Sunday

Every day wasn’t quite this bad for me, but some days were worse. I hated Sundays. At every other time in my life, Sundays have been a welcome reprieve from the week, a wonderful reason to relax and truly let myself feel the Spirit. Feeling devoid of the Spirit, however, Sundays during my worst depressive episode tended to drag me down. I felt they were a reminder of my failure to be happy. I seemed to zero in on the countless times I heard from the pulpit, “If we’ll keep the commandments, we’ll be happy.” I could not reconcile the two facts. I knew the gospel was true; I have never doubted that, even on my worst days. But I couldn’t figure out what I was doing wrong to stop the good news from working for me.
On Sundays we would walk into church and sit on one of the shorter pews on the side. I never let Jeff have the corner; I had to be right next to the wall. The more he could shield me from whatever it was I feared, the better. I still enjoyed the Hymns, and many of them were a source of comfort for me. Songs like “Be Still My Soul,” “Where Can I Turn for Peace?,” and “Abide With Me” spoke to my soul more deeply at this time in my life than ever before, and I felt like somebody must understand that life was hard and that it was okay to be sorrowful at times.
In the halls I was never sure whether or not I wanted to talk to people. Certain people could make me forget myself and come into the land of the living a little more, while talking to others made me wish I could hide. I dreaded the question, “how are you?” because for some reason I just didn’t know how to answer it. Do I tell them I’m fine? That would be a lie. Do I tell them I’ve had better days and make them wonder what’s wrong with me? That would start too many questions. Part of me wished that people could just know that I was depressed, but I simply did not want anybody’s pity. I didn’t want people to think I was weird or weak, and I didn’t want to explain it because it didn’t make sense. So in the end I would settle on telling people that I was fine, even though this was the least fine I had ever felt in my life.
In Sunday School I would sit next to Jeff and he would find it interesting that I couldn’t seem to control my hands. Sometimes I would get up and leave for awhile to get my jitters out, and other times they came out on paper. One week I filled a whole sheet of paper with random words that the teacher said; other times I’d just doodle. It was only recently that I read that these are actually symptoms of depression in some people—called psychomotor agitation. My social anxiety would again manifest itself in Relief Society, when I wanted to be invisible in a corner, yet longed for someone to notice me.