"In the depth of winter, I finally learned that within me there lay an invincible summer." — Albert Camus
"Sometime in your life you will go on a journey. It will be the longest journey you have ever taken. It is the journey to find yourself." — Katherine Sharp
"Your diamonds are not in far distant mountains or in yonder seas; they are in your own backyard, if you but dig for them." — Russell H. Conwell
On Michael Jackson's album, HIStory, he did a remake of Charlie Chaplin's song "Smile." I think it's absolutely beautiful and when I was depressed as a teenager, I would listen to this song, hoping it would give me strength. I smiled for as long as the song was on. When it was over, I was empty again.
Thank you, Mike, for making me smile many times in my life. "I will never let you part, for you are always in my heart."
My childhood pop star has died. I am grieving for his family. May God have mercy on his soul.
"We cannot go back and make a new start, but we can start now to make a new ending." — Author Unknown
"To the world you might be one person, but to one person you might be the world." — Casey
"One of the most valuable things we can do to heal one another is listen to each other's stories." — Rebecca Falls
"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." — Martin Luther King, Jr.
I’ve been doing some thinking lately about this blog, mainly since I haven’t been blogging. If you’ve emailed me, I haven’t answered because I haven’t logged in to the email associated with this account. Therefore I have come to the conclusion that it may be best to terminate this blog.
You can continue breathing. I will not hit the delete button tomorrow. Or the day after even. I have—what I consider to be—a wealth of information stored in this blog and I hope to export the posts I have and import them into another site. It’ll be an extremely long and arduous process, especially since I will need to update all internal links. Despite the immense amount of time I’ll be putting into doing this, moving this blog to a free blog host will save myself $12 a month. Twelve dollars is a lot to spend for only regularly publishing Quote of the Week and not having a paying job right now.
I have also dropped off the face of the blogosphere. I have not been able to keep up with many of you—as interesting as you all are!—and this has led me into feeling guilty and also kept me away from blogging.
I recently finished reading a book called The Emotionally Healthy Church by Peter Scazzero for the women’s Bible study I attend on Wednesday mornings. He outlines six principles for an emotionally healthy church but I believe those principles can be applied to being an emotionally health person as well. The principle that spoke to me most was Principle 4: Receive the Gift of Limits.
Within Principle 4, Scazzero discusses “Learning to Discern My Limitations.” He expands on the following points:
I’ve evaluated these points in my life and am learning to discern my limitations. The season of life and life situation I had when I began this blog is much different than what it is today. I had less responsibilities, struggled significantly more with depression and suicidal thoughts, and had more time on my hands to blog and research. (And Facebook didn’t seem so appealing back then!)
Your season of life is also a God-given limit. Ecclesiastes teaches us there is a time or season for everything under heaven: There is “a time to plant and a time to uproot … a time to weep and a time to laugh … a time to be silent and a time to speak” (Eccl. 3:1–8).
I planted this blog back in July 2006 and boy did I ever speak. Now, I am silent and it is time for me to uproot. This blog has served its purpose and I would like to relocate it somewhere where it can continue to serve as a resource for people. I know I have many links throughout the web that will become inactive and broken. I will lose readership. I will need to rebuild a blog presence should I choose to continue writing about mental health issues. I have not lost my interest in writing about the subject; my season of life and life situation currently limit it. I must devote my precious time and energy to my novel now. And my personality—that guilty feeling that haunts me for not blogging and reading others’ blogs like I used to—cannot handle it right now. I am learning to discern my limitations. I have reached my limit with this blog.
My original intent for Depression Introspection was to write about issues regarding the mental health world with a Christian viewpoint: news, relevant information, anecdotes, commentary. I have a definitive answer to the tagline of this blog: I am NOT my diagnosis. I am done being introspective about my depression; I plan to move forward. Depression Introspection as it is now will one day be no more.
I hope to blog again in the future. However, the topics I want to tackle do not fit this readership. If you’ve been a loyal reader of this blog for the past couple of years, thank you so much for your support.
I will also delete the email associated with this account once I have completed the process of relocating this blog. Suicidal.recovery will be no more. I do not check it regularly and do not want the added burden of checking a separate email account. If someone wants to contact me, they will need to comment on the new blog and I will respond from an unpublicized email. I am setting my limits.
Marissa Miller will also be dying along with this blog. I am tired of pretending to be someone I’m not, and quite frankly, I’ve gotten to the point where I no longer care if people know who I am. I’m not a celebrity and never will be (unless I make it to that unattainable New York Times Bestseller List goal). So when this post publishes to my Facebook account, I’m not deleting it. I struggle with bouts of depression and have had multiple suicide attempts in the past. If that scares you or you now think less of me, you never cared about me to begin with anyway.
As for my Lamictal withdrawal, I’m still in the process. I’m on my second day of being on 50 mg and looking forward to the day when I am no longer attached to this drug and don’t fear the risk of seizures or Stevens-Johnsons Syndrome. The absence of constant fatigue will also be quite nice. The fatigue has probably been the most consistent and annoying side effect of the drug. 100 mg gave me insomnia and the 75 mg replaced that with dizzy spells. It’s sad when I have to start thanking God for changing side effects. The goal is to be completely off of Lamictal by August/September but so far, things have been going extremely well with the exception of a few minor blips here and there. If any unfortunate side effects crop up between now and August, I will lengthen the withdrawal process. The goal is not to get off of the drug quickly; it’s to withdraw safely however long that takes. I’m not so scared right now but going three days without Lamictal in my body sure will worry me.
This post has been kind of a non-event. You may continue to email me if you choose but the lack of a response means I haven’t read your email yet. I will response when I can. I can barely keep up with my personal email; suicidal.recovery has lately been the least of my worries.
I think that’s it for now. Comments welcome and appreciated below.
"Become a possibilitarian. No matter how dark things seem to be or actually are, raise your sights and see possibilities -- always see them, for they're always there." — Norman Vincent Peale
"Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced." — James Baldwin
"Our greatest glory consists not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall." — Confucius
One of my many paternal aunts, who lived in Montréal, Canada, died in early April. I wasn't extremely close to her but she would call to check in with me and send me birthday cards. I'd also see her in New York during the holidays at family gatherings.
She was one of my aunts who suffered from schizophrenia/paranoia but improved with medication.
I always felt a little weird calling her because I never knew what to say. I didn't know much about her other than the fact that she traveled a lot. Her speech and her English were tough to understand at times but she had remarkably improved both over the years.
A few minutes ago, I was cleaning out one of my document bins and came across a list of questions I wrote down to ask her so I could steer conversation next time I talked to her. Her phone number was prominently scrawled at the bottom.
So I dialed it. The phone rang and rang and rang. Hope fluttered in my heart, waiting to hear her voice, mixed with anticipation that someone totally different would answer it.
An automated operator broke in to tell me in French that the number was disconnected and out of service. If I needed assistance, press "0" for help.
I hung up. She really is gone.
"The truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it." — General Schwarzkopf