So much geekery, so little time

I find myself in a strange position this Easter Sunday: I am balancing my faith and love of God with my internal struggle; landing neither here nor there.  For those of you closest to me, you know that i have been struggling for the last two years- since my break up with the man i had thought i was going to spend the rest of my life. If you are in a small handful of people, you're aware that that has caused me to spiral into a serious depression that has not gotten better or easier one smidge in the last two years. Some days are easier to ignore than others, but it is always with a heaviness in my spirit behind my smile. 

Depression is a deeply personal and tricky battleground to navigate. It manifests itself in different ways for different people, making it hard to recognize in friends and loved ones, especially those like myself that have figured out how to hide it in public. This is how it manifests for me:

I am forgetful. Now, I have never been known for having a sharp memory, but there are days when I struggle to remember anything that happened even the day before, my memories have huge blank patches and skipped spots where i must've turned myself on autopilot to be able to make in through the day and back to the safety and isolation of my apartment; my bed.

I feel blank. Numb. I'll smile, joke, and laugh easily enough, but it's all surface level. My good humor is like a layer of ice on top of the depths of my sadness and numbness. I still take pleasure in things, but the heights and depths of which i used to feel have been hugely diminished.

I am tired. Exhausted really. Mentally, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. It is a battle to get myself out of bed monday through friday to go to work. On the weekends I tend to just not get up unless it's absolutely necessary. Weeks go by when i should be doing things like cleaning, doing laundry, grocery shopping, enjoying my free time in a fantastic city, but i don't. If i don't have concrete plans i stay in my bed all day for two solid days, until i wake up on Monday morning and force myself to move for work. When i come home from work i am often too exhausted to put in any effort into existing, so little gets done; food goes uncooked in the fridge, dishes pile up, dust bunnies of cat hair start to appear in corners from lack of vacuuming.. but i can't bring myself to care. This is particularly shitty, because i have a roommate who often picks up the cleaning slack. The guilt just gets added to the pile of emotional baggage, but doesn't change anything.

I feel untethered, aimless, drifting without purpose life an abandoned helium balloon. There is no shining goal to my existence. I just keep waking up each day, without knowing why. I often wish I could take a break from existing.

I cry easily. Tears are never far from the surface, and often spill over at confusing, inconvenient, and embarrassing moments. The overwhelming sorrow mixes with the guilt and the shame to form this otherworldly cocktail of misery expressed though warm salt water on my cheeks. I try to contain it to my bed, when I'm alone.. it does not always work.

Over the last few months i have come to recognize and voice my anger with God, while simultaneously understanding the absurdity of my reasoning. I am angry with God for not being the very things i usually cite in defence of His character: God is not some sort of cosmic wish granting genie. God is not a puppet master pulling strings to make us act according to his will. God will not override our free will. I have used these very points in order to explain His relationship to humanity countless times as good things. Now I'm finding it frustrating that he is Not those very things, because if he was then my countless desperate, broken hearted, tear ridden cries wouldn't have been met by silence. He wouldn't leave me to wrestle with the yawning expanse of my loneliness.He would've brought the one i love back to me; he would've fixed it. Instead there is unbearable silence. Heavy, crushing emptiness.

So now it's Easter, the remembrance of the resurrection of Christ; The holiday that defines the faith that has defined me for most of my life, but I am not jubilant. I am split in two: One side is so overwhelmingly grateful and celebrates this day as the day my chosen deity completed the miraculous sacrifice and closed the gap between God and humanity by being resurrected from the dead. The other side of me is struggling. Drowning. Cannot see the light at the end of this tunnel, feels abandoned and aimless. I am reminded as i read through the crucifixion and resurrection passages in Matthew and Luke this morning of the love and compassion God has for me; that i have not been abandoned,that i do not walk through this darkness alone. I love God, down at the very core of my soul- He is truly my rock and my salvation, the reason for everything and the one place i know i could easily find rest and peace if i want it. But right now i am angry with God, stubbornly unwilling to give up the love i have for the one who left me. Unwilling to see that it could possibly have all been for my good when it feels like there's a gaping, jagged hole in my chest, painful with every breath.