Daily Life – Moving through every day with depression and anxiety

In previous posts I’ve written about my struggle with depression and anxiety as it relates to my emotions and relationships with others but what I have not talked about is how it affects me physically and mentally on a daily basis.

Most people know me as very organized, good at time management and usually on top of things.  I’ve always been that go to person when something needed to be done.

What they don’t see is the struggle with maintaining it especially when the depression is prevalent in my daily life.  It becomes overwhelming and my thoughts get scattered.  I become no longer organized and struggle with keeping up with just daily chores, exercise routines and eating habits.

I am currently in that downward swing and trying hard to focus & get it back together.  I’m not being very successful at it.

This has caused many arguments between me and my family.  They do not realize that as I struggle with the depression having things disorganized and cluttered only increases the anxiety.  It compounds everything in my thoughts causing frustration with not only them but myself as well.

When I feel this way, I sometimes can put full focus into putting things back into to order but sometimes I become overwhelmed, unfocused and lose motivation.  Once I get started though usually I’m okay.

When new things are occurring in my life, such as my new job right now, I have to put other things to the side so I can focus on the project at hand.  So my home becomes chaotic until everything starts to even out again.  I am rather obsessive about cleaning so it doesn’t stay messy for very long.

It took me a long time to realize that the chaos, clutter and messiness was a symptom of depression. I just always assumed people are messy and not everyone is organized or wants to be.

I also started to realize that my shopping habits and buying “things” that I did not need at yard sales, flea markets and second-hand stores was a part of the depression too. I was just filling up the house when in actuality I was trying to gain control over how I was feeling.  I stopped that habit of shopping at these places over a year ago.  I still buy things but decided that the object has to serve more than one purpose in order to purchase it otherwise it’s a no go.

Now with that being said, I have purchased items that are only specifically for me to accomplish some of my goals and as a creative outlet for the depressed moods.  I like to try to keep both my body and mind active.  It has helped tremendously with the depression.

I always thought I was just weird for liking to organize, categorize, color code and label everything.  After some of my counseling sessions I realized it was also a part of the depression and anxiety.  It is about being in control.

It was always a source of contention between myself and my ex-husband.  He was very laid back and could care less if things had a place or labels.  I was busy trying to run a household that supported 6 people under one roof so organization was only way to keep things moving.

Now it’s just about me and two teenagers so there is still arguments and disagreements but things are fairly organized.  I have made it a point to try to keep the common areas such as the living room, kitchen and dining area clean and kept up but left their rooms to their own volition.  There’s no point in trying to put some sort of standard in place for them to follow, they are after all, teenagers.

My room is off-limits if the door is closed.  It’s my own sanctuary where I go to try to relax or find peace.  Unfortunately, when things become chaotic my room becomes cluttered causing sleepless nights and is no longer a peaceful place to be.  It’s currently in a state of clutter and I need to make time to clean it up and put my clothes away but the motivation is not there.

I feel fine physically but mentally I am struggling with trying to decide what my next step should be.  I stepped back into the working world again but maintaining focus on it is tasking.  Today all I did was sleep and eat.  It’s now midnight and I am just now getting things done that needed to be started two days ago.

It’s still a few days away, after a 3 week break, until my next counseling session and so here I am writing everything out as a way of trying to keep the motivation up and letting out how I am feeling right now.

So depression and anxiety isn’t always that person who sleeps or cries all day.  I’ve been there too.  Sometimes it manifests itself into other things such as a messy home, messy car and sometimes a messy appearance.  That’s been me also.

To those who know someone who appears this way, take it easy on them, sometimes there is more there that meets the eye.  Ask them if they need a hand and understand if they say no.

We all need to look out for one another, have compassion and understanding because you never know what another a person is going through.

Thanks for stopping by and have a good week ahead.

Suzanne