During my depression I made a lot of mistakes. It was not so much with the things I did, but with what I failed to do. In a way, dealing with the medical problems was easier. I had little control over the problems that I was confronted with medically, but the other problems I had created by my failure to do what was necessary.
Since 2002 I had been running my own business. With that comes certain responsibilities. Responsibilities that I had to fulfil. To run a successful business you have to work hard and be proactive. To run a business there is a bare minimum that you have to do. I was doing less than that.
It could have been viewed as me being greedy or selfish. The truth was that in reality nobody was hurting more than me. If you told me in 2002 that I would be in this situation, I would have laughed at you. But in that moment where work had to be done and decisions had to be made, I would pick up the edge of the carpet, shovel everything under there, walk outside and bury my head in the sand. For five minutes I would feel better. Inside my head my problems would disappear, but hen they returned they would be worse and harder to deal with.
It was not a good space to be in. I felt tremendous amounts of anxiety and guilt, and I had felt like I had let a lot of people down. But it came time to deal with it all. I realised at the time that I could not deal with my medical problems and run a business. My medical problems weren't going to step aside, so I had to take a leave of absence from my business.
I order to do that I had to let a couple of people in on the problems I had created. This was extremely hard. I was embarrassed and guilty and the people I confided in were really great. I couldn't have blamed them if slowly but surely they left, but they didn't. Instead they helped me deal with it. I was really surprised, but also extremely grateful.
As it stands now, I have a very solid business. The problems I faced although tough have been dealt with, and although I am still not involved with the business on an operational level, I am still very proud. I started it, I created it, I moulded it into the company it is today, and although it was others who took it that final step, I set the foundation. I am also no longer guilty about where we are positioned. We are strong, healthy and moving forward.
Next time I will talk about where I am at now and what tools I have to stop me falling backwards. Until then, stay well:)
If you think you may be suffering from depression, go and see your GP. They will be able to assess you and point you in the right direction to get help. If you don't feel ready to see someone yet, type "depression help" into google and that will give you a list of resources you can use for help. In Australia, Beyond Blue is a great place to start. There website is:-
www.beyondblue.org.au
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