![]() ![]() “You are wrong in thinking you are weak and should be ashamed of having this illness, you have got it because you are strong … a weak, cynical or lazy person faced with difficulties will quickly give up, so would never get depressed enough to become ill.” Tim Cantopher’s words from his book Depressive Illness: The Curse of The Strong: If you are, or feel you might be, depressed, take comfort and pride from Dr. When all seems lost, there’s still a way forward. Then came the anxiety attacks, and twelve months after our painful decision, I was diagnosed with a stress-related facial skin disease and depression. I wasn’t miserable when I slept, so why not just keep sleeping? It made perfect sense.īut the damage to my boys forced me to keep my comforting escape route a secret. Cooking for one underlined my loneliness, so I didn’t bother, and for a while I comforted myself with alcohol, as the health implications were no longer important.Īnd that’s when I thought of making it all stop. I wanted to run away rather than face the misery ahead, so I escaped to bed to shorten the days. Feeling weak and pathetic because I couldn’t cope on my own without a man around. My even busier life was now a nightmare, yet I was barely functioning and I didn’t recognize myself anymore: lethargic, hollow, lost, ashamed, and desperately lonely. Something had died, but instead of grieving, I pretended I was coping. And when my boys went to stay at their father’s, nothing could stop the overwhelming loneliness from driving me into the ground. When we did separate, my expenses escalated while my income sank. As I tore their world apart, it broke my heart. A parent’s supposed to make things better, not worse. I felt sick when I awoke to the conversation we’d been dreading: telling the boys that Mom and Dad were splitting up. Our joint, shameful debt took me months to resolve, was a debilitating hell, and meant we had to live a lie under the same roof for eight months, sharing our bed in cold silence for the first four as we pretended to our young teenage sons that all was normal. I’d also fallen out of love with my first home-based business, so my marriage to my best friend was over, and my future was gone. Have you thought that perhaps sometimes they’re not coping either? That maybe, just like you, they’re not perfect? Not always much fun being a grown-up, is it?įrom the outside, others seem to be holding it all together. Feeling lost and alone, living in silent despair. You’re an amazing somebody who often feels like an invisible and overwhelmed nobody. You feel guilty and inadequate and worry that someday all those plates you’re spinning will come crashing down. You and your needs aren’t even worth a mention on your very long to-do list. Juggling all your different roles, trying to be all things to all people, and “shoehorning” so much into every day. What Do You Pretend?Ĭoping with everything life throws at you is tough. So, while pretending to everyone that I was fine, I thought about it. I couldn’t put my boys through that, but I couldn’t see another way out. ![]() I was strong, so not coping would mean I was weak.īut it hurt and hurt and hurt. You just cope with it like everyone else. So what? Separation and divorce are commonplace. If you’d told me I’d one day consider taking my own life, I’d have laughed and said, “You’ve got me confused with someone else!”īut after twenty years and two sons together, my husband and I decided to split up. “Our strength grows out of our weaknesses.” ~Ralph Waldo EmersonĪll my life, I’d been a strong, independent woman, building a business from home, raising two wonderful sons, and staying happy and positive throughout. ![]()
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