I’m delighted to welcome author Lillian Csernica, who writes eloquently from the heart about her life. She says the following essay “embodies the main theme of my NaNoWriMo project, Keep Getting Up.”
HAPPINESS: A WELCOME
STRANGER
By Lillian Csernica
If you ask me where I make room for my happiness, it will
take me a minute or two to come up with a reply. Not because I don't know where
I keep it, but because in a very real sense, I don't have any to keep. I live
with Major Depressive Disorder. It's not like I get depressed every now and
then. I'm depressed all the time. I have to fight my way out of it to a state
of mind that approximates the kind of baseline cheerfulness that gets most
people through their day. The specific name for the no-happiness part of my
condition is anhedonia. That's the inability to experience pleasure from normal
activities such as watching a funny movie or playing with a pet. If that sounds
sad, it is. Some days it goes beyond sad all the way into tragic. I sit there
and watch life go by. I can see the colors and hear the sounds, but I can't
feel anything other than depression. The tastes, the smells, the textures are
there but they don't connect to the pleasure center in my brain.
I've had to actively seek out qualified people who taught me
the skills I need to change my perceptions and reframe my thinking. I might not
be able to feel happiness, but I take great pleasure in other people's joy.
Here are two examples:
- My son John just finished taking a class at the library on using a digital camera and laptop to make movies. He learned how to use some new software and do some interesting things with the storyboard pages he'd spent so much time drawing. John doesn't have a completed animation project yet, but he did master a new part of the process in just one hour. I put the experience in context for him, explaining how the animators he admires had to learn step-by-step methods as well. John is proud of himself.
- Michael, my older son, just brought home his latest award-winning art project. He and his aide had kept it in his classroom until summer school ended because it's a triptych with two of the panels created by two of Michael's classmates. It shows a street scene right off the beach in Capitola, done in multimedia that includes paint and crayon and some glitter. While Michael didn't make it into the Top Three for this year's school district art contest, he and his team received ribbons for Awards of Merit. All of us at home made much over Michael winning his fourth award for an art project.
I have to work hard at making room for happiness in my mind
and in my life. Every day I have to survive in an environment of ongoing
tragedy, knowing that because of their disabilities, both of my sons will not
enjoy everything life has to offer them. I've learned that I can't hold on to
happiness. Life changes too quickly, and some of the changes are permanent.
I've learned that I have to take medication to correct my brain chemistry so I
can get out of bed in the morning and get through the demands of each day. I've
learned that I can't let my mental and emotional room be taken up by negative
feelings and old baggage. Most of all, I've learned that if I just keep still
and be in this present moment, happiness will wave at me or throw me a smile.
Once in a while, it will even come and sit beside me so we can share the
moment.
Lillian Csernica writes fantasy, romance, and horror. Her short stories have appeared in Weird Tales, Fantastic Stories, and Jewels of Darkover. Her Kyoto Steampunk short stories can be found in the Clockwork Alchemy anthologies Twelve Hours Later, Thirty Days Later, Some Time Later and Next Stop On The #13. SHIP OF DREAMS, an historical romance, is set in the Caribbean of 1725 during the Golden Age of piracy. A genuine California native born in San Diego, Lillian resides in the Santa Cruz mountains with her two sons and three cats. Visit her at lillian888.wordpress.com.
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