slings and arrows

I woke up feeling extremely sorry for myself today. Weepy, hopeless, overwhelmed, and like what's the use, anyway. I know this is an effect of this cocktail of drugs I'm on, which interact in ways that surely can't be predicted. So days like this have to be expected. But they're tough when they come.

Depression, I think, is one of the largest of the problems for cancer victims. When they pump you full of the steroids it's fine. You feel like superman. You do things like send emails to the entire university telling them cancer is great and that everyone should try it. But the steroids are only a temporary fix, and the mood is artificial. Afterward you crash and start dwelling on all the things you had once planned to do with your life that literally evaporated overnight with the pronunciation of a single diagnosis. Projects that oriented your set of priorities and punctuated the years with their goals and projections become suddenly pointless--what's the use of any of it when we all die--usually painfully--in the end anyway?

And so on and so forth. It's incredibly easy for someone with a debilitating illness to fall into this kind of pattern of thinking. I'm aware of this, and I've developed certain remedies for coping with the depression. But it's not easy.

What helps, though, is to remember that depression is a luxury. If you're feeling well enough to feel sorry for yourself, you're probably well enough to do something about it.

As long as it doesn't involve going anywhere, anyway.