Catch 42

Look it up in your favoured browser, the meaning of life is “42”. Douglas Adams may well be smiling at how his apocryphal assertion has become the ultimate answer. But there is a catch.

For me the meaning of life changes dramatically as events along life’s itinerary  impact and it seems to me that these meanderings impact a "mal de tête" person in a disproportionate way.

 The difficulty with the meaning of life whilst suffering a mental illness is that it is in constant flux. Frequently and most damagingly it reaches its nadir in possession of zero meaning. A state reached far too many times and very deeply in recent weeks. Despite a greater understanding of how, one that never feels easier to return from... Whatever you get told!

'There is always the Dog to talk too'

Doctors and psychiatric workers will be horrified by this as its the basic assumption all their work is predicated upon. That the more one understands the factors that precede depressive feelings,the easier you'll find it to modify them’. The reality seems to be that the more one understands, the more one questions the reasons why the pea soup persistently descends. And questions one’s ability to ever permanently prevent it from falling.

The questions you ask yourself are nearly all unanswerable. But often those canvassed by others (not least professionals) bewilder. They are often risible to a malignant, miasmic, mind:

"Have you ever been truly happy?" 

"Have you ever been depression free?"

"Have you ever been hopeful?"

"Tell me why do ‘you’, think you're unhappy"

"Why are you sad?"

"What causes them to start?"

"When is it at its worst?"......;

"What!?"

'20,000  Doubts under the Skull'

Sometimes I forget that those things really exist. There are fleeting moments. Unfortunately guilt persistently swamps the joys just as they are being recognised as such. This guilt is like a cloak that depression wears to cover you in darkness.To make you invisible before joy takes hold too firmly. Then comes the doubt... The doubt that you will ever truly rid yourself of this whirling mass of unanswerable questions. Painful overwhelming doubts. The doubts within the ungraspable dark grey covered  'duck down' duvet. Engorged with the leaden weights of memories too heavy to release from inside this cover. Meant to bring you warmth and comfort. It instead presses down on you in a way that makes you feel as though 'all that you are' is racing to your brain. To escape your body and the only route out is through your eyes. So overwhelmed by the flow that the tears appear as a stream and you wonder if they will ever be 'drops' again. The doubt - the doubt that sows seeds of self deprecation that germinate in rivulets of tears and the swanlike songs of Bunyan's slough"

So there you are mental health problems are really a Catch 22. A paradox where the attempting to escape suffering of depression seems to make the escape impossible and each new attempt makes the next episode more painful and more desperate.

"TOWARDS THE LIGHT! you bloody fool!"

AH! I hear the crowds roar; ' but you proved you can escape so next time you'll feel better because you know you can do it!'

'Really?' how many times do you visit failure before saying 'no more!'

Drink from the puddle the first day you may be quenched drink from it every day you may be trenched.

I have fought back with extreme effort this time. I have walked further with and spoken more to  my dog’s (to reassure myself I still have a voice).Though enjoying these things the respite from my troubled mind looms above me as a terrifying reminder that, the next plummet into the 20,000 doubts under the skull is but a pin prick in a buoyancy tank away. It has left me very tired.

If Adam's is right?; The meaning of a 'Life' with mental health?

It's a Catch 42......