I wanted to make a quick post about depression because of Bourdain's and Spade's suicides.
I have dealt with severe depression, and even though I am on a great anti-depressant and have figured some stuff out, I know I need to watch for triggers. With that said, clinical depression - for me - was not about being sad.
When I went into the black hole, the worst part was feeling nothing. It is worse than feeling sad. I felt that everything was unimportant, and more than that, in the long-term, the world is slightly, on the margins, better with me doing nothing or without me.
I have read a lot of articles about depression this week. The phrase, "you never know what is going on in someone's life," in my mind, is actually pretty harmful. A lot of depression exists without ancillary causes, but problems that you have amplify the feelings of depression.
Depression is a social disease. For me, the loneliness recursively makes depression worse. The scariest part is feeling that nobody can empathize with you and that feeds into the loneliness.
For me, Wellbutrin and just being more open about my feelings has really helped. Academia is a weird place with a lot of rejection, there are extraordinarily high rates of depression, and not many real resources to help. I do not think Bourdain or Spade were being selfish, frankly, I imagine they were in pain and felt the world would be just fine without them.
/endrant. There was not much of a purpose in this post. If anyone ever needs to talk about this stuff, though, feel free to PM me. I am not an expert, and my advice may not be helpful, but I really know how having someone listen can help things.
) and dolls house furniture. Go for a hike? Also watching that la Bron mural getting trashed is fun as hell