is left in me - remember what i have taught my children about living one minute at a time - because i can do that - one minute is short and i can do that. i have to suit up for the war inside me that will never end - but today's battle can be won. this cold black depression can be choked and held until it releases me in the sunlight and feeling returns. age and experience tell me it will not last forever - it always passes - the dread fades away and clarity returns and i will remember with gratitude the gifts piled at my feet.

maybe not this morning, but soon.