Depression?

“Oh dear”, I thought.  “I spent three days asleep.  I keep bursting into tears for no reason.  Every time Robert opens his mouth, every time I open my inbox, every time I pick up the phone, read a sentence, watch an advert, I think they’re criticising me.  And why wouldn’t they?  I’m so crap.  I’m so stupid and ugly and hideous.  No wonder I didn’t get accepted to King’s.  No wonder everyone hates me.  I just want to eat.  I just want to eat chicken and chocolate and go back to bed in my pyjamas.  I stink like shit.  I haven’t washed in days.  I can’t face doing any of my work.  I have no energy.

Am I getting depressed again?  But there’s no reason to be depressed.  And that’s always a bad sign.  Oh shit, oh bollocks.  Not again.  I can’t do this again”.

Then a day later, curled in the foetal position, a powerful pulse of pain.  I reached for the painkillers and cancelled the evening.  And then I realised.  I’m not depressed.  It’s just, y’know.

Y'KNOW.

Never been so grateful to be doubled up in agony.  I was getting worried.  I have become hyper-vigilant to my moods.  I’m constantly waiting for another episode of something to knock me on my arse into the dust.    I sometimes forget I’m the type of woman who gets down and emotional and thinks plants are calling her fat when I’m Y’KNOW.

Today I feel normal again.  And I view my five days of bursting into tears at Andrex ads like a little bit of a holiday.  This is why I missed my periods when they stopped dead from stress.  I remember when I wasn’t using tampons but I was using Lithium and listening to women moan about PMS.  I felt a sense of grief at how natural and how uncomplicated that was.  There is something so wonderfully ordinary, something that makes me feel part of the human race, about being a woman on her period.

But there are no jaffa cakes left.

FAKE EDIT: I’m aware some of you will read this and roll your eyes.  Please feel free to discuss CHICKEN, JAFFA CAKES or FEMINISM in the comments instead.