Friday, September 30, 2011
Monday, September 5, 2011
DEPRESSION
Days go by slowly when you are moving about, but accomplishing absolutely nothing, The vagueness of it all becomes a comfortable bed to lie in, Do not attempt to struggle just move along from one moment to the next. Filling each with events of little or no significant, cold or hot, wet or dry, dark or light, day or night the times are as one. To look at one’s life like this is to get the impression of total uselessness and utter frustration were it a possible feeling. But no feelings are possible since there is a need to put forth some effort in order to be in contact with them. Things are looked forward to with no enthusiasm and once arrived at beheld with no wonderment. One arises not because it’s time to accomplish some preset goal but rather to do the expected. The expected can be what the person expects or thinks others expect of the person. It is expected the person will go to work were the mundane is common place. This person expects to make it through the day without the necessarily a why; things just are.
If another body happens to be lying in a shared bed upon arising it is noticed with indifference. When one is not there no expectation for sex is felt and that is fine. Eating is done for the sake of stopping the gas pains in the stomach, but the excitement of different tastes is elusive.
Many people pass before vacant eyes as one. Noticing only a certain few for a moment they are then quickly forgotten. Things are done in a series of prerecorded steps which never change. Showers, not baths, are done in ritualistic manner like preparing for a sacrifice. Each day there is a sense that the person is offering their body for sacrifice on the altar of insincerity which is relieved daily without notice. The possibility is that small parts which make the whole have died leaving an empty shell which must wait until the correct chronological time to die comes.
There are goals which are vague and somewhere ahead. There are so many that they run together each looking for attention like several puppies might each wanting to be petted. As a goal gains attention it is followed until sidetracked, by some vague thought, then another takes its place. In this way none are ever reached and many reasons for ''why'' can be found. Career is a thing of the past and offers an indefinite future. Others who pursue such an exacting mistress are mocked with a knowing sneer. This mistress, like the spell drugs of addiction cast, is difficult to become disentangled from once enchanted. Yet there are those who, through circumstances, are thrown by the wayside never again to be in its company. Strive as one might there is no regaining that particular bed ever again. Each day is a long search for a way back into the arms which will never again enfold. Soon the searcher becomes cynical and unfeeling. Of course this elusive mistress is not the only one that has the ability to place you in living limbo.
Faded memories of those who once arose passion, and then moved on, float daily through his mind. Reflection is rejected and replaced with a guard so impregnable even the one who created it cannot get through. So love is a memory stirred only by late show movies which now seem trite where once they were the meaning of life. The magic moment never comes, and happily ever after is the most hideous of jokes. New people move in to positions created by memories and because they do not fit pass from view. No remorse sets in any longer at the passing of those who were briefly part of this so called life. Life denotes animation and involvement which are things vaguely remembered when picture albums are reviewed with cold squinting eyes. What is seen is registered only as points in time. The original significant emotion reached to each lies deeply buried in the cemetery within a mind guarded by never ending walls. The vicarious thrills of a movie or TV program has no connection to life events and are as faded as clothes awaiting cleaning in commercials.
His eyes look deep into others unknowingly searching for the spark which may to ignite spontaneity. There may be hope that a small glowing ember would again kindle the flame of caring. This hope is not conscious but rather in a catatonic state and if the ember by chance did come near it is doubtful it would be recognized or responded to.
How does one reach such a state?
THE WAY THINGS ARE...WHY?
When l returned to school, at the age of forty, I was already ''older then dirt'' Most of the time I found myself being asked for wisdom by younger classmates, In most classes there seemed to be this belief that Carl had the answers, or should have them, or would get them, I found some professors who would profess ultimate knowledge of why we, each one of us, act/behave, think, feel, react, believe, etc., etc., the way we do. Many exhibited various forms of distress at my seeming threat to their leadership role after all I was only a ''student'' and a freshman at that. Many of my young freshmen peer would sit taking notes imprinting the supposed knowledge these professors would expound into their memory banks. It seemed to me that the information speech had not been changed or updated in a very long time. Each person seemed to believe, without question, the information given by this all powerful giver of candle light.
One or two in the class would, attempted to let sun light in by question using the ''why'' to the knowledge givers, But, in order to receive the grade needed to pass, one did not question beyond what was clearly acceptable to the professor, Slowly their individually alike boxes were being formed about them; creativity stifled, The ideas passed on in class after class offer views of how to correct the problems of Twenty-first century humans based mostly on Nineteenth century ideas. Expectations of how a person is to act were formed, according to what label is applied. The label (diagnosis at times) does not insure recovery from a particular dysfunction, and the label may perpetuate the prognosis.
Depression, as an example, may have several epidemiological beginnings yet the depressed person is, in order to be labeled (diagnosed) depressed, must display certain behavioral criteria. Once an acceptable, to managed care companies, diagnosis is made ''treatment'' can begin. Overtime these criteria will either continue which will mean more treatment, or abate which will mean a cure has been achieved. This is the basis for the medical model of wellness.
There is only one way a person can get influenza and that is by being infected by the virus. If someone were to be infected by an influenza virus they would be treated in a specific way. There are not many cures for one particular disease. So each person who contracts an influenza virus can expect to be treated the same way, Since mental Illness can have many entomologic beginnings how can people with mental health problems all be treated the same? Chemotherapy has replaced behavior therapy and psychotherapy due to increased case load and cost of patient care. Warehousing (mental institutions) was societies answer to giving rid of those that are undesirable and cannot be boxed. This practice in effect for hundreds of years ended in the nineteen seventies. Now we call them the ''Homeless'' and use bus therapy on them.
These quick fix, band-aiding, of those who suffer must be stopped and it is time to stop the oppression of those who are different.
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