Now that my husband has blogged about what it was like for him to go through mild depression, it seems natural for me to talk about what it was like for me to be married to someone going through mild depression.
I learned early in our relationship that Jamie can be... well, for lack of a better word, 'moody'. Sometimes something happens that hits him somewhere deep inside, & it affects him for some time. I'd notice it mostly in him being less aware of the feelings of others (I've always loved the way he cares about how others feel), & being hard to engage in conversation or activity or anything happy. Learning not to take it personally was very helpful! ;-o It'd last a couple days or up to a week, but overall, Jamie is a happy & caring person. So in June of last year, when he started acting down, I didn't worry too much. & then when he starting talking about feeling really down, I still didn't worry too much. It was right after he'd spent a week at a huge event doing something he loves, & in my mind I related his feeling down much to how I felt when I'd get home from working at a summer camp. You pour your whole self into this life away from your normal life, & then when you get back to 'normal', you can kind of forget what you really liked about it. So I tried to be encouraging, I told him to give it time, & I cooked yummy foods & let him hide away with his pc games as much as he wanted. But I was wrong. It didn't get better. It got worse. What had come up seeming like a general funk turned into a pervasive dark sadness, frustration, crankiness, lack of initiative, lack of appreciation, loss of joy. As this became apparent, of course my primary responses were sympathy & wanting to do anything I could to help! But lemme tell ya. Some days were so hard. It's hard enough to live with someone who is fighting something so tough, but then when it's constant & some days you need a break too, some days you count on your spouse being there for you but he can't be there like he used to... It was interesting, really-- having Jamie as my friend/boyfriend/fiance/husband was really significant for teaching me to tell someone about my feelings, to let someone help, to see how much better I could feel when I didn't just keep all of my feelings to myself. But when he was in this depression, I couldn't do the very things he'd taught me to do. As he got more used to dealing with his funk, & I got more used to it as well, I found ways to vent to him juuuust a bit, but keep the majority aside to deal with on my own. I found ways to make myself feel a tiny bit better, things like getting out of the house, doling out little bits of my feelings across various friends, soaking every little bit of joy out of little things like making fried chicken & watching Digimon. But it was a rough adjustment. Also, I've been used to being the detail person among the two of us, but I had to take on everything. Jamie could barely make himself focus on one thing at a time, & I
needed him to focus on feeling better & getting through his workdays
& putting on a good face for the rest of the world. He was
basically acting for much of the time, & it took a lot out of
him. His job requires him to be nice to people, & help placate them
when they aren't entirely pleased. We're both introverts, but Jamie has always felt more drained by being around me than I do by being around him... so when he'd get home from a long day of having to hide his own stress to deal with others', he wanted nothing more than to be alone. So... yeah... a big part of marriage is finding joy in your spouse's joy, being happy when they are happy, wanting to make them happy... When your spouse can't be happy & can sometimes barely be around you, that makes it very hard. Over the course of a year, I took care of my husband, I took care of myself, I took care of my house, I took care of our scheduling... I took care of everything I could by myself. I became good at it. It felt both more & a lot less like being married, because I was definitely doing everything I could to support someone else, someone I loved with everything in me, but there wasn't a lot of response of any kind. I still knew that Jamie loved & appreciated me! But most of the time, I didn't feel special or beautiful or desired, I admit. I generally had to find ways to treat myself, or do without. But there were exceptions, & in a way, they were made all the more special. Jamie made plans for our anniversary, & that was such a huge deal to me. That little trip was probably my happiest time with him in the whole time that the melancholy lasted. There was also the time I came home from Target & told him that I snuggled a Twilight Sparkle, & he went & bought it for me. I feel a warm glow whenever I see it now, I don't think he evens knows that it instantly become one of my favorite things that I own. So it's not that he didn't want to make me feel special & wanted! It just took a lot of effort, because everything took a lot of effort. As hard a time as I'm probably making it sound like I had, it is so so important for you to remember what he was going through. I'm not writing this to complain, or out of resentment & regret. I'm mostly writing this to encourage anyone who might ever be put in a similar situation. I'm writing this for the married people who notice their spouse is sad lately. I'm writing this for anyone who is engaged, dating, or ever might be. I'm writing this so that you can feel that it is real, that it happens, & that it ends. You make it through. You learn, you grow, you live happily ever after in the midst of it all. Life is a huge big complicated mess, & you need to consider that when you're considering binding your life with the life of someone else. Marriage is hard, depression or no. But it is always worth it (in my experience, anyway, which is admittedly limited). If each of you is willing to put the love into it. I went through some other big stuff in my life during this depression thing-- I even did the scariest thing I've ever had to do, something I'd been dreading for years & years, among many other things. I started working with International Geek Girl Pen Pals Club. I made deliberate efforts to make more friends. I installed a floor. A lot of life happened, & a lot of it has been super good. & now, here we are, & Jamie is finding himself post-depression. That has its own issues! Haha. The first day that he was really acting like his old happy self again really hit me. He was excited & bubbly & in that moment I realized how much I had changed my approach to him & our relationship. It has been weird to readjust. Mostly so happy! We've both grown through this experience, & are enjoying rediscovering 'normal', even as we both have new & exciting other things going on in life right now as well.
Special thanks to the few people I told about this while it was going on. <3
