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One Year On - A Personal Essay

© John McManamy

"I would write as I learned, one article at a time. It would all be tied into my recovery."

Perhaps the worst thing about major depression is the uneasy feeling of no escape. Having fallen victim once, twice, several times you almost know there will be a reoccurrence. You may be short on specifics but you are quite certain it will sneak up on you as you're sleeping, in a manner not far removed from this:

While you are under the covers, a construction crew of 112 roustabouts with their heavy machinery will quietly tiptoe into your room, dismantle a few walls, and lay down five miles of high-speed electro-gravitational rail track that runs right under your bed. This is sort of the Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes in reverse. God has singled out you and you alone for the visitation that is about to eventuate.

The next day you unwittingly arise only to find your brain turned to hamburg by the Tokyo Express hurtling out of your closet and through the back of your skull and out over the horizon, your sanity receding in the doppler blare of the engineer's horn, clanging crossing bells mocking your weakness and stupidity.

You eventually find a new head to pop onto your shoulders, and pick yourself up, only to be mowed down by the Hoboken Local, then the Chattanooga Choo-Choo, a tram, a trolley, and finally little puffer bellies all lined up in a row.

It's hopeless now. The kid down the street and his Cocoa-Puff train can render your prefrontal lobes into sushi simply by looking in your direction. And this is perhaps the cruelest part of depression - there is no train to finish the job. The final deed is up to you, and you alone.

I bring this up because this happens to be my first anniversary at the Suite. I had survived my worst round of depressions yet, and was still in a state of shell shock from the experience. One of the first things I did when I crawled out from under the covers was get to the computer. I was new to the internet and I was new to finally acknowledging depression, and I was also coming to grips with my diagnosis as a manic depressive, something I had somehow known all my life but up till now had steadfastly refused to accept.

I bounced from website to website, reading about what devastating illnesses both depression and manic depression were, but I also found that both were treatable, and that I had a major role in my recovery. Then I discovered various mental health bulletin boards, and even started replying to messages, once I worked up the courage. Over the next few weeks, I found myself gravitating to one particular board that was frequented by bipolars.