Coming Off The Ledge

I had a few very bad days of being super-depressed. When I get like that and nothing else can bring me around, I go off the grid; close myself up away from everyone and everything so that I can do my praying and thinking in peace. I also try to find reasons to deal better with everything.

The other day - about Day 5 into my time in the abyss - I was re-reading a book about the band INXS. I just loved  this group back in the day. The singer, Michael Hutchence committed suicide (or at least, gave in to sadness) at such a young age, 37. Like a lot of people, I was surprised and had to ask the usual "Why?"

A good way to revive yourself out of a funk - or at least talk yourself off the ledge - is to think of someone who didn't make it out. You think of how much they must be missed by the people who loved them, and all the wonderful things they did not live to see. You think, or I did in the case of Hutchence, of  how the talent they shared with us is the only thing left. I still use the lyrics that Hutch and Andrew Farris put out there for us. And Hutch isn't the only sweet soul who didn't make it; he's just a famous face of so many people's pain. They just didn't make it out of a very bad, and probably very temporary, place. As Bono put it about Hutchence: he was just stuck in a moment.

Now, know one thing about me: I get stuck in moments, but I've always made it out. I have a secret weapon in the war on depression. I have a deep faith in Jesus. If I didn't, I'd have not made it through things that came years before this bad time. Trust that.

Jesus promised, "I will not leave you as orphans, I will come to you." (John 14:18)

Some people don't have faith in anything. Some people just teeter alone into the bad places that depression can take any of us. If you are depressed, please find a positive way to deal with it. Call someone, hold on tight to someone, pray - just don't give in to it.

Anyway, my bad moment has passed. I celebrated last night by listening to some of  my favorite INXS songs. My "favorites" in anything change with my mood. Right now, this is my favorite:

R.I.P. Hutch

Peace

--Free

P.S.: If you don't understand faith, I don't either; I just have it. This is a story of a woman who seems to have & understand it.

U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline:

1-800-273-8255

Save.org

Suicide Awareness Voices of Education

**Wikipedia has list or resources for those of you who live outside the USA**