i once was grateful but now am not

for years, i somehow managed to appreciate my experiences with depression.

often, in the midst of each episode, i was driven towards God in a way i couldn't fathom when i was well. the weakness i felt during times of depression would force me to trust God because there was nothing else i could do. instead of praying for strength, i learned to pray that in my weakness i would rely only on God's strength, for i know how easy it has always been for me to try to be wholly independent (of God and everyone around me).

the darkness of depression pushed me to seek Jesus, the light of the world. in the depths, i saw my neediness more clearly , and i would find myself earnestly pleading with God during the days and nights.

though originally my pleas were for healing, eventually i would simply ask for help and for faith.

after the storms would pass, as each episode would end, i would see the growth in my life. i would see what i had learned, and how i had changed, and how God had used that time to mold me. i could see the pain and struggles i'd been through and praise God for it all.

by learning to be grateful after each episode, i eventually learned to be thankful even in the midst of them because i knew that God was working in my life through it all.

but over the last few years, i've found it harder to seek God while i'm depressed, harder to be grateful, and harder to find any goodness whatsoever.

the first severe episodes taught me patience, compassion, empathy, and so many other things that have forever changed the course of my life. but over the last several years, it seems as if instead of becoming a better person because of the struggles, i am becoming more callous, more hardened, less patient, less giving and forgiving, and more cynical.

the episodic nature of this illness seems to be catching up to me. the constancy of it all has worn me down. the fact that i've been spending more time depressed as each year passes has exhausted me.

these days, during depressive episodes, i become a fairly miserable person to be around. i am impatient, bitter, angry, unforgiving, and so many other things i'd never wish to be.

instead of growing through what i learn through depression, it feels like i am shrinking. i let myself wither away during these episodes into a person that is far from whom i ever believed i'd be.

i used to find God during these times of darkness. i used to seek God out due to my desperate need. now, i find that i am resentful and angry, and thus avoid God. during the moments i can bring myself to cry out to God, i hear my voice echoing back to me in an otherwise silent vacuum. i cannot seem to feel, sense, experience, or hear God in any of the ways i have in the past. worst of all, during the rare moments that i am able to somehow know or believe that God is really there, instead of alleviating any of my suffering it simply makes me more aware of my pain and lonliness, thus driving me towards fear and to avoid praying at all.

so, after a few years of allowing depression to send me on a downward slope, allowing it to make me a person i don't want to be, allowing it to lead me away from God and goodness, i now wonder how to - and how to be willing to - reverse that trend.

i've been listening to this song by Matt Redman a lot more lately, in the hopes of starting to learn how to live it once again:

Blessed Be Your Name (2002)
- - -
Blessed Be Your Name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

Blessed Be Your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk
through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be Your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's all as it should be
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name