What a bad day looks like when you suffer anxiety and depression.

Today is a bad day. For a lot of people this might mean they forgot their wallet, or spilt their morning coffee on their shirt, perhaps they made a mistake at work and their boss told them off. For someone with anxiety and depression, someone like me, a bad day means I couldn’t get out of bed.

My husband brought me a cup of tea, reminded me to take my medication, cooked me brunch and made sure I ate it. We watched a comedy sitcom on tv together before I crawled back into bed for the afternoon.

He came in and hugged me and I had to grit my teeth and not yell at him to go away. I wanted him there and I wanted to know he loved me, but I also wanted to be able to lie there and cry without having to explain my tears.

On a bad day, my tears have no reason, my emotions are all over the place; anxiety makes me think about everything and I cannot switch off, while depression makes me apathetic and numb and I cannot care. So, when someone wants me to explain how I am feeling, I can’t. I’m too befuddled by everything, and nothing.

I feel dazed and confused, no words coming when usually I have no problem communicating. My vocabulary shrinks, I stutter and stumble through sentences, I repeat myself and then I get frustrated because no one seems to be understanding what I am trying to convey.

I look at the world through a foggy lens which leeches the beauty and wonder out of everything in front of me. On a bad day, I just lie in bed thinking how I am not good enough I will never be good enough and trying to make anything of my life is futile.

On a bad day I feel unloved, unwanted, and as if no one understands me, no one cares. It’s on these days suicide ideation seems like the most normal and natural past time, I’m not doing anything with my life so why keep wasting oxygen?

These are the days I need my friends the most, but also the days I won’t reach out to anyone. The days I fear my own emotions, and what I may do. I try mindfulness, meditation, grounding, I read a book or colour in, most days these strategies help and I can get up and get on with it, but sometimes there is nothing to pull me back and all I can do is get through the day and hope tomorrow will be better.

Tomorrow isn’t always better, this is my third day in a row where getting out of bed has been such a struggle. I still hope for tomorrow though, and hope is like a lifesaver I cling to while trying not to drown in a sea of deadly emotions.

So, yesterday was a bad day, today is a bad day, and tomorrow, well I just can’t say yet. What I can say is whether tomorrow is a bad day, a neutral day, or a good day, it’s a day I’ll still be here. I’ll still be fighting to keep my head above the choppy waters. Tomorrow I just might even make it out of bed!