I think my brain meds are working. I’m calm, sort of, in a nervous kind of way, kind of antsy, reflective, and fearful of the future. In other words, I’m filled with dread. What’s that all about?

Reality bites, at least today, and today is all I have to work with. Tomorrow.. well, it will be, what it will be. But the problem is, I have a pretty good idea what tomorrow will be....

Just like today. That’s the catch.

Tomorrow will be more of the same, unless a meteor falls on my head while I’m sleeping and what’s the chance of that?

I’m stuck in that circular thinking thingy. You know the kind I mean. Where you try to decide what you should do next and line up all the possibilities and run them through your logistical brain goop..... and then round and round you go... back to the beginning.

When the reality of the situation is that you should do nothing. Nothing. Just get up and put one foot in front of the other and smile. Smile like those people in the movie “One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest”. I have a hard time with that part.

So tomorrow is another day. Yippee.. I need to start celebrating now. Put on a party hat, strip down to my underwear and do the fandango. And truthfully, I have no idea what I want tomorrow to be. If I did, I think I could move toward it. But I understand all my frailties, my shortcomings, my peccadilloes, my total lack of understanding of the norm. I can’t function in the norm. I’d look like Auntie Mame in a room full of Amish people. Standing down in a crowd is not one of my strong suits.

And have I mentioned how great it is to be sober? I love it. Before, when I was drunk by this time of night, I could believe that my total lack of faith in the future was my booze soaked brain playing tricks on me. Now what?

And so I go forth in my sobriety into the vast known.

I should be hitting the hay soon, got a big day tomorrow... I need to get up early so I can plaster a strange smile on my face and practice putting one foot in front of the other. At least I have something to look forward to.

By now you know that I can be a bit over the top, riding the extremes. For me, being in the middle, the balanced part of the titter totter, is brief and fleeting.

I have come to realize that I need to be truthful in order to sustain my own mental health. That pretending and living a lie is costly and may be more than I am able to afford. I need to get it out, look it in the eye, confront it and deal with it.

But at what cost to others?

Because you see, telling the truth is the ultimate selfish act; you relieve yourself but force others to now adjust to a new reality. And as my dear friend Tim once told me, “The genie cannot be put back into the bottle”.

I’ve always believed, felt, that living a lie only cheats everyone involved. I believe we have talked about this before, in the past. And yet I come back to it today.

I’ve made a decision to confront a situation, get it out into the open, so to speak. And I am convinced regardless of the outcome, I will feel better, as if a weight has been lifted from me. And I can bear little weight at this moment in time.

I will live with the consequences of this action, accept whatever comes from it. I am hoping for a compromise, something equitable for both sides, we shall see.

The point being..... it won’t be dangling anymore. I won’t have to push it out of the way every 10 minutes. It won’t be the “Dreaded” thing. It won’t be standing between me, myself, and the light.

Wish me luck.

And so I changed over my closet just now, from summer clothes to winter clothes. A semi-annual ritual of sorts, indicating a change....a passage of my old friend Time.

I’d promised myself that I would accomplish at least one thing this weekend, one thing that I could consider worthwhile and necessary. I can relax now. My promise to myself has been fulfilled.

I am reduced to telling you about my mundane chores. How pathetic.

In the process of changing over the closet, I encountered articles of clothing I knew I would never wear again and started piling them up on the floor. By the time I was finished, it was quite a large pile. And I walked past it for an hour. And I tried to ignore it. But it just kept sitting there, looking ugly, and the more I stared at it the more agitated I became.

I realized that most of the things in the pile were things I used to enjoy wearing, basically good clothes, but now I hated them, wanted them to go away, considered them to be excess baggage in my life, things I now have to contend with, fold, arrange, make room for, have cleaned, ironed, and stored... and for what?

So I gathered them up and walked to the garbage shoot and threw them in. I immediately felt relieved and guilty all at the same time. I have the ability to just throw things away, rid myself of anything I perceive as being bothersome, perhaps not one of my better traits.

I now have to resist the urge to throw everything I own down that garbage shoot. I imagine sitting here surrounded by bare walls, the utter freedom of it all. But I won’t. Not today, I have accomplished enough for one day, fulfilled my promise to myself.

I just got back from the doctors. Two hours in the waiting room after the mammogram and then called in for an ultra sound but all is fine. I am wrung out.

I thank all of you that left your wonderful support in comments. I will call my doctor and insist on getting in sooner.

I need for you to know that I have held this illness hidden inside for most of my life and pretended to people. The pretense is exhausting. I need to let it out in the open. I came very close to not posting my morning, because I knew that it would pass. But I think it is so important that you see and read how this can escalate in a matter of hours. And how utterly helpless the person feels at the time and how reluctant they are to tell anyone.

I need to think that by telling it minute by minute, you might be able to recognize this in a loved one, sister, mother, wife or daughter.

This is a dangerous disease. It is sneaky and vicious and sometimes the people that suffer from it have no idea what is going on.

I am going to continue to chronicle the bad moments and they come in all sizes.. this was just one panic attack. I normally don’t have panic attacks. I am normally the other way..the deep dark depression, lethargic.. lifeless.

This scared the piss out of me today. I needed to write it down and that helped me keep a grip... keep me in the real. But it will help me to go back and read it... to realize the compulsion for secrecy at the time that it was happening. That is the scariest part. I look normal on the outside to everyone who approached me, for the most part. (except that poor guy I talked to early I the day)

I take a pill every day for this.. 365 days a year. But I know that I need an adjustment now. So, thank you for your patience and understanding and letting me dump this here.

So I will not delete.

But trust me when I was waiting for my results to come back... if I could have gotten home, I would have deleted.

Ok, so if I am going to do this, and do this right, I have to write it down. This is for me now. I need to write down how I feel and all the circumstances.

I started off the day depressed, woke up that way, dreading coming to work. I wondered at the time if I did not have to come to work if I would have been depressed. I struggled to take a shower, forced myself to put on makeup. I came to work slightly early in order to not put myself into a panic mode.

I got here to find an email from SS. I wrote her a long email back and before I hit send I deleted it all, and just sent her a few short lines, I am trying not to send long drawn out emails but I feel the need to write all this down.

I started talking to a co worker and before I knew what was happening, he was staring at me. I had started talking about a woman I knew that had killed herself. I was talking as if to myself and forgotten that he was in the room. He told me to leave the office, that I was not myself.

I cannot concentrate on work. I took a valium to keep from getting a panic attack at my desk. I have an appointment for a mammogram at 1:00 today. I just need to hold on.

I made an appointment to have my meds checked but I can’t get in until September 28^th . I can’t wait that long but I could not tell the woman that I was in a bad way. I pretended to be ok and accepted the appointment.

I am trying to determine why today is so bad. The sun is shining and it is nice outside. No reason to be affected today. At this point I can not imagine surviving until tomorrow. It seems unfathomable. But I know that in a few hours this can lift and I will not remember what this felt like. The valium should kick in soon.

My mind is on escaping. I feel like I need to run. But I have no idea to where. I want to call someone and talk, but I don’t want anyone to see me like this and I know it is a broken record, same thing over an over again, nothing new and talking does no good, just wastes my time and theirs and on and on.

I don’t want my family to be upset because I know this will pass and then I will look like a fool. I just need to hide for a bit. Wait.

The valium should kick in soon. I just need to hang on. Wait till this passes. One hour and I can leave. One hour and I can leave. See it is looping in my brain. That is part of the syndrome, the looping. The valium should kick in soon.

Written from memory after I get home: I go out to smoke.... walk around the building....tell myself that I cannot show you who I am,... no good can come of it. Why do I want to expose this garbage to you? I want you to like me. I need you to like me. And I am a fuck head for even thinking about this bullshit. I recognize the self-loathing come kicking and screaming to the front. I go back into the building.

Ok, so I have to continue. I am cold, chilled. I feel like all the warmth is leaving my body. And I am wearing down, feel the need to sleep, lay my head down and go to sleep embrace Morpheus. I have 40 minutes to go. Only 40 minutes to go.

The valium has hit me now and I am in slow motion now. Thank god. The pressure in my chest is still there and I realize that I have a blemish come up on my face in just this short time…..

.......I just had to step away, a Trustee asked for my help to print 14 copies of a sheet of information she needs for the meeting that is going on right now. I was incapable of helping her. My mind will not function.

She got someone else to help her, thank god.

The copier jammed and I tried to help again, but I cannot perform simple tasks. I have no patience to find all the jammed paper. I had to walk away. I need to leave now. 30 more minutes.. just 30 more minutes. I need to leave now. I cannot wait. I must leave now.

I am at home now:

I made it... lasted the 30 minutes and the walk home was good. It felt good to be outside in the fresh air. The pressure started to let up in my chest.

But when I came in the house, I could see grease on my counter from where my husband had eaten dinner last night and I flew into a rage. A simple thing like cleaning your space. And I went to get a paper towel and the roll was empty.

And all I could think about was the injustice of it all.. Now I would have to go into the closet and bend down over the vacuum cleaner and wrestle a roll out of the bag and take the old one off and put the new one on.

Then I was not sure what time my appointment is for.. the mammogram appointment and now I begin to look for my paper work, the referral and I can’t find them and I know they were here a few days ago, and maybe I had enough sense to put them into my purse so I start looking there an pull everything out and still nothing... and then maybe I folded it up and put it in to my wallet, and there it is.... thank you Jesus.

It takes me forever to find the number to call and then I get the recorded message... “Listen carefully to your options. Dial 1 for this and 2 for that and 3 for this and 4 if you think you are going to blow your head off in the next 5 minutes.” So I hit 4 and get thrown into a voice mail........................

This is what I am going to call a melt down.

I need to leave the house in 30 minutes to get to my appointment on time.. I don’t want to go now. I want to lay down and sleep. My body weighs a thousand pounds and I am exhausted from extending all the energy changing the paper towel roll.

But I was good, I deleted all the emails to SS... every one of them.. all 10 pages. I was very good.

I may come home and delete this... depending on how I feel.

I am so glad my name is Zee Zee. It helps, you know, helps keep the two of us separate, the Zee that is depressed and me, the Zee that is, well, not depressed.

She is such a downer, Zee that is. I have been dragging her along for years. Some days she just sleeps and I get to spend the entire day hanging out looking for fun things to do. Some days she just comes out at night. But right now she is sleeping.

I’ve grown to tolerate her, realize that she is the yin to my yang, and she can write a sexy, moody blog on occasion, but not the really funny stuff that I can come up with at times. She is basically unrealistic and just plain dark. She has an entire wardrobe.... and it pisses me off that it is taking up a lot of room in our closet.

Her choice of shoes is hideous, and she never changes hand bags, lets face it, I am the one with the style. She has no ability to focus on the details.

I basically slipped her a mickey finn when our son arrived. He is the bomb. We had a blast together. She only stuck her head out one time when #4 was making dinner and I kicked her to the curb. Jeepers. She can be a pain in the butt.

You should have seen Robs face when I checked him into his room. He has a friend staying with him so I got them a room across the street from where I live. The Weston Hotel. Nice, very nice. They upgraded the room due to some thing I belong to... and his room has a big plasma TV. He almost squealed with delight.

We did the lunch thing with his friends and then I took him shopping for Bears stuff... a jacket and shirt. He apparently needs to be dressed like this to go to a game. Perhaps it is some requirement for admission.

The friends then went their way for a few hours, to relatives in the area and Rob came back to the condo with me. He was really pooped from lack of sleep, so he took a little snooze on the couch. OMG..... just watching him sleep was such a pleasure. I wanted to wrap the memory up and put it into my special hiding place..... and pull it out when no one is around and hold it in my arms.

Jeepers..... she is starting to wake up. Shhhhhhhhh

See, she can’t just go with the flow, live in the moment. She is always prying into the meaning of things and the why’s of shit. And she cry’s, I hate that. And truthfully, no one wants to be around her. I see the look on their faces when she shows up, and everyone grabs a newspaper and pretends to be reading the funnies.

Too late, she’s here.

Ok, I don’t have a lot of time, my son will be here in a few hours and I really need to do something to prepare. Although I have no clue what that would entail. I suppose getting dressed: A shower, makeup, hair product, clothes, shoes.

But for the moment, I will type.

I want to thank you all for your understanding and patience with me. And the lovely flowers you see came from Sensuous Soul. My dear sweet girlfriend. They smell wonderful. I wish you were here to smell them Kate.

It is obvious that my brain chemistry has taken a dive. I will not try to deny this fact. Fall is not a good time for me. The impending darkness, the days growing shorter, the crisp air, all play havoc with my brain.

I may be different for awhile, more moody, more dark, like the days to follow. But I feel the need to chronicle my depression this year. Not fight it so much. Let it evolve and avoid the delete button. I will remind myself often that the depression is clinical and not environmental.

I’ll try to stick with just the feelings and not breakout into any kind of blame game. Because in truth.. it’s all about the chemical imbalance and nothing more. I do take a pill a day to chase the blues away, but I fear I have grown immune to it.

I can tell that some of you suffer depression as well. I can follow your moods... the swings... the words you say are often what I am thinking or feeling at the time. So maybe we can learn something, maybe I can learn something, or not, about this strange phenomenon that only affects a few of us. Thank God.

I am better during the day. The light helps. I’ve spent time investigating light therapy. I also know that alcohol boosts my serotonin level. But that is a delicate balance of which I am not terribly successful with.

My depression is changing a bit. I am receding from life in a way I have never done before. I am avoiding people I love. I have not been home, I call Southern Illinois home, since May. I don’t feel that I can keep up a pretense for 48 hours. The thought exhausts me.

It is easier to hide here in Chicago. I catch myself crying more often. I cry during the day now, shut my door at work and cry for no apparent reason, then gather my wits and go on for a few more hours.

Then I get home and try to work out, well, I am getting less successful with this motivation, but I do make promises that I try to keep.

I don’t care much about food anymore. I eat to keep my blood sugar at an even keel. But the food is tasteless in my mouth and I have difficulty swallowing it.

I am doing a fairly good job at hiding all of this from my husband, but last night I did slip, at the dinner table. He was embarrassed and put out with me. Sympathy is not one of his strong suits. I know this and should have avoided the conversation that catapulted me into the crying jag. But it is just harder to hold back the tears now, harder to pretend all the time.

See, when I have to push myself to pretend, I tend to get a bit manic. Then I go overboard and look and sound like a complete lunatic. So it is easier for me to hide at home, stay away from everyone. Because for the most part, my husband can ignore me at home and I can hide at my computer. This seems to be a workable situation. Not perfect perhaps, but livable for the time being.

I have backed off IMing most people and try to keep my emails to a minimum. Some people are easier for me to be around than others, and I hope I have warned everyone I know that if they get an email from me after 9 pm.. you should just hit delete and not read it.

My short term memory is almost non existent at this point, which is why I will not delete any of my upcoming blogs, and will try and tag them as my depression phase. You are relieved from commenting. I will not hold it against you if you stay away.

Ok, now I need to get dressed and ready to pretend. It is the least I can do for my son, my precious son. I am looking forward to seeing him, touching him. I just don’t want him to have to endure me. It’s hard enough for me to endure myself these days.

So I will catch up to all of you on Sunday evening or Monday evening. Take care and know that you are all in my mind....in my heart.