Blessed Not Depressed

 I'm very fortunate, as I've never dealt with actual, clinical depression, which I know well can be truly debilitating. Rather, I get bouts of melancholy, or the blues, and typically these periods last weeks -- not months or years.

The only different time for me was after my Dad died. He passed in July, and in August of that year (1982) I went back for me senior year of college. First, like Psych 101, I developed chest pains. I hadn't seen a doc other than Health Center folks, and I called my dear family friend Bob Davidoff, who was then Co-Chair of Neurology at UM. He had me see a nice young internist named Michael Lerner, who gave me my first EKG. It was normal -- Dr. Lerner, though not a psychologist or psychiatrist, said I was clearly having symptoms related to my trauma. So I'd live.

As that last year played out, I would often have a strange sensation: I would be sitting in class, but I felt as if I were above my actual self, looking down. Later, I learned that was probably a dissociative disorder - I was dealing with the event by having my psyche get out of myself. Thankfully, that passed near graduation, in May of 1983, and by the time I met Wifey, three months later, I was mostly back to baseline neurotic.

But the blues came calling several weeks ago, right before we left for D.C. and my nephew of another mister Scott's wedding, and they hung around heavily since. And then, yesterday, was mostly very happy.

Wifey and I drove up to D2's house, and D1 was there taking calls while D2 and Wifey did pilates. They had brought in lunch, and after pilates and the calls, Wifey, the Ds, and I got to sit for a solid hour catching up -- talking of days past and days to come.

We piled into the man sized SUV and fetched Little Man, who knew that Grandpa pick up meant honey yogurt, which only I mix the right way. He had us laughing all the way back to D2's house, and from there D1 drove him to skateboarding.

Wifey and I piled the 3 dogs into our vehicle, and followed D2 to D1's house -- we watched Baby Man play in the back, so happily, and then greeted his older brother and D1. It was delightful -- happy grandsons, happy Ds, and happy Wifey. Even the dogs were happy, except for the Special Needs and now VERY elderly Spaniel -- he was a bit grumpy and snapped, mostly toothless, at Baby Man.

And on the way home, with unexpectedly light traffic, I felt it: the lifting of the blues, the thinning of that queasy, melancholy feeling.

I spoke on the phone for over an hour with one of my dear friends, whose health stuggles are one of my triggers -- he was feeling well and optimistic. Me, too.

To reinforce this positive change, I played Johnny Nash's "I Can See Clearly" on my Iphone this am, as I indeed walked under blue skies, with none of the "dark clouds that had me blind."

The issues that brought the blues, a/k/a known as life, will remain, but oh, it feels so wonderful when one's mood is raised.

I recalled my Dad, and the funny way he taught me the Yiddish word mechayeh. We had come to Miami Beach for the first time, probably December of 1970, and as he and I waded into the glorious Atlantic, in DECEMBER, he sighed and said "What a mechayeh!"  I asked him what that meant, and he said "Oh, a Me-HAI-ya is a beautiful and peaceful Japanese lake -- actually called Lake MeHaiya -- near Kyoto. So when something is so peaceful and lovely, you refer to that placid Japanese lake."

I believed him, and then shortly after, he said "Just kidding, Dave! Mechayeh is Yiddish for something delightful or pleasurable -- like the two of us swimming in the ocean here in Miami while everyone else is freezing their tucheses off in NY." I knew what tuches meant...

So the lifting of the blues is indeed a mechayeh. I count my blessings, and hope to keep the depressions at bay.