As a clinical depressive (severe), I am often asked, “How are you?” to which I usually reply, “Fine” or Good”, which makes me a liar. Sometimes, I am neither fine nor good, but it is much easier than the honest answer, which can be along the lines of, “Actually, I feel utterly worthless, a complete failure and I hope I die before I get old.” However, I am reasonably certain that the question isn’t intended to be another version of “Hello!” And who wants someone to recite the state of someone else’s mental health?
I mean, it’s nice that people ask, often with absolute sincerity. Most people, as I am fond of saying, are good people, so I would much rather they ask than didn’t. The issue with me is being honest not just with others but with myself.
These days, I try harder. If someone says, “How are you?” and I am ‘with it’, as opposed to ‘without it’, I have a few standard replies, the most popular of which is “Still breathing”. If that elicits a ‘blimey what does that mean?” response, my follow up is often, “Well, it beats the alternative!” Result: nervous laughter.
When I am in the comparatively rare “Hope I die before I get old” mindset, the “Well, it beats the alternative” standard comment is redundant. It’s tricky because to date I’ve never got to the stage where I really wanted to end it, although it did get close a few years ago, but what I am really saying is I don’t want things, when things really are shit, to go on forever.
The small act of lying (“I’m fine, I’m good”) troubles me because due to reasons I don’t quite understand I am now utterly obsessed with being brutally honest about everything, even to the extent of submitting honest job applications which point out my failings as well as my abilities. You can probably work out, along with my status as a trainee geriatric, that in job applications brutal honesty is not the best policy, but fuck it. I’ll stick with it. As one of my closest friends and colleagues in the DWP always said, “I hate liars” and I hate myself enough without making me hate myself even more for being a liar.
I do feel that this is a form of self-harm. It’s the mental equivalent of cutting myself and a part of me thinks, “Just play the game”. But life isn’t a game. In one way or another I am permanently fucked up. And I’m happier when I tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Which is what I have done here.
I’m expecting to win the lottery this week and with part of the proceeds I shall arrange ongoing therapy for my depression and an assessment to determine whether I have ADHD, autism, PTSD or am bipolar OR that I am just thick. I by chance I don’t win, maybe the week after that, or maybe even on the twelfth of never.
I’m neither fine nor good today but it could be worse. Thanks for asking.
