40

Well, we did it. A decade recorded, one year at a time (yes, you can check out 39, 38 and 37, 36, 35, 34, 33, 32, 31, and 30). 

##

I never thought I’d say this, but there’s been a real upside to my depression. As a person who has prided themselves on giving a damn 99.9% of the time (except about where we go to dinner. Please, you pick), finding myself reacting to external factors with a quiet I could only describe at the time as nothingness was lonely at first. Where was that fire? That pulsing rhythm? That incessant chatter of shoulds, and expected tos, and you’re a failure if you don’ts? 

My therapist was surprisingly excited about this turn of events. Aha, she said, lighting up. A change! 

I was less stoked, since a relative stranger had started dialing into my inner monologue. Rather than do, she suggested be. Rather than should she encouraged relax. Rather than for the love of god don’t be an asshole no matter what she was all, oh hey, being an asshole sometimes is okay especially if it’s just deciding you don’t want to buy a used couch today and you cancel on that stranger from Craigslist with two hours notice so you can take a nap. Maybe I should have felt some kind of way about all of this, but…I didn’t. 

Because it wasn’t that I was out of damns to give. I simply didn’t have any to begin with. So having a reaction in the direction of I should was out of the realm of possibility. 

And let me tell you, not having any damns or shoulds was fucking liberating. I could eat celery and peanut butter for dinner without chastising myself for not cooking. I could wear a dress that didn’t define my waist and not give a shit if it wasn’t cute. I could nap without any sort of guilt. I wasn’t beholden to the stifling systems we all tred within. This new inner monologue granted me the courage to question my addiction to the patriarchy, the male-gaze, and our collective obsession with keeping men happy. She provided me the audacity to rebel against capitalism’s hustle culture, and consider a paradigm in which I was worthy whether or not I did anything. And she allowed me to witness the characteristics of white supremacy at play and in collaboration with other systems of oppression throughout the day through the lens of an observer instead of a participant. In fact, this weirdly soothing lady in my head was telling me everything was gonna be fine even if I didn’t run myself in circles to find an intimate partner, and I’d still be a worthwhile human being. 

Whoa. 

I started to see why my therapist was excited. This depression-voice was turning out to be hella subversive.

Who is this voice? my therapist asked one session. We’d been identifying and intermingling with my internal family system for over a year, and I’d met characters like the Crows of Criticism (a pack of birds who swoop in to nitpick everything I do), a glowing outline so large I could only really make out her boots (a protector who often forgot to make space for others), Bugs Nunny (a chill but guilt-tripping rabbit who almost dares me not to do what is “right”) and Sheila (my confident, poised, work persona)—and after meeting, we’d do what could only be considered couples therapy between each part, and I know this sounds nutty but it’s rather fascinating.

Well, she’s a fox, I said, and then paused. 

And besides good-looking? My therapist prompted. 

No, she really is a….fox. We both giggled at the misinterpretation before I continued. She’s calm, cool and collected, but also quick and playful. And while she’s a step ahead, it’s not at the detriment of the present. 

How do you feel when she’s around? 

I feel nothing, I admitted. Absence. 

Tell me more about that. (Yes, therapists really do say this and it’s a great prompt.)

It’s not like a void or anything. It’s just…calm. Like…easy. So easy I’m not aware, but fully aware. 

I’ll spare you from the rest of my therapy session, but the tl;dr is: absence of anxiety and self-criticism and constant second-guessing wasn’t nothingness—it’s just something I’d never experienced so I couldn’t yet put my finger on the feeling. And because the closest thing I could relate it to was depression, it’s hard to tell the difference (a little soundtrack for this sentence. You’re welcome). Of course, we’re now getting to know that fox, too. 

Regardless, all of this has made me think. I’m turning 40, and thus I have spent 40 years living one kind of way. It’s a way I’m intimately familiar with, one I can feel without even needing to experience it, like looking through the most boring of binoculars. And right in front of me is another option, beckoning me like a kaleidoscope, where I can only peer towards a version of life that makes perfect and zero sense all at once. And I have the choice to explore that version of how things can be, or remain in the experience of how things are. It’s thrilling, really, to now ask myself, who would I be if I didn’t give a damn?, a question I was never before ready to follow through on because suddenly, the answers feel limitless: I’d do gymnastics. I’d try ketamine therapy. I’d wear baggy jeans. I’d move to Europe. I’d be remarkably bad at Spanish but keep trying to find the right way to learn. I’d spend less time wondering if I looked okay. I’d trust myself enough to give myself what I needed, rather than what someone else expected of me. 

I thought not having any damns to give would damn my humanity. Instead, it seems to be leaving more room for my own.

Follow