Do you get more depressed at Christmas time?

I’ve recently realized that Christmas—the darkest time of the year—brings me to my darkest mood. Christmas, I always thought, was a relentlessly cheerful time probably to help people fight off feelings of depression.

Most people can go along with Christmas cheer—or festivals of lights or Solstice celebrations. They like these efforts to keep up a positive attitude. It works for them.

For people like me, it doesn’t work. The happier people are, the more withdrawn I get because I can’t feel happy. The thought of it makes me feel queasy. Maybe because it is so false, in my case. I can pretend, but the look of happiness is all on the outside (and not very convincing, either). It never changes, inside me.

I also realized that the worst things in my life happened at this time of the year. My first depression peaked (this was before I was diagnosed). In following years, I made other horrible things happen, almost as if I wanted to guarantee I’d be depressed. I couldn’t allow myself happiness. I was always the person on the outside looking in. I now realize that this started years ago, long before I got that diagnosis.

This year really is no different. I’ve done things to cause me to lose friends—one a very good friend. It’s not on purpose. It’s only in retrospect that I realize I’ve picked a fight, most likely because I’m depressed and can’t allow myself to feel good.

I say that as if I had control over it, but it isn’t like that. I’m going along, acting normal (at least for me) and then all of a sudden it seems like the world crashes in on me. The haze fills the air. My head pounds. I’m moving through some thick ooze. My stomach is nervous all the time. I don’t sleep. I kill friendships without even trying. It’s scary. I so wish I hadn’t done that.

It’s weird, because I now know I have this pattern and I tried really hard not to follow it, and it still got me. Even now, I’m still hopeful I can pull out of this dive before I crash into the ground.

Is this familiar to anybody out there? Does the happiness of those around you make it worse for you because you can’t get your mood up there even though you try really hard? Do you find yourself doing more self-destructive things at this time of year? Do you find yourself seeing all your blessings and instead of being happy, you feel like you don’t deserve them and people would be better off if you weren’t in their lives?

It comes on so fast and quiet, like a bird of prey, and it hits like a buffalo stampede. Scary.