A Candle in the Darkness 8

Crystal Abraham is 33, unmarried, and childless. She is an educator and writer, and in her free time she enjoys reading, hiking, and singing. Crystal is a practising Catholic, teaches confirmation in her parish church, and is also involved in the parish’s outreach programme to displaced people. Crystal is currently undergoing treatment for depression.

EASTER is my favourite time of the year. I like it even more than Christmas. I love the reverence and remorse of Good Friday, the stillness and wary anticipation of Holy Saturday during the day, and the joy of Holy Saturday night when the Gloria is sung and the church bells are roused from their silence.

I wanted to be better by Easter.

After all, I was diagnosed during Advent and had hoped that, with the passage of liturgical time, I would rise out of the tomb ready for Easter Sunday. I even planned to buy a new outfit for the occasion.

Instead, on the Monday of Holy Week, the psychiatrist increased the prescription of my antidepressants again.

I’m relieved. After the disaster that was my trial run on a reduced dosage, I welcome the respite from desolation, pessimism, worry, nervousness and crying that the antidepressants offer me, at least until my therapy is far enough along that I can avoid these feelings without medication.

Depression has been, for me, an everlasting Good Friday. Like a dementor engulfing me, depression robs me of happiness, harmony, and hope, then deposits my soul into an unmarked grave.

Yet the Easter story goes beyond the darkness of Good Friday, and, even though I am not recovered, the account of Jesus’ suffering, death, and resurrection consoles me in a way that my medications and therapy sessions do not.

Firstly, Jesus was no stranger to loneliness and disappointment. In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus, scared, doubtful, and questioning, asks his closest friends to stay awake with him.

What do they do? Fall asleep. They too are tired. They’re confused, and they don’t quite understand the severity of the situation. It doesn’t mean they didn’t like Jesus, or didn’t care about him, just that sometimes people can’t support us in the way we would like them to, even though they’d like to be there for us. A bit like Fr Mike and me.

Furthermore, Jesus was well acquainted with despair. He, too, felt as though God had deserted him. “Why have you forsaken me?” screamed Jesus from the cross into the heavens. I’ve shouted these words at God too, and have been given the same non-response, but have never thought that I am screaming into a void. That is also comforting.

There will always be people who don’t understand, who think you are depressed because you are too weak or dramatic, who do not wish you well. On the other hand, there are always people along the way who ease your burden, if only briefly. Simon of Cyrene helps Jesus carry his cross, Veronica wipes his face, and Mary his mother, Mary Magdalene, and John the beloved apostle stand at the foot of the cross.

A colleague volunteered to do extra work on a joint project so that I could get a rest, a lady in my church choir asked me to join her for an Easter egg after mass on Gloria Saturday, my friend James remains at my side.

The Easter story promises healing and transformation. Jesus’ friends and followers don’t recognise him when they meet him after he rises from the dead.

Maybe I will be someone different after the diagnosis is lifted. Although I have a good memory, I find it hard to recall the me that existed before depression, since I have carried this cross with me for as long as I can remember, even though I’m only now getting help. But sometimes I am funny, or brave, or take charge of a project, or speak to a new person, or don’t worry about anything for half a day, and I begin to remember what this old Crystal was like, and to anticipate what the new Crystal could be like.

I trust that the cumulative effect of my medication, therapy, hobbies, and of course prayer will eventually lead to my diagnosis being lifted. Still, just as Jesus is identified by the wounds in his hands, side, and feet, even when I’m better, my depression will continue to be a part of me and of my story. There’ll be a chance of relapse, but there will also be a chance that I live for another 50 years without having to deal with serious depression again.

In the gospels, it is Jesus’ love, justice and mercy which come to define him- not his wounds. I don’t want my wounds to define me either. I hope that therapy will help me address the underlying causes of my depression, and that the therapist will help me develop techniques to deal with anxiety. He’s already promised to help me find ways to meet new people, so I don’t feel so lonely.

So right now, it may be Friday, but Sunday’s coming, and I can see the morning sun.

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"A Candle in the Darkness 8"

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