Just in case someone trips across this place, don’t say I didn’t warn you…

I’m down today, so anything I write at this point is probably best left alone, but I’m paying for this domain, which makes it “my party, so I’ll cry if I want to.” Right? Whatever…

So, I’m down today, and the obvious first question is “Why?”

Maybe I’m tired
Definition of a good night’s sleep:
(1) Fall asleep, more or less comfortably, in less than an hour after getting into bed.
(2) Sleep a minimum of 6 hours without being awakened by physical pain, external noises, in-house noises, or dreams of the frightening and/or strange type.

By those parameters, simple as they are, I haven’t had a good night’s sleep for weeks…maybe months…although I’m pretty sure it must have happened at least once in the last year or so. That makes “I need sleep” a pretty reasonable excuse for the downness of me, I suppose.

Maybe it’s my job
Even in the best of times, work can be tough–these are not the best of times, though.
Today I am (more or less) starting on a “new” schedule which starts me off with a closing shift and works up the clock until I get to my weekend, which will be Sundays and Mondays unless I ask for a different day off (infrequent), or I switch shifts with someone else who wants the day off (slightly more likely), or I volunteer to work somewhere in order to increase my hours on the next paycheck (fairly likely), or my manager goofs up or flakes out (very likely).

Adapting to a new weekly routine is stressful. Even harder is not really knowing if you actually have a routine. In addition to the manager-induced uncertainty, the company is closing my store sometime in the next 2-9 months, but we don’t know when; we also don’t know which stores we will be transferred to or what it will be like at the new destination when we get there or even if we will be transferred or “offered a generous severance package.” It’s a good guess that work issues are at least contributing to my downness.

Maybe it’s a health thing.
I’ve got a double row of prescriptions on one of my medicine cabinet shelves, and not a single one is for anything “fun,” unless you count the budeprion (generic Wellbutrin), which I certainly don’t. Most of the pills are about getting older after not really taking great care of myself for a few decades.

There’s also the pain, for which I have no prescriptions. Why not? I have no idea, but I think a change of doctor will be required to do something about it. In the meantime, I wake up feeling like I’ve fallen down a flight of cement stairs. (Yes, I do have first-hand knowledge of how that feels.) I spend my day battling constantly increasing discomforts (ranging from dull ache to piercing sharpness) in assorted places; sometimes the pains make me clumsy enough to pick up some very nasty bruises, as well as scrapes and cuts and burns, which of course feeds into the increasing pain. Sometimes the pain is so bad that nighttime finds me trying to fall asleep in spite of it; on those nights, I’m lucky if I get to a half-sleep stage for a couple of hours. When the new days begins, I get out of bed feeling like I’ve fallen down a flight of cement stairs…

The down factor for aging, pills, and pain is huge.

And then there’s the big one — Money.
More precisely, it’s the lack of money, and it’s big because just fixing this one would not only delete it from the stress list but would enable me to address all the others more aggressively and more effectively. I’ve never been in a position of having too much money, so I can’t honestly say if having that much would be good or not so good, but I’m constantly aware of the impact of not having enough.

Definition of enough money:
(1) Can pay usual monthly living expenses without having to incur huge late fees, without picking up overdraft fees, and without needing a payday loan (which means the next paycheck won’t cover things, so you need another payday loan…). Can do this without giving up gas for car, necessary prescriptions, routine doctor visits, or food.
(2) Can regularly pay on indebtedness enough of the total due as to not make the creditors call and nag at you, or turn your account over to a collection agency, or have someone threatening to garnish your paycheck.
(3) Can manage things like routine car maintenance or replacing worn out work clothes.
(4) Can manage unexpected expenses like a flat tire or sudden illness.
(5) Can have some fun once in a while. Like go out for a meal that isn’t on a dollar menu. Like take a drive just to look at the scenery. Like go to a play put on by the local small theater group. Like take grandchild shopping for a small toy “just because” and stop for ice cream cones on the way home.

In a good month I can manage (1) and a tiny bit of (2), but there haven’t been any good months for a very long time. That means (3) requires juggling things around and usually has to be put off way too long. Which means (4) is more likely to happen and it’s a given that (4) will completely screw up (1), (2), and (3). Just thinking about (5) makes me tear up…

With enough money I could buy a really good mattress topper and maybe I could wake up feeling rested, not crushed.
With enough money, the uncertainties at work would be annoyances, not overwhelming restrictions or potential disasters.
With enough money I could find a doctor to address the pain issues and take the actions needed to improve my general health.
With enough money I could look forward to my rapidly approaching “golden years” knowing that part-time work may never stop being necessary, but full-time on-my-feet work will have an end.

Money can’t turn a good life into a amazing life. Money can’t make an empty heart feel full. Money isn’t a fountain of youth or a magical, all-purpose treatment for every ill thing in life. But it isn’t true that money can’t buy happiness. When you don’t have things you truly need, when surviving is a constant struggle, money can dissolve an awful lot of obstacles and leave you with enough strength to try and rise further.

I’m down today, and I don’t feel like trying, but there’s not a lot of choice for me. I have to do what I have to do even if I don’t want to do it and can’t do it without making some part of life worse, not better.

Have you ever considered the idea that sometimes depression is not a disease or a defect, but a reasonable response to an ongoing set of circumstances? Would I need antidepressants just to continue struggling if the struggles were not so hopelessly endless?