The Great Depression

No, this isn’t a history lesson on the economics of the 1930’s, much as there has been reference to those times in the news lately. Although, now I think about it, it may more appropriate than I may have intended, to conjure those black and white newsreel images of drawn faces, ragged clothes, and the sad shuffling gait of those that wandered the streets during what is now called the Great Depression. Not that I want to discuss the current economic recession, but my own actual depression.

There are many reasons, and at the same time, none in particular, to be depressed right now. Like the economy itself, I have had a “perfect storm,” that perhaps at any other time I could have weathered with no repercussions. But with things in the state that they happened to be at this moment in my personal history, they have gathered to create this Great Depression. I have been fighting back pain for over a year, so the fact that it depressed me now, means that it was just one factor in the many that have contributed to this downturn in my emotional economy. But it is also true that my condition worsened recently, when two of my discs began to bulge in the lumbar area, creating a higher level of pain, and in turn, a deeper level of depression.

As a result of the pain issue, I haven’t been able to work for over a week. And the doctor expects that it will be at least another week before I will return to work. This created a snowball effect in the era of my Great Depression. As I have stayed home from work, I have worried: what is happening there without me? Are they discovering that they don’t need me? Don’t miss me? Are glad not to have me? Are they rifling through my desk? What are they finding? And with the cutbacks going on in the organization, will there be a job there for me when I return? Plus, as I have stayed at home, I have begun to get even more deeply entrenched in this Depression; I have watched too much TV, slept too late, eaten too much junk food. Then I have worried: am I getting fat? No one will want a fat, lazy, TV-addled boring old handicapped gimpy girl around anyway.

And that is the other problem.I have nothing else to do, aside from the TV and sleeping, but go to doctor appointments, where I have just become a cluster of symptoms. Or at least that is what I feel like. I have gone to clinics and hospitals, where I have moved so slowly, and with such pain, that most staff members immediately have offered me a wheelchair because they thought I couldn’t walk on my own. I have been asked things like “How do you like to lie down? Do you use a pillow between your knees?” and “How did you get here, do you have someone who drives you?” and when I have told the staff that I drove myself, they have had a look of horror, like “Gosh sakes, stay off the sidewalks til that handicapped woman gets home!” I hate it. It’s embarrassing. And when I have tried to get up out of chairs or off of exam tables, there is always a worried looking attendant or two, asking how they can best help me up. And then I have gone through the same thing at home, when the kids have been there to help me into/out of bed, onto/off of the couch, etc. Yes, I have been lucky that they are so caring, etc. But it is scary and depressing to have become this person: who is constantly being moved and lifted and shuffled around. It is depressing to have it hurt every time I take a step or sit or stand. I don’t feel young or pretty or sexy or desirable or fun. I feel like my stock has fallen through the floor, and the only people interested in me anymore are those who can profit from my presence: the doctors who might be able to treat me. And I am tired of their attention.

The Great Depression is scary: it came out of nowhere and I don’t know when it will end. It swooped around me one day like the wings of a vampire, sucking the life right out of me. And now I am just waiting…shuffling along, like the people in those 30’s newsreels, waiting for help. I don’t know where it will come from: whether it will be as simple as a friend’s company that will rally me. It might be when I just feel well enough to return to work and see that I have the same old crappy job that I did a week or two ago. Maybe it won’t be until I am completely well, and I don’t know when that might be. Weeks? Months? I don’t know.

Maybe that is what makes any Depression so frightening; we don’t know just what makes them happen, when they will go away, or when they might come back. They might be caused by pain, the loss of a loved one, or the loss of a job. It might happen for no good reason at all. And then one day, just as quickly as it descended, it will lift. Our market will rally, and so will we. So will I.