Time, itself, is irrelevant when you
plunge into the abyss. Whether you are lost in it for one hour, one day, one
week, etcetera... it feels
like an eternity! Desperation sets in immediately as does fear, loathing,
panic, gloom, doom, and a host of other negative feelings! They're ALL
in there! It's horrible in that trap and it's hard… so hard to find the way
back out!
You crawl, you claw, you cry, you scream,
you tear at whatever you can feel and pray it will give you purchase to lift
yourself back out while those black, oozing vines curve around each part of
your body, holding on tighter and tighter, pulling you downward. It seems the
more you struggle the stronger those black tentacles become that have you in
their grip. You try to scream but the black ooze pours into your nose and
mouth, suffocating you! It rains down on you like a thunderstorm hell-bent on
destroying you! It's so all-consuming! You wonder, again and again, if you will
make it out this time or if you will just give up and allow yourself to be
pulled to the bottom.
There are so many of us that sit there on
the edge of the abyss. We want to move away from it. We want to go interact
with our friends (what friends we have left) and our families (yes, IF we have
family left too), but we just don't have the strength to move away from it. We
don't enjoy the view here and we certainly don't like falling off the edge and
having to fight our way back to it when that happens. The Eagles said it best in their
song of Hotel
California, "We are all just
prisoners here of our own device." No one has ever uttered truer
words.
Once you manage to claw your way back to
the edge and get seated once again you're too drained… too tired… to do
anything. All you want to do is sleep. This is your exit strategy from the abyss right now. You have
worked so hard climbing out of that pit of hell that to finish the job of
coming back, to be able to put your "smiling, I'm okay" mask back on
for everyone else's benefit, you need sleep.
Those around you still see you as
though you are in that depressive state of mind. They think you're still
so depressed that all you can do is sleep. Only you know the struggle you
just fought through. No one that has not been inside the abyss knows the real
story. Even when you try to explain it to them, they don't get it, they don't
fully understand it, they just can't imagine the reality of it because THEY
have never experienced it.
It's like a military veteran trying to explain war
to those who weren't there like he or she was. We can't imagine being in the
throes of gunfire, grenades exploding all around us, smelling death in the air… I know I can't fully imagine it because I've never had to live it. Thank
God for all the troops who face that kind of thing in order to protect our
freedom! I am so grateful for that!
I'm holding on to the edge again. I've
clawed back up this far. When I can find the strength I'll pull myself back
onto the edge and sit there awhile. I'm just so tired from the struggle right
now.
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