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Donna Mae DePola - Guest Speaker Chat ...May 25th 2013 ... for more information please read this!
There is still plenty of time and spaces if you'd like to sign up for the Guest Speaker Chat scheduled for this Saturday!
There is still plenty of time and spaces if you'd like to sign up for the Guest Speaker Chat scheduled for this Saturday!
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It is strange that depression has become such a constant part of my life that I am not completely conscious of it. Sometimes I feel it, sometimes I am aware of the heaviness, but since it feels no different then what I experience every other day, it just feels like my norm.
My therapist has me doing art, she thought it would be a good way to access feelings and express things I have not been able to express verbally. And so I have been. It has been an interesting process. I can't draw, which she thinks is a good thing, because I spend no time thinking about technique and just draw.
It is amazing what comes out, what gets expressed, what gets said and unsaid. It is amazing what I pick up on, and what she picks up on. How much of the process is unconscious. Some of it is more graphic then I expected, more explicit. Some of it is more abstract. Some of it is just feeling.
I left today feeling a few things. I felt a sense of relief, something I have not felt in a long time. But I also felt a feeling that this stuff is so much. It is so big. The hugeness of it overwhelms me. I feel a bit like in the two years I have been working on this as deeply as I have, I really have not gotten that far. But I know that isn't true. I know I've made progress, I know I have grown and changed. I also got waylaid by changes in therapists.
The other lost feeling is anger. I can touch it, a little bit, sometimes. But then I shy away from it, hide from it, push it down, do anything not to feel it. Which of course, worsens the depression.
Sometimes I cannot really understand that this is my life, this is my reality, that was my childhood. I feel split off from it. That was someone else's experience. That was not really me. That happened to someone else. I imagine I must be making it all up, I am making it worse then I really need to be. But then I look at this art, my feelings, my experiences.
it becomes so much, almost to much.
And then I don't know what do to with it. I feel like I could either sink all the way into the depression, or explode in anger.
Maybe I need to keep drawing.
My therapist has me doing art, she thought it would be a good way to access feelings and express things I have not been able to express verbally. And so I have been. It has been an interesting process. I can't draw, which she thinks is a good thing, because I spend no time thinking about technique and just draw.
It is amazing what comes out, what gets expressed, what gets said and unsaid. It is amazing what I pick up on, and what she picks up on. How much of the process is unconscious. Some of it is more graphic then I expected, more explicit. Some of it is more abstract. Some of it is just feeling.
I left today feeling a few things. I felt a sense of relief, something I have not felt in a long time. But I also felt a feeling that this stuff is so much. It is so big. The hugeness of it overwhelms me. I feel a bit like in the two years I have been working on this as deeply as I have, I really have not gotten that far. But I know that isn't true. I know I've made progress, I know I have grown and changed. I also got waylaid by changes in therapists.
The other lost feeling is anger. I can touch it, a little bit, sometimes. But then I shy away from it, hide from it, push it down, do anything not to feel it. Which of course, worsens the depression.
Sometimes I cannot really understand that this is my life, this is my reality, that was my childhood. I feel split off from it. That was someone else's experience. That was not really me. That happened to someone else. I imagine I must be making it all up, I am making it worse then I really need to be. But then I look at this art, my feelings, my experiences.
it becomes so much, almost to much.
And then I don't know what do to with it. I feel like I could either sink all the way into the depression, or explode in anger.
Maybe I need to keep drawing.
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i say keep drawing too. it sounds like it's helping you process things you can't verbally.
i'm glad that you are finding these lost feelings and taking them in. i agree with maybej that i think you will be fine in the end.
you gave me hope in what you wrote. thank you.
I care about you and I would really like to see you not having to carry the weight of depression around anymore. I know you are used to it and it seems normal, but you are carrying a weight. You deserve to have that weight lifted. Life is so much better without it.
I am glad you are doing this work, hard and big as it is. As my therapist says, you'll keep chipping away at it. It will be better over time.
Thinking of you.
Pink, thank you as well. I am glad I gave you hope since that means you see hope in me.
Untangling thanks