Mindy Newell: Depression Really Sucks
“…Depression… is a storm indeed, but a storm of murk… slowed-down responses, near paralysis, psychic energy throttled back close to zero…the body…feels sapped, drained.” Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness, William Styron
Sorry for the skip last week, everyone, but I wasn’t up to it – I was down. As in my depression said “Hello, again!” last weekend. No, I didn’t lie in bed for 48 hours, I’ve never given in to that, even back in the day before I was properly diagnosed with this goddamn thing. So on Saturday, though I could feel it banging on the door of my psyche’s house, I did get dressed and made the usual weekend runs to the supermarket and to the laundromat…but by Sunday Elvis was in the house, and even though I got up and put on my workout gear, I blew off my free personal training session that my gym offers to all members for their birthday, decided that I didn’t want to expose my grandson to his fucked-up grandma Mindy, and so just sat around in my workout gear, surfing the web and eating waaaaay too many potato chips. And I kept watching the clock tick away the hours thinking that I had to write my column, but I just couldn’t get the energy up and finally I let Editor Mike know I was sick, though I didn’t specify with what in my e-mail to him.
See, the thing about depression is that it drains the battery and warps the mirror. When it hits me I feel old and ugly and fat and powerless and oh! so! damn! alone! and my thoughts are all about the mistakes I’ve made and the lover(s) I’ve lost and the roads not taken and the…well, it gets pretty nasty and self-destructive, folks. And, for me, at least, it’s embarrassing, because…well, you know that old saw about how when animals are sick they hide away from the herd or crawl under the bed? I don’t know if it’s entirely true, but I always think that if it is, it’s because the animals feel shamed. And I get that, I really do, because, even though I know it’s completely illogical, I feel ashamed and embarrassed.
Which is why, I think, I try to be so open about my depression. It’s my way of fighting it. It makes me so! God-damned! angry! that I have had to deal with this shit for 25 years… anyway, it’s another old saw about how shadows disappear in the light, and I just wanted to let you guys know where I was last weekend.
But that was last weekend. It passed, as all things do….
Everybody stand up and cheer that our friend and fellow columnist John Ostrander came through his cabbage with flying colors! Yeah!!! And yes, we medical folk really do pronounce the acronym CABG that way. I do owe you an apology, though, John. I forgot to let you know about the shave job. Just be glad it wasn’t a body wax!
I’ve been binging on Star Trek: Voyager this week. Totally forgot how absolutely marvelous Kate Mulgrew (currently playing “den mother” Galina “Red” Reznikov on Netflix’s Orange Is The New Black) was as Captain Katherine Janeway. The lady had a lot hanging on her performance as the first woman to head a Star Trek series, though technically she wasn’t the first woman we saw command a starship – I believe that honor goes to Tricia O’Neill as Captain Rachel Garret of the U.S.S. Enterprise-C in “Yesterday’s Enterprise,” which aired on Star Trek: The Next Generation in 1990. But it’s clear in her execution that Ms. Mulgrew embraced and cherished the opportunity and the role.
All the actors were superb, but one thing I’ve always questioned is why Voyager creators Rick Berman, Michael Piller, and Jeri Taylor chose not to have Robert Duncan McNeill replay his “fallen Starfleet cadet” Nicholas Locarno in TNG’s 1992 episode “The First Duty,” instead of “bad boy” Tom Paris. It may have been just synchronicity that McNeill read for the part and won it; it may also have been that it would have been very expensive to resurrect the Locarno character, as the writers of “First Duty” would have had to receive royalties every time Locarno appeared on the screen, which would have been every episode of Voyager.
Can’t say I’m happy about the results of the midterm elections last week. I don’t understand why the Democratic candidates ran away from President Obama. Hello, Allison Grimes, did you not learn your lesson when Al Gore distanced himself from Bill Clinton? Jesus, woman, you were a delegate for Obama at the Democratic convention! Who the hell did you think you were fooling? I don’t understand any woman who votes the Republican ticket. No one’s forcing anyone to have an abortion, lady. And what business is it of yours, anyway, if another woman chooses to do so? I don’t understand why someone who is against the minimum wage, denies global warming and climate change and wants to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency (created by Republican President Richard Nixon, by the way), gets into office. Oh, I know. She can slaughter hogs.
SPOILER ALERT! STOP HERE IF YOU MISSED THE DOCTOR WHO FINALE! “Bowties are cool.” But Osgood is dead. Or is she?
Danny Pink is dead. Worse, he’s a Cyberman. Or is he?
The coordinates for Gallifrey are wrong, a lie told to the Doctor by the Master – uh, the Mistress. Or are they?
Clara and the Doctor have ended their relationship – or did they?
Is that really Santa Claus?
Ho! Ho! Ho!
Hey, at least I’m not depressed anymore.
I’m glad you’re feeling better. I have some experience with depression, so I empathize with what you went through.
As for the rest of your topics (In no particular order):
She’s still The Master. If actor now refers to both sexes, The Master can too.
I agree wholeheartedly with you on the midterms.
For the Nicholas Locarno/Tom Paris conundrum, I made up a backstory that resolves it: Starfleet Academy let Tom Paris enroll under the Locarno name, so he could be his own person and not Admiral Paris’ son. If you make that adjustment to the character’s backstory; the events of First Duty align with Tom Paris’ background, as given in Caretaker.
Hmm, that’s an interesting idea, Doug. And considering Tom’s ambivalence about his relationship with his father, it makes sense!
Been there, bought the god-damn t-shirts.
What t-shirts, Mike?
“I don’t understand any woman who votes the Republican ticket. No one’s forcing anyone to have an abortion, lady. And what business is it of yours, anyway, if another woman chooses to do so?”
This is a question that has an obvious answer for anyone who knows that life begins at conception. It is why my wife, and a lot of other women I know, votes Republican. You may as well ask what business was Kitty Genovese’screams to her neighbors.
No, for anyone who thinks life begins at conception.
If it couldn’t survive on its own, it ain’t “alive”.
The only “evidence” you could possibly cite for your counterfactual belief is “God told me so”. (Whatever you dress it up as, that’s what it will be at root.)
Stop trying to force your religion down my throat.
That’s cool, George, really. I don’t think anyone’s denying that life begins at conception; well, maybe the far-lefties.
But I’m just talking about choice here. There are situations in which bringing a baby into the world is detrimental to the child and/or the woman and her family and loved ones. I’m not just talking about cases of incest and/or rape and/or birth defects. And I don’t know ANY woman who has ever said: “Tra-la-la, I’m going to have an abortion today.” Every women I’ve assisted with during “TOP’s” (Termination of Pregnancy) are very upset and need A LOT of TLC==some are quiet and stoic, some are openly crying, but ALL come to the decision to terminate a pregnancy because of various reasons, and as a nurse, I believe it is my duty to support them in a difficult time and situation.
Abortion has been going forEVER, George. If Roe vs. Wade is overturned (and I know that the judicial decision does stand on shaky legal reasoning), women will continue to have abortions, only they (especially the lower-income population) will be forced to once more retreat to UNSAFE and MEDICALLY UNSOUND procedures (i.e., the “backstreet, on a dirty kitchen table, using dirty instruments or wire hangars”) that will result in thousands of women’s unnecessary deaths.
It’s about the separation of church and state guaranteed in our Constitution.
It’s about a private matter that is between the woman and her God.
It’s a matter of CHOICE.
P.S.: I would like to see the legality of abortion changed from 24 weeks down to 10 weeks. Preferably, for me, at least, I think the cut-off should be 7 weeks, because by the time 8 weeks has passed the baby is fully formed, but sometimes women don’t realize they’re pregnant that early. When Roe vs. Wade was passed, it was impossible to keep a fetus/child alive outside the womb at 24 weeks. It’s not easy now, but it is possible with the advances in neonatology and NICU’s.
P.S.S.: Most late-term abortions are because of medical problems.
I deny that life – well, human life – begins at conception, as i said above.
Until the developing embryo could – with proper medical care and assistance – exist outside the womb, it’s not life.
In some* cases, it’s a malignant growth that threatens the woman’s life.
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* Many (? haven’t got actual stats) – Like that woman who died because the Catholic hospital would not permit the emergency procedure that MIGHT have saved her life – at the cost of the fetus/baby.
A year-old, month-old, day-old baby can’t survive on its own. A patient on a respirator or other form of life-support can’t survive on their own. Are they not alive?
“The only “evidence” you could possibly cite for your counterfactual belief is ‘God told me so’. (Whatever you dress it up as, that’s what it will be at root.)”
You’re wrong. My belief in God has nothing to do with being Pro-Life and it is not why I am Pro-Life. There are Pro-Life atheists.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/03/11/yes-there-are-pro-life-atheists-out-there-heres-why-im-one-of-them/
“Atheist and civil libertarian journalist Nat Hentoff said that ‘Being without theology isn’t the slightest hindrance to being pro-life.’ Atheist philosophy professor Don Marquis declared abortion is ‘immoral’ because it denies developing fetuses “a future like ours.”
Surely you don’t insist morality is based on religion.
Again I say, this country is based on the, among other things, THE SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE.
That includes aetheists and agnostics.
Okay – if it can’t (due to stage of development, as opposed to fetal damage or malformation) survive without proper and appropriate medical support and treatment, it ain’t alive.
I don’t deny that there are atheist anti-abortion True Believers.
I do, however, say that, without actual information, that they are almost certainly only a small fraction. The great majority of anti-abortion sentiment and agitation comes from religion – particularly the extremely patriarchial and misogynistic (not necessarily both at once, but more often than not) groups within it.
Can’t remember who said it, but
Arrgh!
Editing on the fly can make you leave out words.
That still may not be perfect, but i think it’s a touch clearer
Still not perfect but closer…
Atheists are usually offended when you attempt to couch their non-belief as a belief. Besides the separation of church and state has nothing to do with the determination of when life begins.
George and Mike,
Yesterday I wrote a lengthy reply to both of you, but now it’s gone! So my reply about the separation of church and state and aetheists and agnostics naturally doesn’t make any sense.
I’m going to write “the boss” (Glenn) and ask him what the heck happened to my reply.
Separation of church and state has nothing to do with when life begins, indeed – but it has EVERYTHING to do with believers trying to use the government to force their beliefs on others.
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I absolutely agree with you that atheists are as much True Believers as Christians or Islamic terrorists. Just as Christians or religious Jews, they believe based on no objectively-verifiable evidence.
WHich is why i’m an agnostic trending toward skepticism.
Mindy,
I must admit your reply, (that just appeared somewhat recently), surprises me, in a good way.
Yes, I realize abortion has been going on forever. So have a lot of bad things but at least we don’t sanction them and give them the imprimatur of legality. If Roe v Wade were overturned it isn’t absolutely necessary that women would have to resort to back alley abortions. I would hope the legislation that repeals Roe would include medical care and adoption services for the mothers and babies.
And while I am sure most women do not blithely intend to get abortions instead of using responsible contraception, those who do, do exist and society should not enable them.
That is just so full of wrong that a reply is not possible, since it would be to treat it as actual reasonable and reasoned discourse.
“That is just so full of wrong that a reply is not possible, since it would be to treat it as actual reasonable and reasoned discourse.”
Too bad. I believe it is reasonable discourse.
And the old adage: “If men got pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament.” is proved false because most Pro-Life people are women and they can get pregnant.
“I deny that life – well, human life – begins at conception, as i said above.”
Interesting disclaimer there. You’re saying other life begins at conception but not human life? I can only assume that is because that would be… inconvenient which is really not a justifiable reason.