Depression is Back

The last two days I have been very depressed. I even skipped my therapy session today because I was too depressed to go- I had to run home after work and go to bed.

I work in healthcare- basically in the service industry.Which is a hard place to work with a mental health issue, because it is not enough to do your job. You have to do it with a smile. And I understand with my patients- but with my coworkers too? I wish that I never got asked the question by a co-worker, how are you. That is a terribly personal question. I don't want to tell you the truth half the time, but I don't like to lie. So it is never a satisfactory response from my side when I feel like hell.

And that really is all too often. I am starting to wonder if I am in the wrong profession, but then I don't think that there is any right profession. I feel like I have to be so close to 100% every day to not only treat my patients right, but also to get my paperwork done, and treat my co-workers cheerfully. And I'm just not 100% everyday.

Is there a job where you don't have to be on top of your game everyday?

Is there a job these days that has no paperwork? Where you don't have to smile when you feel bad? When no one will ask you how you feel or how your weekend was, when you stayed in bed depressed all weekend? If there is, I want to know about it.

And yet, I love what I do. Just not all of the time. But I love being an occupational therapist. It is the best thing in my life right now. And the biggest burden. I guess that is normal.

When I am depressed, the one thing I have to do is work- I can let everything else go. But I have to work. So I wind up getting very angry about it, because it is so hard. But a girl has to make a living! I have been on disability, I don't want to go back there, assuming I could even get back on it. I have to make this work, no pun intended.

Today I have the running retrain "I want to be dead" going through my head, which I tried swapping out for "loving kindness." Did it help? Maybe some. But I felt bad that I was just using these words with such bad feelings, like they didn't have any meaning themselves. But I think it did help a little, and did make me feel a little more present with my patients. And I'm all about my patients when I am at work. I know I am there for them, no matter how bad I feel.

I'll feel better on Friday, when I get my next paycheck, and I can put a little more towards my new car fund and towards my credit card debt. I can't believe that it is almost the end of the month.

But for today, here I am bitching. Because in my day to day life, there is no place for this.