I'm Back. Hopefully it sticks this time.

Obviously, I should have written goal #40 a little more specifically, as in "Start a blog and update it consistently."  I got a talking to from my little brother earlier this week while on a family camping trip (Hi, Matt!), so anyone who is still optimistic enough to be checking for updates has him to think.  He said some very flattering things about the blog, and then castigated me for neglecting it for so long.  And he's right, at least about my utter neglect of the blog.  And it's not that I don't think about writing blog entries.  In fact, I'm frequently composing them in my head.  It's just that, at the end of the day, I can't bring myself to do it.

I think I can attribute some of my inactivity to a brief upsurge in depressive symptoms.  Which is something that I have been having all kinds of internal debate about whether or not to post to my blog.  Most of the people who are the very closest to me know that I've struggled with depression for most of my life.  But this isn't something I've previously shared with the rest of the world.  There are a lot of complicated reasons why that is the case, but the biggest reason is the stigma that is still attached to admitting that you have something as terrible and shameful as depression.  As a mental health professional, I recognize the inanity of bowing to that stigma in my own personal life, but the fact remains.  And as a mental health professional whose co-workers occasionally read my blog, I've been a little worried about putting it out there on the internet.  But there it is.  I have depression.  To be more specific, Major Depressive Disorder, Recurrent. 

The last year has actually been pretty good.  I've worked really hard to find the right combination of medications and activities to help me keep things under control.  I've had a lot of help and support in finding the right tools and doing the work I need to do.  But, unfortunately, that doesn't mean that I'm not subject to the occasional relapse in symptoms.   And, oddly enough, when I start feeling bad, I stop doing a lot of the things that bring me satisfaction.  Apparently blogging is among those things that goes when I'm feeling worse.  But along with trying to get a couple of miles of walking in at least three or four times a week, I'm trying to get back in the saddle of working on the blog.