Everything is connected?

or

how my treatment of my Major Depressive Disorder is changing my perspective on life

This is the beginning of something new for me. I've talked about cars and I share some emotional stuff on Facebook... but I'm going to try something new here. Just open and honest sharing of my experiences with my depression and it's treatment. that being said this might not be everyone's favorite stuff to read so I'll tag these posts with the word depression and tag all the car stuff as such so we can sort one from another. If you're intrigued, follow me past the jump where I'll let you get a peek inside my brain!

Let's get a little background going here...

I'm 26 as I sit to write these words, but I've had depression at LEAST since my teenage years (although I'm starting to feel like the roots of it are even older than that). I got help for it, some sporadic therapy attempts, I tried Prozac for a year... Then I just kind of kept soldiering on in denial of my depression (not a good idea). May of this year I had a breakdown... Like staring at a cut that had reopened just sobbing uncontrollably blaming myself for everything bad and tearing myself apart. Very much not okay, that was a big wake up call for me.

I ended up going to a psychiatrist that works with some of my other family members and she put me on Wellbutrin (which has been significantly better than Prozac). She suggested I see a therapist and so I started researching... I found a lovely local therapist who specializes in a therapy model called "Internal Family Systems" or IFS for short.

What's this IFS stuff? well it's more of a conceptual model than anything else. Ever say "some part of me wants...." or "some part of me doesn't like..."? Well internal family systems says to that, "Yes! there are distinct parts of you! and your self is separate from them." My favorite thing about it is that it's not pathological. It's not labeling parts as bad or good, it's not judging. All the parts WANT to do good for you, they want to protect you. but they can get overzealous and do the wrong things sometimes (they call it a part getting "extreme").

This lead me on a new search for further meaning in my life in a spiritual way. I've come to also appreciate and practice Buddhism and meditation to help keep me calm in this storm of a world. So full of stimuli and information we can hardly take a breath between thoughts! My practice is still young, but I'm noticing the benefits and that's reinforcing my practice already.

DISCLAIMER: By NO means am I claiming to know everything or be enlightened, these experiences are the first steps on a long journey and I'd like to take you along for the ride if you're interested.

Onwards to the more relevant parts of this experience! (and getting towards my thematic point here).

Today was my third session with my therapist, and we had finally gotten the intake out of the way and mapped out my familial history and the tensions that exist there (which was eye opening). This morning wasn't my best, but those will happen. I stopped at a Coney to grab some breakfast and a coffee and do a little reading. Something told me to grab my 3DS (my 26th birthday present lol) and while I didn't play, I did grab it and take it in with me.

when I got to the session I talked about my feelings and the pain that I had been feeling. My therapist was helping me navigate the parts within my mind, because one of my parts a "protector" was trying to block me from a connection that needed to be made. this part hidden away would be called an "exile" in IFS terms, and it's that part that gets locked away in a corner for whatever reasons.

well once we connected with this part, and I let it take a form in my mind..... low and behold I was looking at an image of a 7-8 year old Brian. I could feel the pain, as soon as I gave that part attention, he flooded my body with pain. My true self, the part doing this internal work, felt total compassion for this part of me (Buddhism is paralleled here, as we're told to view ourselves and others with a "loving kindness"). Now I'm seeing the connection with that urge to grab my 3DS. At that age I loved Legos and my N64. That part of me wants to play, and remind me to be playful.

My therapist and I decided to externalize this little boy version of me at first, had him "sit" in the room with us on an empty chair. the pain and sadness got a little intense, and one of my "protector" parts swooped back in to try and take control of my mental state. I was glad that I was able to calm that part down and really listen to this quieter part of me.

He was, and is to an extent, sad. He craved the affection and emotional connection that only a father can provide and had issues navigating that relationship without it. My therapist pointed out that his love of Legos, and later cars, was a coping method. This part of me was building a world where he felt like he belonged. He just wants to be heard and understood and loved for who he is. He wants to feel good enough. He wants to feel worthy of praise. So I finally had moved aside the protectors and detractors and let him express himself in that session. And it was very emotionally intense as an experience. My therapist was great in helping me release his pain, he's doing it over time. I'm still getting pangs of sadness as I type this.

But now i know WHY I'm feeling sad. And I'm able to console instead of just repeating the words my inner critic (for all it's good intentions) has internalized: "Man up", "You're a wuss", "boys don't cry"... but this part had sadness to release, and crying is the only way! Oh how sad I was to notice that I had neglected this beautifully optimistic and loving part of me (I used to want to be the first man on Mars at that age!). But I was glad to reach out and help him too. I imagine giving my younger self a big hug full of love and compassion, something he seeked from males in his time. He reminded me of my love for Legos, and my dreams of achieving great things. 

As my therapist and I worked with the other parts that wanted to get in the way, I would feel a sense of resonance bubble up from this young part. It all started to click into place. With a relationship that had felt conditional and was very different between the public and private spheres between him and my father, he decided to build relationships with his creations instead. It's part of the reason my cars are anthropomorphous. They reward work, don't complain unless something is broken, and respond to logic. Logic was a way this boy had used to connect. Logic and intellect where the strengths of his connection with dad. So, kind of like Spock, he fled to logic (or more correctly I did) when he got hurt. Which leads to a lot of "why am I the source of this negativity?" and boom. inner critic just got a whole lot of fuel to throw on my emotional fires. So the critic has a reason to want to squelch this, but his efforts are misguided sometimes.

Leaving the session my chest felt lighter. Not perfect by any means, I have a lot of work to do still and other parts to open up this kind of dialogue with. But that young part of me that was shoved off into the corner long ago is finally starting to feel like he's being heard and respected. And that's a great first step, and it's making it easier to communicate with that part of myself.

I feel more whole, even if there's more emotion as well. That's okay, and I see now that that's the part of me that had been receiving the self hatred. As I would tell myself to "get over it" or "just move on", he would suffer the consequence. Just wanting to feel like he belongs and is loved. He just wants a hug and a compassionate listening ear, and I internalized patterns that were not providing that.

Great story Brian, but how is everything connected?

Ah! now we get to the interesting part. My latest attempt at treating my depression has been motivated by my not wanting to have another attack, and it's starting to turn into a motivation from progress as I am seeing changes however small.

Buddhism and meditation are about awareness, and looking inside of ourselves. Some quotes that might help drive this home (emphasis mine):

Nothing ever exists entirely alone; everything is in relation to everything else.


Imagine that every person in the world is enlightened but you. They are all your teachers, each doing just the right things to help you.


You can search throughout the entire universe for someone who is more deserving of your love and affection than you are yourself, and that person is not to be found anywhere. You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe deserve your love and affection.


There is nothing so disobedient as an undisciplined mind, and there is nothing so obedient as a disciplined mind.


Peace comes from within.  Do not seek it without.

- Gautama Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama, the founder of Buddhism)

Those are all separate quotes, but each of them holds a deep significance to me. as I strive to become my greatest self (Maslow would call it "self-actualization", modern psychologists call it high functioning), I'm seeing more and more that the answers are already within me. Not only do I need to trust myself, but also know myself. As I turn to look inward, through meditation or therapy, I remind myself of that loving kindness that I should be showing myself and others.

The Buddha was also very much against dogmatic beliefs, he expressed the idea that you should try out someone else's idea or value and see if it brings you a benefit before making it a part of you. My explorations in therapy and spirituality have been opening my eyes to not only the potential all humans possess, but the path to happiness and peace within. As I see these parallels between my different practices of self care, it only strengthens my belief that my path is the right path for me right now. Being aware and mindful, in the Buddhist sense, is helping me identify these parallels, and appreciate them! They're valuable and useful insights for me.

And that's part of my reason for writing this all out, so that I can remember these kinds of breakthroughs on the rougher days. As a reminder of how far I've come from that day where I had to drag myself out of bed, sobbing, to seek external support for my internal issues.

I'll leave you with a few more Gautama Buddha quotes, because I think his words can be immensely powerful (emphasis mine).

It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you.

Look within, thou art the Buddha.

Thanks for taking the time to read if you've been sticking with me! It's all too easy to forget to take care of ourselves in this fast-paced world full of distractions and notifications and things vying for our attention. I got caught up in it for years. But I'll repeat a phrase I picked up from a support website for people with mental illness.

Self care isn't selfish.

And it makes sense to me. If we're not the best version of ourselves, how can we expect to be good to others? How can we expect ourselves to be happy? How can we expect ourselves to be high performing and functioning well? Take care of yourself, it's vital to your health and your life and your happiness.

I hope I've helped you in some way with this post, and I'll be trying to make this a regular thing. Although breakthroughs of this magnitude are not sustainable long term, i'd be blowing my own mind every week :P, I'll share what insight I have gained and where I've struggled in the hopes that it will help someone. I wish you peace and a wonderful day!