Demonic Possession as a Metaphore for Depression

[jamesq]

how can depression present itself as anger if depression is an inherently passive state and anger is an inherently aggressive state?

Depression isn't a passive state. It's a state where nothing gets accomplished, but the common idea of depression as inert slumping isn't accurate, and I suspect leads to a lot of depression not getting picked up as soon as it might.

This is an amateur's description I'm about to produce, but here we go. Depression drains the sufferer's energy - but only the energy to do good things. The energy for bad things, like attacking oneself, deploring the damnable state of the world, hating something, and fighting, is inexhaustible. Much greater than a well person's energy for those things: put a well person and a depressive in a fight, and usually the depressive will win, because the well person will eventually drop out of sheer fatigue. This is why I compared it to demonic possession: there's something very powerful inside the sufferer, but its only power is to do evil.

Hence, a depressive might not have the energy to, say, do the weekly shopping trip - but he or she does have the energy to spend three hours arguing that they shouldn't have to do it.

Depressives can also cling fiercely to ideas that are making them unhappy. It isn't done on purpose - it really does seem to be the illness acting through them, and many people experience the depression as an active alter ego that hates the sufferer and bears little resemblance to them, so it's important to emphasise here that I don't mean people stay depressed on purpose. It's more that the depression fights for life, and to live, it needs the sufferer to be unhappy.

As a result, there can be a lot of energetic resistance to a positive thought. Tell a depressive that people really do like them, or they're not a worthless person, or they've achieved many fine things in their life, or that if they'd just do X it might improve their situation, and you're likely to see a dazzling display of inventive and energetic refutation. No positive thought can survive in the depressive acid bath for more than a few days. Depression has endless stamina, and it dedicates that stamina to destroying its victim by convincing him or her to reject the very possibility of a positive outcome to anyone.

Personally, I think the word 'depression' is a bad name for the condition, because clinical depression does not resemble the kind of 'depressed' feeling people say they have when they're feeling dismayed or tired. A depressed friend of mine suggested the term 'savage discontent', which is much more accurate.

If you look at what a severely depressed person gets done in a day, you might assume they're listless and passive, because they probably won't have got much done. But that's from an auditor's perspective. From an interpersonal perspective, they get a lot done: it's just that it's a lot of damage.

This perception of depression as listlessness is something I had before I encountered the disease in people I knew, and I think it does a lot of harm. It's my view that, depression being as common as it is, the ability to recognize the symptoms ought to be included on school curriculum. It's like teaching children to swim: you try to prepare them so that, should there be an evil day, they'll survive. And frankly, people are far more likely to run into depression than they are to wind up on a sinking ship or falling into a lake. Misinformation about depression and other mental illnesses is something that education really ought to be tackling.

(From a Slactivist post on mental illness. The above was written by Praline, aka Kit Whitfield. She writes stuff. Go buy it.)

I bring this up because I've been doing it a lot recently. I am aware of it when I'm given a chance to step away and think about it. Arguing with me at the time though will just make me dig my heels in and fight tooth and nail. I don't mean to be an ass, it's mostly reflex.

*** FYI: Not feeling depressed at all right now - just thinking through some bad habits ***

Comments

[thekillerb69.livejournal.com]

Just wanted to say thanks, this is something that many people face on a daily basis either with themselves or with those around them and I have never seen it written out so eloquently. It's so easy to just pretend it isn't there and pawn those thoughts off as something else but it is a very real, very difficult and very debilitating thing.

On the up side however once it is recognized for what it is, it's a lot easier to do what it takes to regain control of your life. Be strong, I know it's in you! I know this because I found it in myself.

[snooness2]

"No positive thought can survive in the depressive acid bath for more than a few days. Depression has endless stamina, and it dedicates that stamina to destroying its victim by convincing him or her to reject the very possibility of a positive outcome to anyone."

I've found that when I was severely depressed that as much as it feels that positive thought can't survive it can... but it's sort of like dieting (you go good for a bit then the bottom drops out and you have to start again)...
When things were really bad I could force myself into small spurts of self aware positive thought, then I'd slip back in to negative thought mode - but the more often I practiced thinking positively the easier it became.
Starting the cycle can feel impossible... but I spent a long time (years) just trying to think one thing good thought a day - I used to write it on my mirror in the morning. It slowly became habitual, now I make little resolutions that I will think differently about something I've been negative about and practice it.... and it seems to change how people relate to me - so over time it got a bit easier. It's not that you don't have bad days - but after a while you become more self aware of them, and you can catch yourself dropping into one of your pits before you're so down you can't do anything.

[hislittlekitty.livejournal.com]

Holy crap, they hit the nail on the head O.o
I mean, some people sort of get it.. but.. yeah. wow.

[snooness2]

"*** FYI: Not feeling depressed at all right now - just thinking through some bad habits ***"

Good to know.
:)

[bungle-lord.livejournal.com]

The hardest part I know is what to do to help someone else with depression. Just because I have gone through it does not necessarily give me the insight to help someone else.

Also, you are talking about the level of depression where the positive feelings are shut down. There are further levels down below. One is where you just sit like a vegetable vaguely aware of what is going on around you. I was talking with a doctor one time, and he told me of cases where the depression was so bad that the person eventually didn't bother breathing.

Thank you for a view of your version of the grey hell.

[gifted-spirit.livejournal.com]

This ties in very well with a theory/practice I have adopted in the past year. The viewing of internal mental Critics ( the voices in your head) as Demon's. ( No don't rush out for a crazy couch) This helps to seperate the constant attacks on self worth and potential for positives as not something I am doing to myself ( or that someone I love is doing to themselves) but as an internal attack by another force. Some are seductive little demon's and other's are just down right vial and blood thirsty.

The one thing the mind is not? Still. or Inactive. Learning to identify when the " demon's" are twisting your views and perspectives is a full time job!

:) Here's to good demon hunting.