Thank you sincerely for following my blog. ❤ ~Sarah *Davs
Quarantine Blues and Learned Appreciation for All Levels of Functioning
Almost everyday I post a new photo of what I fixed for dinner as food and cooking to manage my type 2 diabetes is increasingly become a special interest of mine, but don’t let my fancy food posts fool you, cooking for myself is sometimes the only productive task I accomplish for the day. Many times it’s just the one meal, I’m otherwise off drinking protein shakes or eating string cheese and cashews because I don’t have the energy to clean and food prep/cook 2-3 meals in a row.
I know a lot of folks understand that feeling right now. You might be experiencing the COVID-19 quarantine blues, overwhelmed, your circadian rhythm might be off, depression, guilt, or shame for waking up without motivation to stick to a routine, diet, or accomplish something productive each day like you used to do under normal circumstances.
This pandemic is hella scary and it doesn’t help at all but my chronic exhaustion isn’t from the threat of COVID-19 and quarantine stress. This has been my life dealing with anxiety, panic attacks, agoraphobia, and bipolar 1 disorder over the years.
Chronic physical, or mental illness, and other disabilities don’t affect people without some sort of energy depletion. This heavy, sedating, somehow both emotional and physical fatigue has been the normal for many people for a variety of reasons, and it’s so hard to explain to someone who hasn’t lived it.
I sincerely hope, that not only will you make it through this incredibly taxing experience, but also that having had lived this sort of stress fatigue, that I do not wish on anyone, you can finally understand why lazy is an ableist concept.
Nobody doesn’t want to not be and feel useful, able, capable, and productive. When you can barely get out of bed, or off the couch, it’s not for lack of desire or discipline just as a bucket of water gets heavier and harder to hold onto the longer you carry it.
Some people have been carrying water for so long that picking up anything else no matter how easy and light it may seem to someone else can actually feel and at times be legitimately impossible.
Go easy on yourself and hopefully when life gets back to normal for many of you, you will find a new understanding, compassion, and learned appreciation for every level of human functioning.
~Davs 04/11/20
Being OK With Being OK
I’ve been ashamed of myself, for months, maybe longer. Ashamed because I have not lived up to the person I thought I was going to be by this time, after making some life changes a little over a year ago.
It’s hard to look at yourself in the mirror and not find everything wrong, when you are disappointed in yourself. Guilt, I have too much. Emotional issues I believed had been laid to rest, reawakened, unexpected, like fast zombies, because we all know zombies are supposed to be slow.
I am ok though. I am managing. I’m not on top of the world. But I am not at the bottom. I guess being bipolar for over twenty years has left me confused as to what it is to be ok. Before the medication, before the therapist, before the psychiatrist, before I began seeking help for my mood swings, it was either or and no inbetweens. Either singing from proverbial hilltops, or swinging from a metaphorical noose.
What it is to be OK, I am learning only now. Learning to be OK with being OK? That’s where I fall. I’m supposed to be this great mom, artist, friend, writer, individual who breaks glass ceilings. I’m supposed to have an active social life, always adding to my contacts, painting soup bowls for charity. Never sweat pants, never three days with no shower, never sitting alone in a stairwell crying because I can’t come to terms with just being OK. Just here, living, breathing.
But here, this is the thing, I am here, I’m alive, I’m breathing and I’ve got to learn to be OK with not always being on top of my game. What good does it do me to pick myself apart? So what? So what if my art isn’t selling right now? So what if I didn’t take an extra two minutes to apply mascara today? So yeah, maybe I’m not wearing a cape and scaling buildings. But why did I ever think I was supposed to be a superhero? This isn’t a movie. Nobody can be great all the time. I catch a voice inside me saying “at least you knew how you felt before. Not like this, where nothing is extreme” I admit, being medicated has been a journey. Nobody wants to want to die, but when you find yourself always at the extreme end of a feeling there is some comfort in knowing exactly how you feel. Not having that intense emotion all the time leaves me confused, to be honest. Am I happy? I’m not laughing hysterically. Am I sad? I’m not making plans to kill myself. I mean, that is strange, right? That I don’t know that I’m OK. That I have to remind myself that I’m OK.
Please don’t misunderstand this: I’m glad I got help. I’m glad for this. This new reality of being OK. But it’s new to me, and alarming at times. It confuses me, it leaves me a lot of room for thought. Before I got help, very little thought was put into some of my biggest life decisions. And I paid dearly for that. I was so fervent in whatever opinion, or feeling, or belief I had, before I got help, that I missed out on a valid reality; just breathing, just being alive, just being here. My dreams come from that time in my life, I like to call it the ‘Hot Air Balloon Era’ and they are so big, I’m embarrassed to tell you. And maybe a big part of what makes this new reality of simply being OK, so hard. Because the urgency of my emotions did not have time to just be OK.
Yes, I am not winning any marathons. But I’m not burning any bridges either, and I need to appreciate it.
I am here, I’m alive, I’m breathing.
I’m here, I’m alive, I’m breathing.
I’m here, I’m alive, I’m breathing.
You have to admit, there’s something very beautiful about that.
~Davs 2015
Please Stay *talking about suicide
It’s sad when people so quickly say that suicide is selfish. People looking to take their own lives are suffocating internally. Often they convince themselves that the world would be better without them. They are victims of lies believed, fed by negative messages coming everywhere from society, abuse, depression, themselves, and even bullied in. But not selfish.
My step brother killed himself 13 years ago. How my whole family and I wish he had reached out before choosing a permanent “solution” to a temporary problem. The easy thing would be to call him selfish, because I’m still here, and have witnessed the repeated tidal waves of pain he caused in all that love him. But I will never blame a victim. I miss you Christopher. Your pictures sit by our family’s photos in our parent’s living room, but you never will. And it breaks my heart over and over.
Dear Reader,
Please, if you think the world would be better off without you, understand that you are needed and wanted to be here. If you are suffering, know that you are not alone. Realize that no matter how low you feel, there is always tomorrow. Recognize that if you take your life today, tomorrow won’t have a chance. If you are sinking, know that there is help and hope. Please be aware that someone does care, even people that you don’t even know care. You only get one life. Please stay.
.
The Social Contribution Complex
Here I am. Almost 33, mother of two children without custody, art maker with one hell of an unorganized, tumultuous, self destructive tendency. Being a thirty something. Settle down time? Find myself? Just keep on trucking? WTF. I’ve not been to school since the ninth grade.
I used to harp on myself for being a barnacle on society. I’m the statistic. I’m the one the GOP complains about. I’m Daniel Desario; James Franco’s character on Freaks and Geeks. A loser.
But what if I’m not? 21 years ago I was diagnosed with bipolar and spent my entire teenage career on probation. I was a walking time bomb. In my twenties I was on autopilot in a Kamikaze. After having my second child I did some serious trial and error until my doctor I found the perfect psych prescription cocktail and I’ve taken it with the dedication of a toothpick sculptor ever since.
That’s the thing. What I don’t think anyone really understands. My life right now, is at risk every thirty days. I take pills that have literal killer withdrawals. When my pharmacy has a glitch I’m teetering on an emotional wire. Today, for example… Oh, this is just something that happens without explaination or known reason other than the magic words: side effects. My tongue, and my shoulders to chest, and fingertips.. just roll a numbing sensation through me.
I do take pills to help with the side effects of my psych meds, that also have side effects. I do this. I do it because I came to a point in life where everyone that truly knows and loves me gave me the ultimatum, get help for my illness or lose their support.
I’m an artist. I rarely make money, lately I’ve used my art to barter goods. I’m poor. I don’t have the ability to hold down a job. I need support in one way or another, always emotional.
So many hours I spend wondering if I could hack weening off my meds, what would I be like? As temperamental as before? Out of order? Would I slink into the night, find a needle and pass out in a gutter somewhere? I’ve been there. In the gutter. I’ve been the hitchhiker in the rain at night without a clue as to what direction was home. Chronic bronchitis. Chuck Taylor’s molded to my feet after weeks of never taking them off. Sleeping under a bridge. Endless cups of coffee bought up with nickels and dimes just to be inside some place warm.
People who don’t know all the chapters in my story can’t fathom my illness. I clean up well. I know how to smile. People who think they understand my illness encourage me to kick the psych meds and whole heartedly believe I can navigate my illness intuitively. People think I was born yesterday, for who could be so naive as to go through the shit storm of hassle it is to take a multitude of medication to Just to control an unruly temperament… Just stop being moody.
Ah, shit… My friends. If only you’d been there.
I may not be growing a community garden. I may not be organizing food not bombs picnics or discovering cures to disease. But god dammed if I can’t say with confidence that I contribute to society everyday. Morning and night. With each pill I swallow, trust me, I contribute.
~Sarah Davenport 2015
Galaxy Pants
The constellations in my mind
Cannot be defined by the letters in a book
A billion stars shine together
By gravitational attraction no need of interaction
All I need to do is look
Oh galaxy pants
Come and do your dance
Come on and
Shake my universe
Like an asteroid romance
Oh galaxy Tights
Come on and shine your lights
Dip me low on
Earth bound nights
Show me your meteor delights
Oh galaxy pants
Oh galaxy pants
OH GALAXY PANTS
How can you walk on by
And leave me in the sky
Your like a comet flying by
You left some stardust in my eye
Oh galaxy pants
*Repeat*
((End scene))
By Sarah Davenport 2014
Where’s The Old California
Where’s the old California, hippies making peace signs with their hands
Where’s the old Oklahoma, a good old southern country bands
Where’s the one I called my love-r – – – The one I left for an-other
When we were young and time was wrong
He’s been waiting for me ever since I went free
To come back home where I belong
Where’s the old-time piano, a player singing in a dive
Where are all the people dancing for no other reason
Then to know that they’re alive
Where’s the one I called my love-r – – – The one I left for an-other
When we were young and time was wrong
He’s been waiting for me since I went free
To come back home where I belong
Where’s our old picnic table, carving, singing, drinking beer
Where’s that little surfer wagon that would take us far and near
Where’s the one I called my love-r
The one who kissed me like no other
When we were young and time was wrong
He’s been waiting for me since I went free
To bring me home where I belong
~Sarah Davenport 2014
Name Dropping
Listen to these lyrics put to music HERE
Name Dropping
_______________
I was born with the weight of the world on my chest
My life through a cardiac arrest
I’ve never known which color I like best
Everything’s a double entendre
But there’s no more Mae West
I just want a car to sit inside of
Buckled in like a machine glove
Going seventy on a long desert drive
Looking out Hitchcock’s Rear Window
At destruction survived
All I want is some land wild things all around
Laying flat in the brush my body the ground
An echo of Annie Oakley’s gun through the trees
Nothing to do but sort memories
No one really knows not even I
What it is that’s been 30 years stuck in my eye
And I’ll never get used to the things I can’t see
And Kevorkian can’t even clear out the debris
Take me home gravel road take me home rusty car
I’m tired and hungry and travelled too far
Take me home broken tape deck no more Fred Astaire
Let me sleep for so long that I dream like Voltaire
The Art Of Weakness: A Short Tour Of Davs Art Exhibit
Sarah Davenport AKA Davs
The Art Of Weakness: Surviving Mental Illness Through Art
Artist Statement:
I am so weak. Everything affects me, everything. I have never forgotten the time I salted a slug, then ran to get water when I realized what I had just done. I cried when I saw my son catch a fish, because I could see it dying.
People often tell me how strong I am, because of the things I’ve gone through. But it’s not strength. My weakness keeps me going.
My inability to cope with all the world fuels a desperate need to express my weakness. I do it through art, music, writing, and attempted comedy. I need to be understood, I need connectivity, I need to be an open book.
My weakness drives me. My weakness ruins furniture and purposefully hacksaws self cut bangs. My weakness bleeds oil paint, pushing colors around until I lose myself in a place where weakness can shine. I feel time suspend itself and dive into a photograph moving angles and distorting images, manipulating them until I can visually see my weakness reflect through the altered reality of a fraying thread.
I need people to know I’m weak and that it’s ok. Humanity is evolved, this isn’t the wild animal kingdom. There is a place in this world for people like me. My weakness forces me to be a voice (however so small) that speaks for others who can not reveal their weakness in a society run by wolves. I need justice by way of acceptance.
I strive for acceptance by attempting to prove that weakness can be beautiful, and strange, and scary, but most of all, human.
My art isn’t about image, it’s about emotion. Feelings unexpressed, or feared, dreamed of, wished for, reveled in. My weakness allows me to spill myself, like a thousand slivers of shattered glass, jagged and painful, yet shimmering and translucent like fairy dust. I want to be who I am, I want to be imperfect, and awkward, and weak enough to cry over spilled milk. And I think a lot of people do too.
~Sarah Davenport 2014
Below is a little virtual tour of my art exhibit. The writings between the photographs are excerpts of thoughts on mental illness and why I paint.
Thank you to the LCSC Center for Arts and History for featuring my work, special thanks to Debi Gallion Fitzgerald, >>>Kelsey Grafton for curating a beautiful show, Amanda Gill, and >>>Sarah Reaves for working for no pay on the interactive display to enhance the experience.
Check out my PLEA for people to attend the opening HERE
View a glimpse of the interactive display HERE
Watch Depression On Sale HERE
Watch my flippant intellectual copyright thievery. Introducing Sarah Davenport playing two lead roles in HERE
Watch my oldest son dance at the show = because he’s awesome HERE
Everyone has been absolutely wonderful. THANK YOU.
Shout out to Stacy Streeter who handmade all the frames for the canvas panel paintings:
I have no method for perfection or success. I don’t have a picture in my mind of what I’m about to create. I move the brush with my mood. I push color until it forms it’s own identity.
**
A blank canvas gives me the fear. It’s all the expectations, and pressure, and worries in life on a textured white surface. It’s mental purgatory. But derision becomes equanimity when I let myself go.
**
When I make art I fall into a fugue. Physical forgotten. Time suspends and becomes a blank slate for me to scribble all over
**
I could just be smearing colors into grey, that’s what’s so I enticing. I can do anything I want, there are no mistakes. I let go, fall in, explore. And then come back home.
**
My art isn’t about image it’s about how it makes you feel. That’s all. The image is just a portal.
**
I don’t name my paintings, because I like possibilities. I want the viewer to give it their own name, see and feel it in their own way. I’m releasing the moment in which it was created and giving it to you. It’s yours now.
“How are you?” “I’m fine.” “How are you?” “I’m fine.”
**
If I told someone “I had a headache” they would ask if I needed ibuprofen.
If I told someone “I’m depressed.” They would say sorry, and avoid me until I’m in better spirits.
**
Would someone get a headache because I told them I have a headache? No.
Than why does my depression damper the mood? I understand people being empathetic. But truly, no one can catch my despair like a contagion.
We’re taught, emotions that differ from contentment are meant to be private… As if they’re a sort of dirty laundry. Why is it awkward to be honest? What’s wrong with reality that we can’t say how we really feel?
The more I openly, honestly, and freely express myself, the more control I have over this wild mysterious thing inside me.
Groundhog Day
My bipolar life in 7 stages:
1. Can’t find shoes
2. Frantically searches
3. Hysterics
4. Goes barefoot
5. Steps in glass
6.Finds shoes in most obvious place
7. Repeat *1-6x a day
When I’m depressed, panicked, anxious, manic, or experiencing altered realities I need to to talk about it. Allowing it to consume me, that’s when I go crazy. That’s when I really lose touch with reality. When I am floundering, there is no out of bounds in my mind. I will create looping scenarios, wild and often traumatic, that play continuity to the point of inability to function.
**
Please be aware that people with mental illness are not always experiencing symptoms of their illness. I am not constantly in emotional chaos. Most often I am very rational and logical. But keeping myself even like so, is a walk on a never ending tightrope made of hills and valleys. If I miss one dose of medication, if something unusual happens, if something triggers me… I walk the tightrope down the hill, and sometimes get stuck there for days. But there can be weeks where I’ve climbed the tightrope up the hill and am even again.
Listen though; no matter how deep and far into a valley I may go, I’m still here, I’m still valid, I’m still worthy of respect.
**
Verbalizing emotions enables logic to enter the paradigm. In a society that welcomes honesty, we could speak candidly about our real emotions, and in return feel less isolated, we shouldn’t have our realities swept under the rug because they don’t fit into a Fabergé egg.
**
I can’t count how many times I’ve heard someone say “he/she’s bipolar” and watched the affect of that statement turn the person in which they are referring to into a silent agreement that it is perfectly understandable to discredit and or disregard them as a human being.
**
I wasn’t able to talk about being bipolar. To admit that sometimes I can’t barely brush my own hair, wish to go to sleep and never wake, blackout meltdowns, racing thoughts, grandiose daydreams, and ideas, until I got help.
I don’t think, if I were out in a traditional workforce that I would feel free to reveal anything at all.
There are millions of us, who really do need psychiatric medication to function on a daily basis. One important step to fighting the stigma of mental illness is also to fight the stigma of taking medication for that illness.
**
Would you ask someone with diabetes to stop taking insulin? Than why are psych meds a joke? Why do we laugh about ‘happy’ or ‘crazy’ pills? I’ve never heard jokes about insulin. Why would one question a clinically depressed person about taking an antidepressant, or a severe bipolar, or schizophrenic why they take anti-psychotics? Yes eat raw, juice, cleanse, positive thinking, those are all nice, but truly for many of us they are not enough.
I’m so tired of people believing that I’ve fallen for the conspiratorial Big Pharma scam and “given into” taking prescription drugs. Yes, I’m aware Big Pharma is corrupt. No, I don’t like it. But I have to do what is necessary to keep myself safe > from myself.
Have you lived my life, and watched me day by day? Are you the mother who watched her ten year old kick in a car window shield, with stop motion memory of kicking it in? Her eleven year old try to kill herself. Her twelve year old dress like Lolita hitchhiking around town with strange men? The numbers go higher, friends.
And that was tame.
**
Is it that prescription meds are a crutch, are we over medicated, am I mentally lazy? Or possibly… just maybe, is it that we don’t want to face the fact that the brain can have a sort of arthritis, or Crohn’s, or cancer just like one’s physical body. Yes positive thinking, exercise, eating whole foods are all helpful but my brain has an illness, there is no cure. And I am tired of people thinking I’m a fool for not gambling with my glimpse of stability.
I’m pro-homeopathy, but I simply can not afford to play around with my sanity. Big Pharma doesn’t care about me. But my doctor does, and I trust him, that he wouldn’t prescribe me something that to his educated mind would hurt me. Some people can, indulge in natural herbs and such, and I’m happy if something works for them. I wholly accept what works for others. Can others finally accept what works for me?
I feel, by saying I’m depressed; I’m downplaying the realities of how I actually feel. When one is depressed don’t assume that they’re “just” depressed. When I’m depressed, I’m not just sad, and sulky. I’m drowning, I’m suffocating, I’m torturing myself. A ghost whispers reasons for why everyone would be better off without me, haunting my thoughts, overshadowing rationality.
Why is therapy useful? Because it provides professional guidance. Why should everyday people listen to a friend gush about feeling hopeless? Because to be genuine is to accept all facets of our being. It enriches relationships, garners honesty, trust, and when it comes down to it, it punches holes into the wall that may be crushing your friend.
In my personal experience 90% of people who deny the validity of mental illness are mentally ill, that’s not meant to be an insult. The other 10% are either lucky enough to have never knowingly crossed path’s with it… or use disbelief as a coping skill, because they don’t want to face that sometimes all the positive thinking/prayer/mind over matter/self discipline can’t even out the chemicals in our brain.
**
Please don’t write us off with a simple declaration “crazy”. We go deeper than the flip of a wrist. We’re fighting hidden battles. If your significant other had the flu would you make them soup? Bring them Kleenex? We have the flu, but it’s in our brain. And nobody ever brings us soup. We’re people who are trying to navigate society with chemical imbalances that cause anything from heightened emotions, to hallucinations. We’re not crazy.
How stigmatized is mental illness in 2014? I’m considered brave for talking honestly and openly about something that one in four, about 57.7 million Americans live everyday. Just think about that.
**
I appreciate kind words and understand, when someone tells me I’m brave they’re showing support. There’s no offensive in using that word.
But the truth is, I’m not brave at all. I’m desperate, for me, for others, sick of being silenced, and frantic for change. I’m not brave, I’m weak, I’m in the eleventh-hour. Managing mental illness is still on the back burner of social priorities. People aren’t getting the help they need and that’s at the front of the line for a myriad of societal downfalls. We need education, resources, ongoing open dialog, compassion, and understanding.
***
The Bowling Ball Blues
I drop like a bowling ball
My bowler cheers me as I fall
I bounce up and down a wooden hall
Crash into red striped pin wall
Down down underground
Darkness drowns me all around
I move so fast sound of light can’t catch me
My bowler comes running back to fetch me
Bap Bap bing bam boom
I’m zippered tight inside a tomb
Light blue leather covers my casket
All my bowler see’s is a fancy basket
Sometimes my bowler takes me out at night
Fingers my holes under halogen light
Sometimes my bowler rubs me with a specialty wax
I never mean to but I always relax
Black and blue those are my colors
I’ve got dents and cracks just like all the others
Us bowling balls we stick together
No one else understands unending bad weather
Sometimes I see it, a glimpse of the sea
It goes on forever and makes me feel free
Through a hole burrowed in my light blue leather case
I imagine the waves liquid misting my face
One evening my bowler put me down on the porch
I could see the ocean and a fire lit torch
I could have rolled down the steps if I had the will
But my bowler controlled me with methodical skill
I could’ve rolled all the way down into the sand
But how would I live without my bowlers command
I could have rolled all the away into the great sea
But the thought of no landing too much terrified me
So here I sit in my light blue leather bag
Banged up and bruised over my roll starting to drag
I look out my peephole at the glistening hues
Don’t hurt me no more I’ve got the bowling bowl blues
~Sarah Davenport 2014
2002 | A Song For My Boy
For My Boy
2002
2002
I didn’t know anything
Until I met you
2003
2003
Nothing mattered
Outside of you and me
2004
2004
I watched you grow in utter awe
I’d never known such amazement before
2005
2005
You gave my life meaning
A reason to thrive
2006
2006
We’re two peas in a pod
We’re the perfect mix
2007
2007
Being with you is like
Being in heaven
2008
2008
Anything you want to say
Baby, I can relate
2009
2009
I can’t believe your soul
Came from mine
2010
2010
Your jokes make me laugh
Your laugh makes me grin
2011
Through
’13
Your spirit lifts me
Your love’s so clean
2014
2014
You have it all going
You can be anything
2002
To infinity
You’ll always be
The world to me
xo
Happy Birthday Thomas,
Love mom
My Daddy Wears A Beret
Happy Father’s Day, Dad!
My daddy wears a beret
Every single day
His heart is made of
Mindful art
And he never fails
To say
My daughter dear
I love you so
I’m proud to watch you
Learn and grow
You are the stars
And moon to me
My dearest
You will always be
I’ll love you till the day I die
And honey I don’t tell no lie
There’s never going to
Be goodbye
My love will always be
Miles between us
There may be
But that don’t
Harm our family tree
There’s a bond between
You and me
It goes deeper than
The Caribbean Sea
Forevermore I’ll
Love him so
And hope to heavens
That he may know
That seam in him
I want to sew
My love will always be
~written by Sarah Davenport 06/10/2014 for Leonard Davenport
Sinking In Silence
I’ve been wanting to talk about something, without alarming people. And I’m angry. Because we live in an “I’m Fine” culture. How are you? I’m fine, I’m fine, I’m fine, even if on the inside you’re fucked.
I’ve been wanting to say to my friends “hey guys, I’m depressed” but anticipating the awkward position that puts people in, anticipating the courteous, well intentioned but generally placating response, if any, gives me the fear.
And too, I feel like the word depression has lost meaning; in terms of how we think about someone outside of ourselves experiencing depression. I feel, by saying I’m depressed, I’m downplaying the realities of how I actually feel. When one is depressed don’t assume that they’re “just” depressed. When I’m depressed, I’m not just sad, and sulky. I’m drowning, I’m suffocating, I’m torturing myself. A ghost whispers reasons for why everyone would be better off without me, haunting my thoughts, overshadowing rationality.
I can’t even say in public how I really feel at times, because sometimes I’m not ready to put my freedom in jeopardy. Why do people suffer in silence? Because we can’t be honest. And when we can it’s for one hour twice a week at max with a therapist, who we get showered and dressed up for and smile and say I’m fine. We might say we’re depressed, but we know the keywords to avoid the therapist from being legally obligated to institutionalize us.
I have a secret though. I do have someone I talk openly about my depression with, when it’s taken me over. I can say whatever I want, and instead of being whisked away with a shot if Thorazine in my ass, this person reminds me of all the reasons my thoughts are not logical or truthful. It’s an ongoing open discussion on equal terms. I’m respected enough for this person not to placate me with pats on the head and compliments, or vague hopeful expressions “you’ll be fine.” I’m respected enough that this person trusts that I’m being wholly honest, allowing me to say even the hot button keywords, trusting that I will answer the question “do you need to go to the hospital” honestly. Because I would.
I wonder how many people didn’t have that person who are now gone, and if they had, would they still be around. You have to understand, that while therapy is helpful, a therapist is not available at your beck and call. Sometimes depression can’t wait for a week until your next appointment. Having that next appointment can feel like a lifeboat, and be something to hold onto, but in the meantime, no one should have to hesitate voicing their emotional state. Why is therapy useful? Because it provides professional guidance. Why should everyday people listen to a friend gush about feeling hopeless? Because to be genuine is to accept all facets of our being. It enriches relationships, garners honesty, trust, and when it comes down to it, it punches holes into the wall that may be crushing your friend.
I may be depressed at times, and yes, it is like part of my mind is Clockwork Orange, forced to stare at unsettling images on repeat. But I’m also still here, I’m still able to listen, and think, and grasp that logical hand reaching under the pile of my emotional rubble. (fuck this, I just said emotional rubble. WTF.)
I know if I didn’t have that hand to grasp, I’d be a fading memory.
I’m angry because no one should have to sink in silence. I’m angry because our society is built on “pulling up your big girl panties” “be a man” “suck it up” “How are you? – I’m fine, how are you? – I’m fine” I’m angry because people don’t realize that when you’re drowning, you don’t want someone to tell you your pretty, or offer a hug. You want to be able to yell out “THIS IS HOW I FEEL” without fear of judgement. And for someone to respectfully acknowledge that feeling and give us reasons, not superficial, for why how we feel is temporary, or doesn’t add up. Offer real advice, not go have some chocolate, or take a bubble bath. We want you to talk openly about any experience you’ve had with depression, showing us a) you’re capably empathetic b) how you got through it c) why you’re glad you did d) proving to us that you can handle our honesty in return.
And absolutely, yes. Sometimes, we are too far down the spiral, and we need help now. And I think the majority of us would be willing to admit it, if, we have that logical reasoner reminding us that a few days, weeks, in hospital is worth it.
If someone trusts you enough to tell you they’re depressed, trust them enough to understand that they are reaching out for that logical hand. Ask where they are, on scale from sad to suicide. Why is that scary? Unless they have proved otherwise, trust them no matter their response. Give them meaningful reasons for why they need to hold on… loved ones, pets. Realize they may be feeling like their doing a service by removing themselves from life, and tell them that it’s natural to feel overwhelmed while in a depressive state. Remind them of the times they were contented, and promise that if they keep talking and holding on it will eventually go. Ask them to promise their honesty. Tell them how much it would affect you if they did something undoable. Do encourage therapy, and having an honest talk with a doctor. Tell them why they shouldn’t feel ashamed, tell them they are not alone, tell them there is help. But most of all really listen.
If that is too much to ask, find someone you trust that can help, and if there is no one, urge them to call a doctor or therapist, or both. And in extreme case, go with them and hold there fucking hand while they admit themselves into inpatient.
For me mental illness is something I have to live with for the rest of my life, and I may not always be one step ahead, but actively, openly, having the freedom to express brutal honesty is a huge part of managing myself. For me, having bipolar means I need an active support network. And to honestly, actively check in on my mental whereabouts.
But even if temporary depression, or seasonal depression, postpartum depression, please don’t sink in silence. Someone out there understands. Internet support groups, real life support groups. Find someone to talk to, a friend, a doctor, or therapist. It’s not your fault. It’s no different than having a physical illness, but in your mind. You know how you feel like you’re going to die when you have the flu? Well you’ve got the brain’s version of the flu. It’s unbearable at times, and feels never ending while it’s there, but it does go away. Sometimes medication is necessary, like insulin is necessary to a diabetic. Being depressed has nothing to do with strength or weakness, it’s a condition that millions of people live with. And there are lifesavers everywhere waiting for you to reach out for that logical hand. But in order to find it, you have to shatter the isolation of silence by being open and honest until you get whatever kind of help sufficient enough to save you from yourself, until you don’t need saving.
I’m tired of hiding. I’m tired of this uptight cupcake, ironed pants social indoctrination that allows us to suffer in silence. People don’t want to hear I’m depressed because, somewhere along the line we were taught that depression is personal. Don’t mistake me, I love things about life too, social niceties can be exactly that, I’m not always depressed, typically I am in good spirits. But how refreshing would it be to say “Hey guys, I’m feeling really low tonight” without scaring people, or awkwardness, or regret, and to get real feedback and understanding.
It would be awesome to live in a time where I could sit beside a stranger on the bus and when asked how I was, casually say “I’m down” without it putting a damper on the mood. The honest truth is that I’ve never met anyone who hasn’t suffered from depression, whether it be circumstantial, or chemical. Depression might be dampening the mood of the depressed person, but if someone tells you they have a headache, you don’t get a headache too. And you automatically know to say, do you have any ibuprofen? When people can talk about depression out loud, openly, and honestly it takes it from an emotional place that is unstable, and puts it into a reality that is like looking at it in third person. Verbalizing emotions enables logic to enter the paradigm. In a society that welcomes honesty, we could speak candidly about our real emotions, and in return feel less isolated, we shouldn’t have our realities swept under the rug because they don’t fit into a unicorns asshole.
In a culture where depression was accepted into open, everyday conversation, we would know to say; what are your symptoms and be able to determine how to proceed from that, just as we do with a headache, or a sinus infection.
If you’re sinking in silence, be assured there are many, many people out there who understand, even people who don’t know you are capable of caring, so many it may surprise you. Tell someone you trust, or announce it to the world. If you don’t have insurance and think you can’t afford a therapist, let me tell you I paid my last guy $15 per session, a professional. Often times therapists will work with you on a sliding fee scale based on your income. All you have to do is ask. And if that feels overwhelming there are suicide hotlines that you can call while curled up in bed, still not showered at 2pm. The important thing is to take those streaming negative thoughts and emotions and put them into words, push them out, realize that allowing yourself to drown is scarier than admitting you need help. The longer you go without speaking out, the deeper you go, and you are putting yourself in danger by letting that happen. Believe me, someone out there cares. As Mr. Rogers said, When he was a boy and saw scary things on the news, his mom would always tell him to look for the helpers. Yes, there might be people who may run away, but there are also people who will come running. But they won’t know to, unless you tell them.
Suicide takes the lives of nearly 30,000 Americans every year.
Please don’t sink in silence.
Sci-Fi Unicorn
I’m a sci-fi unicorn
With laser beams for eyes
Livin in a world
Full of faces in disguise
I’m easy when I’m doing things
Not thinking of your eyes
But paranoia’s setting in
I’ve begun to realize
I’m a sci-fi unicorn
With laser beams for eyes
I tried to hide it
To no avail
And I’m tired of
Compromise
I’m ready to be
How I was born
I’m coming out
Better honk the horn
Cause I’m a
Science fiction
Unicorn
With
Lazar beams
For eyes
*Honk that horn*
Repeat
And ((scene))
-s.davenport 05/14/2014
Shadows In The Night
RIP My Friend
Dedicated to Angie Larrabee
1981-2014
We’re just shadows
In the night
Passing through
A dimming light
The time we have
blink an eye
We
Never know
when
To say goodbye
Minutes
Days
Months
Years
like whispers
When
The
End
Appears
The time we have
A quiet sigh
We
Never know
when
To say goodbye
I knew you once
You were my friend
We shared a sliver
Before the end
Our shadows
Passed
Each other
Through
Trading
Hearts
Is
Rare
But
True
The time we had
A clear blue sky
I didn’t know
To say goodbye
But in the end
We shadows two
Mixed
Each
Other
A color
New
~s.davenport 05/08/14
By The Light Of The Moon | Lyrics
Sweet burn can you feel it turn
Into a comfort in your throat?
I’m waiting by the light of the moon
For this sinking ship to float
Another swig from this bottle of booze
And I can chase my fears away
I wanna live by the light of the moon
As long as I can stay
Sweet burn can you feel it turn
Into a comfort in this cold?
I’m waiting by the light of the moon
To turn from tinfoil into gold
Another swig from this bottle of booze
And my weary spirit numbs
I wanna live by the light of the moon
Until the devil finally comes
~s.davenport 2014
Gods and Devils
I believe in all paths to god, especially the paths that set god free. I believe in goodness for the sake of good rather than goodness because we fear consequence. Letting go of the belief that we are born sinners. Recognizing that heaven and hell are not destinations in the sky, but actual places, inside and outside of ourselves that we can go to right here on earth. Realizing that we don’t have to feel guilt and shame for being what we are. It’s ok to be human. We are all gods and devils.
*the call is coming from inside the house*
What It’s Like Being Bipolar
Art by likeLucy
I was diagnosed as a manic depressive, bipolar 20 years ago. As a kid I didn’t know any other way, nor could fathom existing in any other way but for how I was. I was prescribed medication from the start but fought taking it, or would comply for a few months, see no difference and stop taking the pills.
Almost everyday had some kind of chaos, whether it was fighting, sneaking out, trying to get high, sex everywhere, hitch hiking, running away, falling apart, etc, etc, etc. I didn’t recognize any of my decisions as being chaotic though, only in hindsight was I ever able to look back and pinpoint decisions I’d made to be dangerous, rash, and or just plain stupid. At the times of making said decisions it was with the false clarity only mania can give.
When you feel manic and grandiose, it’s like being high/euphoric. You speak without thinking, get overly passionate about things. You start projects, or obsessively hone a skill. You clean and organize and decorate until you notice the morning sun in the window and realize you’ve stayed up all night. Although mania can be dangerous, as in making important life decisions without a second thought. This is a perk of being bipolar, after you do find a med cocktail that actually works you miss the thrilling manic state.
Manic states also cause irrationality, say if you disagree with someone, or feel wronged, and are in a manic state. Anger rushes through you like a mamma bear discovering a camper among her cubs. Often times after a fight I would be told things I’d said or done that I had no memory of doing. The mania catapults your extreme emotion into this place where you just let go so completely that you aren’t even aware of what you’re doing.
Depression is the dark wave that swallows you whole. You don’t know when it’s going to come, and it hits you in the face after being hopped up on mania. It’s strange that despite my 20 years dealing with this, the depression never ceases to surprise me. Every time I start to think things are finally coming up Sarah I honestly forget that it’s not going to last. I forget too, when it takes me over that it’s a chemical imbalance in my brain and not my fault. I feel guilty, like I did something wrong, and this is why I’m depressed. When I say depressed, I mean every worst possible scenario for my life is flooding through my brain as if it’s actually happening to me right now. I feel like everything’s pointless, what’s the point is asked a lot. And then comes the semi-fantasizing about going to sleep and never walking up. That’s the point that I know to ask for help.
So, this is bipolar. For me. I personally believe that bipolar is a spectrum disorder because I’ve known people diagnosed who were milder, or more extreme than myself. I couldn’t find the art piece, but it summed up what being bipolar is like perfectly. Picture a man walking on a tightrope, except the rope goes up and down, up and down forever. The man has an umbrella and is doing his best to step over the valleys in the tightrope, but it’s inevitable that he will fall again. He never knows how far.
Five years ago, after years of trial and error I found the perfect meds for me. I’d never known an even temperament, contentment just to sit in the sun and look at my garden. I’d never gone more then a month without a total meltdown, or fight. I had a crazy passionate jealous streak that I now laugh about. You don’t even understand how wild this is to me. But you might understand how afraid I am too. Everybody knows meds change in your body and lose effectiveness over time. I’m on this five year streak and everyday I wonder when it’s going to come crashing down. To go through the trial and error again, the loss of control, the side effects from meds that don’t work for me, how long will it take to get here again? Will I go mad, and make some wild decision that ruins the life I’ve built up for myself?
Introspective I guess.
I don’t mean to say that I dwell, I enjoy what I have, but it lurks, right? I still get lows, no highs to my dismay. But I’m content. For now.
Davs Art 