A hellhole.

That's about the best way I can describe depression. At least for me.

I realize everyone's depression is different. Everyone experiences it differently, processes it differently, deals with it differently, describes it differently. But for me, it's a hole chuck full of hell.

Because when depression roars its ugly head it consists of demons, fears, insecurities, the stuff of nightmares. My depression isn't a vague gloom. It isn't a cloud over my head or a dimmed light in my life. My depression is a ferocious dragon, and it takes everything good from my sight replacing them with horrors.

But that makes sense. My depression fits my personality. I am fiery. I am aggressive and intense and decisive and deep and fast. So my depression follows suit. I remember when I first decided to acknowledge that it might be depression. I was sitting on the couch with a sister of mine and I mentioned that I think maybe it was time to call what I was in, depression.

Sidenote. All of my sisters have experienced depression on and off in their lives. For a long time I considered myself *lucky* because I didn't have depression. I thought I was the one who was strong enough to not get it. First of all, presumptuous. Second of all, nice try. Third of all, rude. 

Back to the narrative. My sister told me that perhaps it was the lot of Yorgason women to deal with depression for whatever reason. "But", she said, "I think yours will be like you. Quick and deep."

And oh that's what it is. While my bouts of depression rarely lost long (the longest being a few months, the shortest being a few days) they. Are. Deep.

When I am in these places, there is seemingly no way to get out of them. There is no ladder in the hole of hell. There are no guiding lights. There is no hope. Everything is terrible and overwhelming and incomprehensible. It's at these points that you simply don't want to exist anymore. Dying sounds a relief. Because the emotions are too big for your little body. The pain is too deep to fathom and assuredly too deep to heal. The trials loom so large that your eyes can't see the tops or bottoms, the heads or tails.

But.

There are heads and tails. There are tops and bottoms. There are lights and ladders and hope and life. Sometimes you just don't to see them. Sometimes you don't want to see them. Isn't that remarkable?

When I am in the depths of despair and someone throws me a helpline, first I just sneer at it and think "it can't be that simple". And if I don't think it can be, then I'm right. Because if you think that helpline won't get you out, it probably won't. You won't touch it. You may consider it with a smirk or an outright frown. You might give it a tug. But if you don't trust it, you'll never put your full weight on it so you'll never get out. And sometimes, I think, that's okay.

Because I've realized that it is important to experience those emotions. As terrible as they are, feeling those deeply painful emotions must happen in order for the healing to begin. Acknowledging them, validating them, and knowing them must happen before they can be resolved. You've got to be in that hellhole and understand it before you can fathom escaping it. In fact, for whatever reason, before you even want to escape it. Because in the hellhole, cynicism reigns. And all of those silly, optimistic solutions are watery and convoluted. So before you believe those solutions could even possibly be real, you have to take a good long hard look at the hellhole to realize its faults. You have to see how hard the hellhole is lying. And oh man, it's lying big time.

Once you see the lies of the hellhole, you know there must be something else. But going down would only reveal more lies, deeper and darker lies that are so profoundly twisted from the truth they should never be faced. Lies that would not only be rejected outright in a normal frame of mind, but would likely be met with confusion, surprise, and horrific shock. And once you recognize the lies around you, you don't want more lies you want something else. So there's nowhere to go but up. To see what else there is. And that helpline is the only thing leading up. So logically, the sneer becomes a contemplative glance. A tug becomes prolonged. And little by little, you put your full weight on that helpline.

Of course once you get out of the hellhole, it doesn't always mean you're out to stay. But maybe you won't sneer at the helpline so long this time. Maybe the trust will come quicker.

Because living in a hellhole is a hell of a way to live.