A sunny Saturday morning, I’ve been feeling worthless… I cannot really put into words how I feel – crappy? It’s like something hurts inside, not physically, something you cannot grasp.
I read I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteobbokki last year, written in such detail about the author’s conversations/therapy with her psychiatrist. Some parts are still clear in my mind and resonate with my feelings, the writhing emotions which threatened to tear me apart…
“I wonder about others like me, who seem totally fine on the outside but are rotting on the inside, where the rot is this vague state of being not-fine and not-devastated at the same time.”
– Baek Se-Hee, I Want to Die but I Want to Eat Tteobbokki
There are times when I just want to sit alone, doing nothing, staring blankly at something. The things I used to enjoy doing, they don’t excite me anymore… Now, I’m really depressed. Nothing interests me at all… Everything appears like a chore I must do in order to get through the day.
Anhedonia, that’s what I’ve learned in my short course in Psychology. No medical terms matter to me today.
As a Christian, I cited examples in the bible. And yes even prophet Elijah battled depression.
Elijah himself traveled a day’s journey into the wilderness, and he came and sat down under a juniper tree and asked [God] that he might die. He said, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take my life, for I am no better than my fathers.”
– 1 Kings 19:4-7
It feels reassuring I guess, that many great people fell into depression… Elijah’s suffering was an accumulation of fatigue and exhaustion. It’s a slap to my self-doubt, that I’m not religious enough to feel this low. It just happens to anyone.
“Looking deep within myself is always difficult. Especially when I’m in the throes of negative emotion. How shall I describe it? It’s like I know everything is fine, but I can’t stop myself from endlessly checking to make sure it really is fine, and in the process I make myself miserable. Today was like that. I just felt like whining. And leaning on someone, and being sad. To me, sadness is the path of least resistance, the most familiar and close-at-hand emotion I have. A habit that has encrusted itself onto my everyday.”
– Baek Se-Hee
So when Elijah was depressed, God sent His angel to touch him. Delivering a message of hope and the angel gave him nourishment to his tired body. (1 Kings 1:6-7)
Closing this post, I’d like to end this by saying that there is hope. There are things even minute things that can help us, like taking a shower, writing a journal, scribbling, painting… There’s something that can give you relief. I know from experience, it is hard. But there is hope…
hugs ❤
when I’m afraid, I put my trust in You.
– Psalm 56:3
casting all your cares [all your anxieties, all your worries, and all your concerns, once and for all] on Him, for He cares about you [with deepest affection, and watches over you very carefully].
1 Peter 5:7
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