I have “befriended” two sparrows. I leave out grains for them and in return they give me the semblance of nature in a metropolitan city. On days when I forget to put out their chow, they sit on the edges of my potted plants and make a chirpful demand. Despite this entitlement, they would fly away the moment I enter the patio or open the doors a bit louder than usual or talk or play music inside the house at a higher decibel. This behavior, on some level, always bugs me. For months, I’ve been feeding them. I have never walked towards them, let alone hurt them. They should know they are safe, that they can trust me. Then why do they vanish at the mere sign of my existence?
I know I am questioning the survival instincts of birds here. They perceive me as a potential threat and it’s their reflexes at work. They are not even wired to remember faces. I know that. Very clear. Yet, here is a tiny part of me that’s hurt because it thinks it’s incapable of building trust with an aerial species. What I hate about this is that I allow myself to be disappointed despite knowing the basic bird facts.
This, right here, symbolizes my eternal struggle. The disharmony between knowledge and feelings, between the brain and heart, between logic and emotions, between rationality and what all this chaotic potpourri eventually collides with—mental illness.
The Inception
I have had Generalized Anxiety and Social Anxiety Disorders all my life. Of course, I didn’t know that’s what they were called growing up. I’ve also had depression almost all my adult life. The existence of an ultra rad partner inflates the pockets of sunshine in between, but it still lingers over my head. Like a sword. All. The. Time.
But what finally choked me this year (apart from a few physical injuries) was my habit of not allowing myself to feel the pain or accept the symptoms. The constant policing of my thoughts and sentiments, the constant invalidation of my own experiences, the constant intellectualizing of my emotions had finally exhausted me.
I pride myself as a rationalist, I will not lie. It has helped me a great deal in life. I am what I’ve grown to become today because of it. It has empowered me and liberated me from a lot of social and cultural baggage I grew up with. But it also judges and bullies the other aspects of my psyche instead of coexisting. It’s like having the heart of a tender child and the mind of a stern adult.
The Internal Dialogues
There are articles upon articles talking about how anxiety and depression affect logical thinking, but there is nothing about vice versa. This is how the internal dialogues look:
- It’s irrational to feel that way because it will change nothing.
- Read up on books and articles. There is always a solution out there.
- What exactly happened? I see nothing that could have triggered that.
- Note down all the things that led to this. Figure out the root cause. *fetches a magnifying glass and pulls up the sleeves* This is a math problem and you are a mathematician. Solve it.
- Are you sure it’s depression and not just overwhelming sadness? Google the difference.
- You already know what a therapist is going to say. They can’t know you better than you know yourself.
- You have anxiety because you overthink. Think about different ways you can stop doing that.
- Is the constant thought about your dark thoughts producing more dark thoughts?
- See if making the bed every morning helps.
- If you let this feeling take over you, it will be days before you get rid of it.
- See if not thinking about it for 24 hours helps.
- A chemical imbalance caused by the stress hormone can shrink your brain if you don’t stop being depressed.
- If you are really sad, why did you feel happy yesterday?
- It’s illogical to want to be better without trying to be better.
- Yoga!
- Google this. Read that. Solve this. Question that.
…and so on.
The worst part is knowing these are all irrational and unhelpful thoughts, because I would never suggest them to someone else who is battling mental illness. Emotions and feelings aren’t always grounded in logic and reasoning. I also know that it’s okay to be fragile and vulnerable. The problem is not the lack of understanding, it’s the lack of acceptance.
Actually, that’s not the worst part. The worst part is never getting out of this mechanical, problem-solving mode long enough to let myself feel like a human. The worst part is the absolute emotional self-abuse.
The Pretense
To be totally honest, I’ve been ashamed of my poor mental health all my life. I have cloaked it under a variety of garbs—introvertedness, reclusive personality, stressful work-life, nomadic personal life, etc. Even with this article, I hesitated for days before deciding to write it. I did mental gymnastics around how I should present it? Should I sneak in this struggle between half a dozen quips and self-deprecating remarks? Maybe I should give the post a metaphorical title so it doesn’t sound heavy? Should I just write the post for myself and not publish it? Is this how I want to have a cathartic release?
I have so much shame and judgement revolving around this that it’s hard to talk about it to anyone, which makes this journey incredibly lonely.
The Usual: A Doctor Who Metaphor
In one of the Doctor Who episodes, the Doctor travels to the future and lands on a planet where its human inhabitants have programmed their robots to maintain perpetual happiness. The robots operate the colony and keep the colonists happy by monitoring their emotional state. When one of the colonists dies of natural causes, it creates grief among people, something the robots are not programmed to register or accept. The robots take this as a sign of disease and kill everyone who displays unhappiness. This creates a “grief tsunami” and eventually leads to the wipeout of the entire colony.
The colony is me. The robots are me.
I am tempted to end this on a positive note or with a solution or with a hope in sight, but since this is an exercise to go against all my natural instincts, I am not doing that. Instead, I’ll say this-
What destroys me the most about this struggle, with a fiery passion, is that it makes me detest the one thing that brings me comfort, the one thing that works non-stop to entertain and sustain me, that brings me my imagination, my stories, and wonderful solutions to everyday problems, that makes me understand myself, people, and the universe—my mind.