D to the pressing

When you *know* that today is a day that depression has a wee bit more of a choke hold on you- what do you do? People say "be gentle with yourself" and I'm not exactly sure what that means. Does it mean I can lie in bed all day? Then depression wins but I've been gentle. Can I watch Hocus Pocus and ignore the things that need to be done?

The truth about depression is that it does what I've decided to call "D to the pressing." You know how the things you need to do each day have a certain sense of urgency to them? Maybe not even urgency but just a level of importance that means you tackle them first and get it done. Depression is D (down) to the pressing. The things that should be pressing - should be normal catalysts for action (like- get out of bed, shower, eat, pay that bill, get your car's oil change, etc)- they are just somehow tied to an anchor somewhere in the middle of the ocean. SO now, instead of hopping out of bed, showering, eating and going to get your car's oil changed and paying the bill while you wait: you have to swim through an ocean current and added weird gravity to get out of bed. Everything takes forever. Everything is hard. Your brain knows all these things are "easy" and also "pressing" but somehow your brain also knows "meh" and "in a minute." What could be completed by noon is begun at noon, with no hope of finishing. And carries every promise of defeat.

What do you do with that? Do you be gentle by acknowledging that every task today is going to be a marathon but go ahead and do the marathon with an injury anyway? Do you be gentle by giving yourself the day off? Take a knee and the next day you hope you can do the things. The issue is, you never know when you'll wake up injured or when you'll wake up healed, or to really mess you up: IF you will ever wake up healed. Also- we don't live in a vacuum or on an island or any of those metaphors that remind us that while yes, we have a village, that village needs us too. Some of those village people are kids that expect to be fed dinner and have clean clothes. The gall.

So just like the American Dream says: hard work pays off. So should I work hard through it, even though I know I'll go an inch and feel like an ass?

I really don't know the answer.

Today everything is D to the pressing. I did call about that bill, though. And I showered and ate and fed the dogs. Doesn't seem like a monumental achievement but it took a lot to get here. Maybe I'll go watch Hocus Pocus as my reward. For doing the bare essentials.