Before & After: Depression Awareness

Hello.

Today's manicure represents a serious subject that is close to my heart. As you may know, October is Depression Awareness month. If you don't know much about depression, please check out Scrangie's post on depression; it contains a lot of important facts about what depression is and isn't.

I suffer from depression, and have for most of my life, as far back as I can remember. In fact, part of the reason I started this blog was to give myself something happy and positive to focus on for at least a few minutes each day.

Depression can be debilitating. It makes your life dark, like a huge, sticky black cloud has engulfed it. When people tell you to be grateful for the good things in your life, that makes it worse, because you already know you're lucky and don't understand why you feel so horrendously bad all the time; and, you feel deeply, deeply guilty about not being able to pull yourself out of it and feel the way you 'should' feel. The fact is, depression isn't a choice. It's a biochemical disorder that sufferers have no control over. And it can destroy every moment of every day for them.

The official color of depression awareness is green. I chose China Glaze Cast A Spell as the base for my depression awareness manicure:

Cast A Spell is a dark, dark olive green that's almost black. It's filled with dark green-gold flecks, and in this context it reminds me of the way that even when light tries to crack through the blackness of depression, it never quite succeeds, and is tainted by the darkness around it.

Many people who suffer with depression work hard to keep the outside world from seeing it. I've had many colleagues in my life tell me that they admire how I'm always positive and energetic, but they don't understand how hard I have to work to put on that face; they don't understand how draining, how much it takes out of me to put on that face. And they certainly don't understand that the darkness is lurking right underneath that facade, barely hidden and waiting to come out.

To symbolize that aspect of depression, I did a skittle artwork manicure:

On my index finger, I put a coat of Hit Polish High Tech (a pretty glitter with greens, silver and black). On my middle finger, I put a coat of CND Jade Sparkle (a green interference topper) along with a ridge of olive glequins. On my ring finger I put a coat of Lush Lacquer Camo Queen (a glitter with olives, golds, and black), and on my pinkie I added Zoya Opal, a green-blue flakie.


But no matter what good things are going on, no matter how good a front I put on, and no matter what I manage to fight through and accomplish when I'm depressed (and even tiny things are a huge fight), it's all still  blunted  by the depression.  There's a pallor over everything, and nothing feels good, nothing feels right. To symbolize this, I put a matte top coat over the manicure:

If you know someone who suffers from depression, you can support them by educating yourself about depression and about the help available to people who suffer from it.

Thank you for reading if you've made it this far. Below I've linked in with other bloggers who are also spreading the word about depression.

M.