Depression

Early on in the affair, before my husband left, I tried to do anything I could think of to be a better wife, to make him want to stay, to make him want me.  I did not fault myself with his infidelity, but I did regret having anything to regret.  

It just happened over time that our life centered around the kids and their activities.  It seemed natural at the time and something I thought probably happened in most marriages, but at the point that the marriage was potentially falling apart, I regretted not making more time for just us.  I wished I had insisted on fun getaways or weekend retreats or even just regular outings that didn’t include watching a youth ballgame.  I tried to make myself more attractive so he would want to spend time with me.  Losing weight wasn’t really an option since I was pregnant and barely eating anyway, but I spent more time on my appearance.  I asked him on dates.  I left him notes.  I bought him gifts. I guess you could say I pursued my husband.  

Pursuit was futile though at that point.  His desire was elsewhere.  I was not what he wanted.  I would reach for his hand, and he would pull away or limp-fish me, with no reciprocation of contact.  I would snuggle into him in the morning before getting out of bed, and he would lie still and unresponsive to me, with his head turned away.  Where my pregnant belly pushed into his side, the baby would push back or kick against the pressure.  He might acknowledge her, but her being within me seemed to deter him from placing his hands on her movements.   Those were sad days.  I eventually gave up on physical contact.  A person can only tolerate rejection so many times.  

He made clear his plan to leave when the boys finished the school year, and a nightmare woke me up to the fact that I had to get used to being alone.  (Previous blog, “Bad Dream”) Somehow still, even though I was losing hope for my efforts swaying him to stay, I held onto hope that once he was gone, he would miss his family and come back to us.  I eventually pinned my remaining hope on the idea that if anything would bring him back to us, it would be the birth of his daughter. 

All of this was me “bargaining,” although I didn’t realize it at the time.  So when all the things I bargained with and pinned my hopes on didn’t bring my husband home, I was devastated.  Hope was gone.  Not hope for life or eternity, but hope for my marriage…hope for reconciliation…hope for my boys having life back as they’d known it…hope for my baby girl to grow up with her daddy at home with us and have what the boys had during their early years.  

With hopelessness came depression. Detachment.  Functioning in a fog.  Being alive without living.  Surviving with no actual recall of events.  

I ate for the sake of the nursing baby.  I kept life going for the sake of the boys who had already lost so much.  I kept them in sports and summer programs.  We went out with friends and had friends over.  I was there with them, but I wasn’t always engaged.  My mind was a mess.  I worked but couldn’t concentrate.  I kept up the house, yard, pool, and finances to avoid any more change to our lives.  I was exhausted in every way.  Almost everything I did was for the kids.  I myself had no real desire for much of anything.  I was bluh.  I didn’t want to die, but my purpose for living was the children.  

The children saved me.  God saved me.  He kept me intact enough to see how much my children needed me and needed stability.  The baby saved us all.  She was a balm to my sad soul, joy to my crushed spirit.  Seeing the boys with her and her with them… I knew in my heart this wasn’t the end and God would prevail.  I knew He had plans for my children and this tragedy in their young lives could be a platform for faith, so I held tight to Him, knowing only He could heal us in time.  I refused to say this was of God, but I trusted God to make good of it, as in Romans 8:28, “.. all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” 

We fail to see sometimes that what feels bad, maybe even what came from a bad source, can be worked out for good when given to God’s capable hands.  People often stop short in this Romans passage.  They leave it at verse 28, but verse 29 goes on to say, “For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.”  Good comes about when we are made into the image of Christ and used to make Him known.  

I would have never hoped for my marriage to end the way it did…or to hurt the way I hurt…or to see my children hurt as they did, but what could have wrecked me, God used to draw me nearer then used to minister to others.  In those dark days of depression, when I sat rocking my baby, staring blankly at family and wedding photos that taunted me from their placement in my bedroom, wondering how my life had come to this…when I leaned heavily into the shower walls, sobbing my eyes out, letting the water wash my tears down the drain as I yelled at God and questioned Him and begged him to make some sense of the mess and give some purpose to the pain, I couldn’t see that healing would come.  I couldn’t imagine a day when I wouldn’t ache for what I lost. I hoped for it, but I couldn’t even imagine it then.  

But just as grief comes in stages, healing comes in time.  You gradually accept the changes even when you don’t like them, then eventually you wake up to find you not only like the new circumstances but maybe even the new you.  

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I want to clarify that the depression stage of grief is different from clinical depression, and I am unskilled to speak to the latter.  While my heart hurts for those who battle clinical depression, I can only speak to the situational depression I had as a response to great loss.  I urge anyone suffering from clinical depression to seek help from someone licensed and trained to counsel and treat mental health.