Loss and Loneliness

These past few months I have really been feeling an increasingly intense sense of loss; frustration, irritability, anger, sadness, loneliness, aloneness, abandonment, fear, terror, hopelessness...

The most important thing to me, my entire life, has been my family. I would do anything for anyone in my family. I feel my connection to family has slipped away, and almost disappeared, since my Mom died. The disconnection began before she died. As my mental health deteriorated, and hope of wellness began disappearing, my family started distancing themselves from me. In the past year my sisters have really pulled away, and my Dad has taken on a detached attitude...not replying to my e-mails, or making sure our calls are short.

I understand why. I get that it is overwhelming to be around me when I do not feel all up and bubbly. I just really miss my family connection. I miss being a part of the family like I used to be.

I miss me. So far I have lost my young and middle adult years to this illness. Looking forward all I see is being old and even crazier. The future seems unbearable.

Believe it or not, before I became ill I was a person people wanted to be around. I was a bit wild, full of life, ready for love, open to new things, was passionate, compassionate, (I think and hope) kind and caring. I was active, always had tons of energy, was inquisitive, questioning...though often a bit naive and gullible...mostly because I didn't want to hurt anyone's feelings by questioning their motives.

I loved all kinds of music, loved to dance, go to concerts, loved school and lectures, was passionate about learning, read everything I saw, swam like a fish, sang like a manatee, rode my bike everywhere, campsites were my favourite resorts. I really loved to canoe, hike, and rollerblade. I felt one with nature, one with the world, the universe, my friends, my family. Basically I absolutely, positively and actively LOVED LIFE and all it had to offer.

Now, today, this year and last, and the year before that, and the year before that, and the year before that...etc., etc. , I feel disconnected, disaffected, disillusioned, dismissed...pretty much destroyed.

All day I felt like painting a big banner that says, "I HAD POTENTIAL..." and unravel it as I hang myself from the bridge. I feel like because I am mentally ill and not "recovering" like everyone else seems to, like all the literature and studies say I should, like my family expects me to, I am blamed, or dismissed, or left to fend for myself. It is as if no one knows, cares or understands I need love, care, help. I feel really really really hopeless and alone.

It Gets Worse...

It seems I am being blocked at every angle. After seeing Dr. X. yesterday I called my sister to see if I could drive 5 hours to her place and leave my dog with her while I went into the hospital.

She owns her own home on 2.5 acres of fenced in property. She has two dogs that my dog adores. When we go there it isn't anymore work to take care of one extra dog, because really all she needs to do is put out an extra bowl of food and water (which I, of course, would bring with me, so there is no extra cost). I have dog-sat all three of them for a few days at her place before and found it no more difficult than taking care of my one dog.

At first my sister said sure, bring him up. So I made arrangements with a friend to take the 10hr return trip with me. A couple hours after my sister said okay, she phoned me back and said, "Can you find somewhere else to keep your dog?" I told her I had no where else to go. She said she couldn't take the dog, and I could hear her husband yelling at her in the background.

I got off the phone and started crying. I felt completely abandoned at a time when I really need my family to help me. It was really hard for me to reach out and ask for help. I know the dog is my responsibility. I know when I got the dog I made a decision to care for him. I also know I am an adult and need to take care of myself...

I know all this, I am generally, despite being so depressed, very, very independent. I always have been. I rarely ask my family for help. I feel so intensely alone.

It seems like my family thinks I could choose to be different if I just tried harder. Honestly, sometimes I feel like I am being treated like a drug addict, or a family member who is a criminal, rather than a family member with an illness. It feels like my family has decided that tough love , cutting their ties and there losses, and allowing me to hit rock bottom is the only way to saveme from myself. It is as though they feel that if they just push me far enough away my problem will disappear.

My other sister phoned me last night and I was really honest with her about how I was feeling. I told her that sometimes I feel like no one in the family cares about me, like the only way my family would recognize I need help would be when it was too late to help me.

She said, "that is just the depression talking, and they love me, but they have their own families".

I replied," I understand that, and I know your families take a lot of love, attention and time. I try not to ask for help, because I know you are all busy with your own lives, but for me, you are my family. I have no family of my own to help me. I have tried to find help in the community, but I cannot afford to pay very much, and there are no resources that I can find to help me get the treatment I need right now" . I feel desperate for help.

"We cannot understand what you go through.", she said.

Very calmly, but assertively I decided to be completely honest about what it feels like to be me, with my illness, in my family. I asked, "Why have none of you ever taken the time to learn about what it is like for a person to be clinically depressed? Or asked me what would help me? Or even sat down and taken the time to find out what it is that I struggle with. Not one of you has read a book, or tried to see how incredibly hard it is for me to manage an illness like this. Why has no one in my family (except my Mom...but she is dead)...cared enough to learn how to help or be supportive of me?"

When I write what I said down, I feel guilty for saying these things. My intention was not to make my sister feel bad, but to get her to see why I might feel so alone and uncared for in the only family I have. For years I have avoided expressing how saddened I am by the lack of support I get from my family. I am desperately in need of some support now, and I don't feel like I can get through this alone anymore.

I cannot imagine one of my sisters, or my dad or stepmom, becoming chronically and severely ill for years, and my not wanting to help them in anyway I could. To me, that is a familial responsibility, and an extension of your love for that person. Caring for family no matter what seems to me what a family is all about.

I know I cannot dictate, or change, how other people feel. People show love and feel love in their own way. People understand the role of, and their role in, the family in their own way. Knowing all that doesn't make me feel any less alone.

I feel like I really am so depressed that unless I can get more help than I have, unless I can somehow get some relief for awhile, I don't think I can continue in this life. It is too much for me to handle. I feel like a person, screaming in constant pain, and there is medication that could help them, but no one is willing to give it to them, and they are unable to get it themselves.

You know what scares me and saddens me about this whole situation (trying to get outpatient ECT, lack of family support, lack of community support and resources, bizarre and unhelpful treatment protocols etc...What scares and saddens me is that I know there are people who are far more mentally ill than I am, whose families have either completely abandoned them, or were never there for them in the first place. Compared to lots of people I have a caring family and I have a difficult time living with my illness. How hard must it be for those who literally have no one? The world is a sad and confounding place to me.

I Wish My Family Members Cared Enough to Become Informed

Please do not treat me like I am not trying hard enough, or if only I tried harder all would fall into place. Severe and Chronic Major Depression is not like that...not for me anyways.


Me: "Sister I need help. I don't know what to do anymore. I am so tired all the time. You know how people with cancer or hepatitis feel so tired they can't do anything? I feel like that. Exhausted. I am scared. I have suicidal thoughts all the time. I am so sick I want to give up. I won't because I love you and our family so much, but I can't handle this anymore. I need help."

Sister: "You are not sick. You do not have cancer, or hepatitis, or any other illness. All you need to do is get doing things. Get busy. Go kayaking, go for a walk, do your art."

Me: "I have an illness that makes it hard to do things most times. I have no energy. I am sick."

Sis: "You are not sick, you don't have an illness. You are depressed."

etc., etc.

I am lost. I really am sick. Last week I asked my sisters to call me every couple days, just to let me know they love me and care about me, I felt it would help me stay here. I felt really proud of myself for asking for help. Once again though, I reached out for help and have been pushed away.

I am so depressed I am having a hard time functioning. No one sees it. Not the Art clubhouse, where I have tried to explain I need some concessions during this time; not my family...who are telling me not to phone.

On some level my boyfriend is there for me and I really appreciate his being there, but I brought up the fact that I wanted to go to the hospital for ECT and he flipped out; saying if I went to the hospital I would be abandoning him.

I tried to explain that my going to the hospital was nothing about abandoning him, and everything about taking care of myself. He said:, "Don't turn this around." (as though I am abandoning him, but just excusing it by saying I am helping myself???? I don't get it.

He constantly denies I am depressed, or that I have anything to be depressed about. The latter may be true, but from my perspective it seems I am depressed...even if most others in my life don't think so. I really get confused with his attitude, given he has a mental illness and is depressed himself.

I feel so intensely frustrated that those closest to me are telling me I do not feel, or look like I am, depressed. I feel like screaming I am so frustrated. I know I must annoy others...but imagine what I feel like, never getting well....nothing ever working.

I do have a couple people who are very supportive. My friend E is a saint. I feel blessed that she continues to listen to me and be by my side. Same with Dr. X. My boyfriend too, despite his denial of my depression, stays by me and holds me when I need to be held. I have met a new friend to...A and she is so sweet. I hope I can be the friend all these people need when they need a friend.

You might think it was a blessing for others to believe you capable of big things, but sometimes, when a person like me is extremely ill it is hard for others to see such a "strong" person needs help.

Please, if a family member has a mental illness, and is struggling, please take the time to educate yourself about what your family member is struggling with. I feel abandoned and dismissed by my family. I love them so much, yet given I have struggled for years and years, have lost my job, and have basically lost my interest in life...I feel pretty hurt that they have not taken any time, or effort to educate themselves about how these mental illnesses impact the people who have them.

I feel like they do not love me enough to even spend an afternoon at a depression information session, or to read about what it is like to live with severe and treatment resistant depression, or even to come over to my place and go see Dr. X with me. I feel really alone when it comes to my family. So alone I cannot even express it in words...

I'm an Afterthought...and that hurts.

I feel like just sitting in my corner chair and staring, or laying in bed all day...waiting impatiently for each minute, each hour, each day to end.

Dr. X says...(I am paraphrasing with my understanding of what he said...I can't remember exactly what he said), I need to hold on to the moments of happiness, or the moments of joy I do have. That if my mood remains like this I need to try to recognize there are moments that I enjoy.

That is not the life I want. I do not feel a life with extended periods of intensely painful and severe depression symptoms punctuated by brief moments worth experiencing is, for me, a life worth experiencing.

I know, and believe that for some people this might work, or sustain them. I think I used to manage by knowing this would pass, and things would get better. I no longer believe that. I am so tired of trying, and failing to get well.

I am so sick of trying treatments, therapy, medicines that never work, tired of trying to explain what is going on to my family (who I love so immensely it hurts). It hurts so much that I love them and need them and want so badly for them to understand me, to reach out, to help me...and they don't seem to get how much I need them.

I was thinking about why, at 44, I still so desperately need my family's approval, love and support. It feels so childish. I realized yesterday that a life is worth experiencing and living if you have someone who thinks of you on a regular basis. It is as though you really exist if someone wants and needs you here. I mean really needs you...in the way I desperately need my family.

I used to feel my Mom was like that. She would call me and ask how I was, and as if I was okay, or wanted to talk. She always had time for me. She went out of her way to love me, to visit me, to include me in all family functions. I remember thinking there was something pathological about how much I needed my Mom all the time. I was very independent and too care of myself, but always there was an underlying need to be loved by my Mom. It seemed unadult like on one hand, but on the other hand her love sustained me through even the worst of the worst.

Now I feel like my Dad and Stepmom see me as the "problem child" and have taken a ..."wait til she hits rock bottom stance"...as though I were an addict in need of toughlove, rather than mentally ill. I feel as though they actually avoid me.

note: I don't believe addiction is treatable with toughlove...I think it is an illness too. I think all humans need love and compassion to fulfill themselves.

My sisters' have their own family's to worry about...so I am a passing thought. I feel so alone. I feel lie a burden. I feel like I am an afterthought, a sister and daughter who has completely disappointed her family. I feel avoided. I want my Mom back.