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So I Was Wrong About Depression

Every year with some moments in-between, people start talking about mental health awareness. In Canada we have Bell Let's Talk Day, because as we all know, corporations - the primary drivers of exploitation, loneliness and financial stress - love to look like they give a shit about the problems they're causing. Like, in general, I'd say I always deeply cared about mental health and I've done a lot to try and understand myself and others, and their mental health issues as best as I can.

But the corporate vagueness, the ivory tower of academia and the glacial pace of improvements to medical practices in combination with living in a rural community without an effective supply of mental health supports means I get a lot of shit wrong.

I posted a thread on Bluesky talking about a particular flaw in logic I was aware I had, but couldn't pull apart and analyze. I'd had a traumatic experience with a psych med, specifically an ADHD medication. For one reason or another, my body had essentially an allergic reaction to it and caused significant psychological discomfort; dissociation and full-blown mania while it was working, major depression and suicidality when it was out of my system. I knew meds weren't supposed to do that; that wasn't normal. But it was also the only experience I had with a psychological medication, and I never really knew much about medications and their mechanisms except "they don't solve the problem but they help you deal with them easier." I knew my hesitance toward psych meds were an irrational fear caused by one tremendously bad experience, like someone who swore off acid after a single really bad trip without a babysitter. But I didn't know anything close to the kind of information I needed to deprogram that irrationality.

A friend of mine, Ariana, read my thread and started DMing me on Discord about it. It started off with her telling me what I knew; that my experience with psych meds was abnormal, that it was the absolute worst case scenario when it comes to negative reactions to psych meds, and that other meds are more likely to help - or at the very least, not be as traumatic if it goes wrong. She told me that sometimes doctors make a really bad call and prescribe meds incorrectly, and asked what I had used that caused the problem. I couldn't quite recall clearly - it's a collection of memories I don't like thinking about much - but used my medical records app to find out I had been prescribed Concerta, and later on Foquest. (didn't know I had tried two, but I do recall taking a pill bottle full of Foquest back to the pharmacy for disposal. what i did with the Concerta, I can't remember.)

We figured out that the dosage I was given wasn't abnormal, which was the point she was getting at. That narrowed down the cause of the traumatic experience to just a really negative reaction to either Foquest or Concerta. So, I just happened to have a body that doesn't like one of those things. The psych rolled the dice and got snake eyes on the first roll, it is what it is.

But the conversation shifted from there. We started talking about mood, and I said "I don't think I'm depressed?" And she responded in a way that kind of surprised me.

"am i allowed to laugh react at that?"

This kind of surprised me. I'm not depressed, I feel great about my body. I look in the mirror and love what I see. I feel thankful to be alive today, to have survived a long string of really bad years. I'm proud of my accomplishments, I'm proud of myself in general. That doesn't sound like someone who deals with depression, right?

She responded to all of that by saying "okay but you can feel all of that, and still benefit from anti-depressants." And again, I was surprised. Isn't that what it's for? Anti-depressants are for depression, depression is when you're so sad you can't function properly. I get sad when my partners go through difficult struggles like any normal person does, but like, I'm not terminally sad. I'm just sad when it's appropriate to be sad... right?

Turns out, anti-depressants help with other symptoms:

And before I could even ask "how does it do all of that shit," Ari continued:

"They're called anti-depressants because they prevent depressant neuron chemical thingies."

Granted, it's not very academic language, but it was enough for me to get the picture; 'depression' isn't Sadness Disease, it's a neurological condition where certain chemicals the body creates are not being processed by the body correctly, or they're not being created by the body properly or some other similar type of thing. That's when it sunk in; Depression isn't the Sadness Disease, it's an injury to the body & mind that causes a deficiency in its ability to handle the world around it. It's like having a broken leg; you can't go up the stairs as easily as other people because you got a cast on your leg and some crutches, but the world around you is full of stairs. It doesn't matter if what broke your leg was an accident or intentional, your leg's broken and now you can't go up the stairs like you used to.

We switched over to voice chat so I can't recall specifics about the conversation, but I can say overall that there were a significant number of revelations I had that completely turned around my fear of psych meds.

One of the ways Ari described depression was incredibly insightful. During the conversation, I had revealed to her my understanding with the "Goldilocks Zone" of emotional stability. In psychological theory, there is essentially a Happy Medium Of Emotions, where people generally should be. However, what I hadn't quite grasped was why it'd be bad if somebody went beyond that Goldilocks Zone. I had just assumed that I feel things stronger, I get sadder or happier than other people, and while it's not necessarily the best case scenario it wasn't necessarily a problem.

She revealed to me that, as soon as the human bodymind goes beyond that Goldilocks Zone, it starts shutting down portions of the nervous system's functions to try and cope with the extreme situation it's going through.

She opened Photoshop and opened a picture she'd taken recently. It was a photo of her partner in a dark laundry room, crossing her arms, seemingly waiting to cycle the laundry. She said, "this is what normal people see. They see details like the laundry machines, the clothes in the hamper, they can see the separation from one towel to another in the holes of the hamper, they see the detergent in the corner, they see the lacy frills on the edge of her sleeves, they see her tattoo on her forearm, right?"

Then she cranked up the shadows and crushed the highlights on the curves module, causing the picture to look extremely high contrast and oversaturated.

"So this is your brain on depression. You've lost key details in the shadows. You can't even see the detergent, the holes in the hamper just look black and you can't tell whether it's towels or clothes in it. Her shirt looks completely black, and you can't see any folds or wrinkles in it anymore. Now look at her arms, you used to be able to see the texture of her skin but now it's just white like printer paper until you get to the darker edges where it's just a strong, ugly red. The transition from the paper white to that red is extreme, almost pixelated. Your brain can't process the subtleties, so the transition from one pixel to another is a lot higher. When your brain hits that transition, it's too big a step to take on the staircase so it stalls out and starts shutting down. Your mood swings are so extreme that your body can't handle it, and tries to protect itself from it."

Immediately, I recalled the times my partners came to me about stressful situations they were dealing with and recognized the difficulty I had with handling the emotions I'd feel as a result. I'd feel an incredibly strong sense of unfairness, sadness and anger. I don't want them to feel upset, but they're upset, and it's not fair that they have to go through it. And... I'd shut down. I'd dissociate for a small period of time because my brain was overloaded. Often, these weren't even significantly terrible problems they couldn't handle; they were just venting to me about a thing they could deal with perfectly fine on their own, but I just couldn't handle it. Eventually I'd sort of "snap out of it" and try to do what I could, but at times it felt like I was just... stuck.

"Your brain is taking blown-out, over-saturated, high-contrast photos and it doesn't know what to do about it, so it's just shutting off the camera and giving it to someone else who might know what they're doing," she said. "You're switching, or dissociating, or whatever is going on for you, because you've gone out of the Goldilocks Zone."

Then she pulled the highlights and shadows on the curve module to less extreme settings; the photo was still fairly high-contrast and blown out, but you could make out more details. you could pick out a couple very slight highlights in her partner's shirt, hinting at a fold. You could see some of the texture in the skin on her arm come back. Her tattoo on her forearm reappeared with the pitch black ink becoming a dark blue. The detergent box was still very difficult to read aside from the brand in large font, but the box could be separated from the shadows surrounding it. The colour of the cloths in the hamper came back, but it was still a bit difficult to tell whether you were looking at a towel or pyjamas.

"This is your brain on anti-depressants. The transition from one pixel to the next is still rough, but it's smoother now. You can see more details you weren't able to see before. Anti-depressants don't fix the contrast issue, and they never will. You'll be dealing with blown out pictures for the rest of your life. But you're at least able to deal with the contrast a bit better now, and you're less likely to just shut the camera off in frustration and pass it to someone else. In real terms, you'll be able to feel those strong emotions you already feel, but it won't make you shutdown. You'll be able to feel sad that your partners are hurting, and say 'that fucking sucks, that's not fair' instead of sitting there shaking for ten minutes because you want to wish the problem away."

"So it's like a stereo audio signal, if my mood goes too high or too low it just starts clipping when I don't want it to be clipping. So anti-depressants are like adding a compressor, it won't necessarily prevent you from clipping again but it'll at least give you the ability to turn down the gain so it doesn't happen as often," I suggested.

"Yeah, same metaphor basically. Look at the levels analyzer on Photoshop, the shadows and highlights are still peaking really bad, but it's not peaking as bad as it was when I had the curves pegged. You'll be able to handle more stress and emotion before you start peaking if you take anti-depressants, but without them it doesn't take much sadness or anger or happiness to make you start peaking."

As I write this out now, I recall the concerts I played in my 20's in Regina. I remembered playing my heart out, screaming into the microphone along to beats I'd made over the past two years to an audience that barely trickles into double digits. I remember finishing my performance and immediately needing to isolate myself. I remember dissociating, nearly vomiting a couple times, shaking from the adrenaline pulsing through my veins. I remember thinking, in those moments, back to the extreme anxiety I'd feel before a dirt bike race. The fear of getting hurt, the fear of losing, the fear of sucking with a bunch of people in the stands to watch me fail. Then the gate drops and you just, fucking go. That anxiety turns to adrenaline, you rip back on the throttle and slam through the gears, flying through jumps like you're fucking Superman. My dad recorded some clips, I watched it back and I'd get maybe a foot or two off the ground, but it felt like I was as high as an airplane while I was riding. Then I'd remember the emotional and physical crash afterwards; the soreness from whiteknuckling the handlebars, the dissociation from being overwhelmed with adrenaline, the nausea, the exhaustion.

My bodymind, as long as I can remember, has been broken. I dealt with extreme depression with a variety of causes to go with it; neglect, loneliness, self-hatred, rejection sensitivity, jealousy, spitefulness, and what I'd eventually realize was gender dysphoria. HRT was a boon to my mental health, and certainly did what Ari had shown me; it had taken those highlights and shadows, and brought them more into focus. I wasn't peaking as much as I used to when I got emotional; as a kid I'd throw things, I'd fight other students, I'd say bad things about people because I couldn't handle myself. These days I'm still very emotional, but I'm able to keep myself from thrashing my Xbox controller to pieces or punching holes through walls. There are an embarrassing number of holes in my bedroom wall, all caused by me in my childhood. I don't do these things anymore... but I still shutdown when I feel too much of an emotion, good or bad.

I'm handflapping excitedly more often, but that doesn't prove that I'm okay. Just being happy more often doesn't automatically exclude me from being depressed.

Four years ago or so, I had my first anxiety attack. I thought I was having a heart attack; my heartbeat was way too fast, and my left arm felt like pins and needles. I tried to wait it out for a bit, but it got worse as I catastrophized; what if it is a heart attack? I asked for a ride to the hospital, and my dad took me. A nurse hooked me up to an EKG. She saw nothing out of the ordinary aside from a slightly elevated heart rate - it had already passed. She gave me a temporary anti-anxiety medication, and sent me on my way. Whether it actually helped or not I'm not really sure, but it's apparent to me now that I do still deal with anxiety in a way normal people don't have to deal with. It doesn't matter that I've found a way to mentally replace the feeling of anxiety with the feeling of excitement instead, it still significantly impairs my ability to make decisions rationally and it still doesn't work all the time. The recent airplane crashes in America spiraled me into the thought that I might never be able to safely visit my girlfriends if I go by plane. That anxiety is definitely still there, because logically and statistically, even if air accidents happen more often than usual, it'd still be a safer way to travel than by car.

The point is this: my perception of mental illness wasn't much better than the norm. The only thing I knew better than the average person was how a mental illness can impact the body. I still didn't know how those impacts were caused, and I still didn't know what depression really was. I had a general understanding that mental illnesses are an injury to the body, but I didn't know what the medications actually do. Depression isn't just The Sadness Disease, anxiety disorders aren't just problems handling fear, and the Goldilocks Zone of your moods aren't just a general recommended calorie intake but for emotions. Medications aren't going to make me feel less of one emotion or another, it's going to help my body handle those emotions without shutting down, or at least give me more of a heads up before it happens so I can do something about it. Medications will help me use coping mechanisms with more effectiveness, and give me more time to implement coping mechanisms that work better but might take a bit more time to accomplish.

I had a bad experience with a psychological medication. It was the worst case scenario on my first try. It scared me away from psych meds altogether. I knew it was irrational to be scared, but I didn't know why. Thanks to Ari, I know why, and I'm not scared anymore.

Thankfully, anti-depressants are listed in the Saskatchewan Drug Formulary and thus fully covered for broke bitches like myself. ADHD medications aren't, unfortunately, but we'll need to take some baby steps before we cross that bridge.

I was wrong about depression. I'm happy, I'm proud of myself, I love my body, and I can't wait to go swimming in a two-piece soon. But I'm still depressed, and that's okay. Being optimistic or cheerful doesn't exclude me from being depressed, and that's okay. Anti-depressants aren't going to change me and make me more numb to the world around me, it'll just keep my emotions from spiraling out of control in either direction.

I'm depressed, but I'll be okay.