I have suffered from serious depression for over 20 years and only started taking meds for it last fall. Unfortunately, the drugs have only worked so-so. I’ve not had permanent work (or insurance) since getting laid off three years ago, and my continued lack of success in finding work has only made me feel more worthless.
My relationships with friends and family have deteriorated because no one wants to be around someone as unpleasant as me. And I keep developing more and more medical conditions, which in turn require more meds, which have only made me more erratic and “crazy.” Many of these conditions my doctor says are due to anxiety, but anxiety-producing events just keep happening to me, including a major apartment fire this spring, followed by two months of apartment hunting and a big move, quarrels with my mother (who unfortunately has had to support me while I’ve been hunting), etc., etc.
Now everyone tells me to get on welfare or take a job sacking groceries or flipping burgers, despite the fact that would depress me even worse and make me feel even more worthless.
I am pretty much without hope. I don’t see anything good ahead. I feel all of my life up to this point (I’m 40) has been wasted, and that I’m way behind and not at the point career-wise that I should be for a man of my age and education. I’ve accomplished nothing that means anything to me.
That said, I should add I intellectually have hope that God will deliver me, but this nightmare has gone on for so long I’m full of despair. My religious faith has, over the years, been the only thing that’s kept me from doing anything more than musing morbidly over suicide. I’ve never actually attempted it or come even close.
And yes, I have been praying to St.Jude, St. Joseph, the Virgin Mary, and others.
The only peace and calmness I seem to experience is when I’m alseep or in Church or at prayer or when I’m engaged in religious pursuits. I just started RCIA, which I’m very thrilled about. I’d been studying the Bible and doing devotions for years and years, but only in the last few months did I start going back to Church and start taking my religious life a lot more seriously.
Interestingly, after that fire, I was in such a state of shock for over a month I couldn’t really concentrate on any reading material, except, oddly enough, for religious matter.
For years I’d been in the habit of sleeping late on Sundays. But one Sunday, after the fire, after the apartment hunting, after the big move–after all that had been taken careof, I woke up early and decided I needed to go to Mass. I’d wanted to go to a particular Church for many months, but had just never gotten around to it.
There is some concern I may be overmedicated, and I’m thinking about going to another doctor. The depression meds have helped somewhat, but not nearly enough. Last night a friend started nagging me in a restaurant, telling me to either get on wlefare, start flipping burgers, or stop complaining. I got so angry I stomped out of the restaurant and walked the two miles home.
I’m praying for an 11th hour deliverance. I’ve been thinking about the principle of “Mary hath chosen the better part,” that if maybe I concentrate on my religious life, my career and health might fall into place.
So, yeah, I’d say depression is an affliction. Big time.
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