Okay, if you know me at all you will know how out of character this post is. I usually don’t use Facebook or my blog for deep thoughts. I really think eye contact and tone of voice matter for having meaningful conversation, and you get neither of those over the internet. So I usually save deep discussions for when I can look someone in the eyes and have the ability to take them out for a martini in case we can’t see eye to eye to buttress that we don’t have to think exactly alike to be able to get along and respect each other. But after the barrage of tweets and Facebook posts over the last 24 hours, I just cannot stay silent.
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Robin Williams died. I debated posting this until the news had moved from just speculation to confirmation that it was suicide, because I hate to be one of those people who jump the gun based on incomplete information. But I realized the discussion currently happening about depression is very real, so what I have to say on the matter is pertinent regardless of if Robin Williams’s cause of death is changed.
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The entertainment Robin Williams has provided has been a fixture throughout my life. He has impacted everyone so much that there is no reason to rehash all of his memorable roles. But as a 12 year old figuring out the nuances of growing up and life, through him I learned something- Funny people are hurting inside. Of course, there’s nothing like growing up and living life to realize that thought needed adjustment- People are hurting inside. Everyone has their own burden, their own darkness, their own piece of inconsolable sadness. And regardless of if I personally feel that their burden is cosmically important, the fact is that these fears and sadness are real to those who shoulder it, it’s real to them, and I will always treat it as such for them without judgment. That’s just part of being a member of the human race. There has been no time in my life that I have regretted being too nice to someone, but a lot of the regrets I have stem from the guilt that I was not as kind as I could have been. And that’s a positive from Robin Williams’s loss- the outpouring of discussions that we all could be more compassionate to each other. As humans with hearts and souls and empathy and sympathy I think there is a greater good in just being darn nicer to one another.
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However, some of these posts take it a step further, and that’s where I have my issues with the turn the discussion takes. To condense the mentality to a simple sentence, people are saying, “If only he could have seen how much he is missed, Robin Williams wouldn’t have committed suicide.” Which. Is. Just. WRONG. I’m sorry. No, I’m not sorry. Because people who post this should be sorry of their ignorance of depression. Depression isn’t just feeling sad or some bout of “the blues” that you have rational responses to situations and can just shake off if someone is nice enough to you. That is not how this shit works. Telling someone you love them doesn’t cure depression any more than a mommy’s kiss can cure a broken arm. Some things you just need actual medical/professional treatment for.
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I have given birth to four kids, and I have run the gauntlet of feeling perfectly normal to tired and overwhelmed to the baby blues to full-throttle postpartum depression. I know on some small level what it is like to be truly depressed in the medical sense. But more importantly, I have seen how depressions affects the people I love. I have witnessed friends and family members in the death grip of full-on chronic and/or major depression. People I love more than my own life and breath. But people whose depression has thrown them down an oubliette so deep and dark that they are moaning at the bottom and I am unable to follow and helpless in getting them out. And it’s not because I didn’t love them enough or that they didn’t know I loved them enough. Depression is a finger dipped in soot that smudges darkness into the lives of everyone it touches.
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Depression is like an emotional cancer. You can treat it, but it’s never gone. At most you can hope for remission. But the threat is always lurking in the dark corners, the ominous thrumming a constant background noise in every interaction. And the possibility of it rearing its ugly head of destruction makes it a constant enemy, even when depression isn’t currently winning the battle.
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Really, I’m happy for people who obviously have never had to deal with real depression that they can make blanket, easy fix statements about its treatment and “cure.” But let’s be real here. Robin Williams did not commit suicide because there weren’t enough pictures of him and movie quotes of his on Facebook. The man couldn’t even stop at a Dairy Queen on his way to rehab without someone telling him how much they, a complete stranger, adored him. It was because depression is not logical or reasonable, and to treat it as such as a disrespect to anyone who is battling with it. This dissemination of misinformation is what makes me appreciate how truly, amazingly brave the people who seek help are. To go forth, knowing the stigma and ignorance of others they are fighting against, as well as their own doubts on the journey to wellness. Someone seeking mental care should be treated as well as someone getting penicillin for strep throat- treated as someone just doing what they need to take care of themselves.
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My heart aches when I think of the loss of Robin Williams. Not because he was a celebrity and I feel the selfish loss of my own future without him to entertain me like he was some organ-trained monkey. But I mourn because I imagine how tortured and lonely he must have felt those last few moments of his life, and I grieve for him as I would any human who is feeling inconsolable suffering. But at least now he is at peace. To paraphrase the first law of thermal dynamics, he is not lost, but changed. But because of this the Earth is dimmer while the heavens are brighter. Rest in peace.
Poor Unfortunate Soles 