Recently on the blog comments I was treated to a little lecture about how harmful it is to wallow in misery. It struck me that this would be a good topic to explore. It's not an unusual thing to hear if you're a depressed person dealing with people who apparently have decent mental health. Of course the primary function of this is often to make the depressed person shut up so that they do not make the comfortable person uncomfortable. Or perhaps it's about not requiring the person who is in denial to think too much.
It is essential to be able to talk about how you are feeling in whatever ways makes sense to you. Anyone who denies you that space is someone to avoid - they may have their own issues, and sometimes stepping away from each other is the best choice. Working through your feelings is essential for getting on top of them, locking it away will only make it worse.
There are a lot of productive ways of expressing emotions. Pouring it into music, art or poetry can be a really good ideas, as can venting it through physical expression. I've found dance exceedingly helpful for processing things I couldn't think my way out of. Difficult emotions can take time and effort to process - significant injuries, traumas, profound losses - we don't automatically integrate these things or know what to do with them. Coming to terms with anything of this ilk takes time and most of us do better when we can engage consciously with those feelings.
Accusations of wallowing, or loving your own misery or simply making a fuss for attention is one that most depressed people are familiar with. It adds to the burden of distress. Having it thrust at you as an attempt at help, or for your own good just adds to the unpleasantness. So let me be clear that this is never about the good of a person who is suffering. Needing to spend time with difficult things you are feeling is not a moral failing or some kind of character flaw. It's doing the necessary work that moves you, inch by inch, towards healing.
When we are accepting of each other's emotions, we lend support to that healing process. When we listen, show care, and make space for whatever anyone else is struggling with, we help each other. I'm constantly grateful to the people in my life who share their own experiences - l learn from all of that, and I know that in turn what I share of my own journey is at least occasionally useful to others.
I'm not sure what to do with people who respond to distress with unpleasantness. While I'm deeply invested in the idea of community resilience and mutual support, I think we're all entitled to have and hold boundaries. There's a very strong likelihood that the people who want to shut down others for expressing distress are speaking from places of having their own hurt, and unmet need. Perhaps they find some comfort or sense of self worth in hurting people who dare to express hurt. I don't know and thinking about it taxes the limits of my empathy, I'm finding.
The question of how best, as communities, to take care of the people who have little or no ability to participate well in community is something that impacts on all of us. How do we respond to people who come intent on causing hurt? Even if we're confident they do so from a place of distress? I don't have any decent answers to this right now, and I think I'll need to be better resourced in myself before I can explore this in any significant way.
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