Elementary, my dear Watson!

OK, yes.  I watch a lot of television.  Gives me something to do, I guess!  Sometimes it is just to pass the time, sometimes because I got hooked on a series (like the West Wing - amazing!).  Every so often, one of the "just-to-pass-the-time" allocations surprises.  The current season of Elementary has been one of those.

In an episode called "The Eternity Injection" (Season 3, Episode 9), Sherlock and Watson have an exchange that really made me sit up.  Here's the exchange:

Sherlock Holmes: If you must know, Watson, I've been feeling a little bit down of late. It's the process of maintaining my sobriety. It's repetitive. And it's relentless. And above all, it's tedious. When I left rehab, I... I accepted your influence, I committed to my recovery. And now, two years in, I find myself asking, 'is this it?' My sobriety is simply a grind. It's just this leaky faucet that requires constant ...maintenance, and in return offers only not to drip.

Dr. Joan Watson: You have your work, you have me. You're alive.

Sherlock Holmes: I've told myself that many times. So many times, it has become unmoored from all meaning. Odd. I used to imagine that a relapse would be the climax to some grand drama. Now I think that if I were to use drugs again, it would in fact be an anticlimax. It would be a surrender to the incessant drip, drip, drip of existence.

 

I didn't realise how closely aligned the process of sobriety is with that of someone battling depression. 

 

The onslaught of depression is constant.  It's repetitive and it's relentless.  For those of us who suffer depression, we are always fighting.  We are always on guard.  Even when we appear to be laughing, giving a presentation, doing our homework, playing with our kids, throwing a stick for the dog, doing the dishes....  And often our only reward is that we get to fight exactly the same battle to feel exactly the same tomorrow.  And the next day.  And the day after that.

 

For those of you who don't understand what it is like, now you know.  Don't give us platitudes.  Don't tell us to snap out of it.  Don't think it is a weakness.  As a matter of fact, it takes more strength than you know for us to get up, get out of bed and to deal with the world (mostly) without anyone knowing that there is a hard fought battle raging 24/7.

 

And for goodness sakes, don't judge those who get too tired to fight on.