Just Sitting: Me And My Black Dog.
Winston Churchill famously named his episodes of depressive moods his Black Dog.
Like so many I have been visited by the Black Dog before, but it has been a long time.
At the moment I am away from my family in hospital and am desperately missing them.
In the evenings I feel the Black Dog creep into my room. It sits quietly in the corner. It's presence reminds me of a time when it crawled beneath my skin and devoured me from the inside.
But that time is long passed and I have learned to sit adjacent from my challenges rather than allow them to consume me.
So I have told it to sit, and I sit beside it. I do not wish to conquer it or tame it, and in turn it draws no strength and it too just quietly sits.
An appropriate companion considering my circumstance.
The Black Dog was Churchill's companion at his side during times in which he accomplished great feats of leadership, responsibility and strength.
In a time long before today's acceptance of mental illness Churchill's open references really were quite remarkable.
Perhaps he wasn't the first to use the metaphor, but he certainly made it what it is today.
Churchill long suffered with his illness. The treatments, research, knowledge and understanding we have today simply didn't exist.
If you find that you are accompanied by your Black Dog more often than not. Help is available.
One of the largest Mental Health Organisations in Australia has adopted it as it's name.
THE BLACK DOG INSTITUTE
https://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/
I wish to acknowledge @romanskv and @ebryans for the conversation and inspiration for today's scribblings that helped me to self regulate while in the company of my visitor.
I like the expression behind your post but I think Churchill's metaphor sucks; the guy probably never had a real dog or it would have been the last animal he would have used to illustrate depression, black or otherwise.
In the past I would have agreed with you. A dog in truth is a loyal friend who provides companionship and comfort.
But to some people with a familiar melancholy that visit in a cyclic fashion the metaphor resonates.
I understand where you are coming from, but if someone is able to find words for the crippling invisible agony of depression, and it in some way makes it a little more tangible, I think it doesn't have to make sense to everyone in order to do good.
Don't be black-dogist, call it a black cloud ;)
No, I don't like the cloud notion. I live in a land where a storm looming in the form of a beautiful black cloud marks the promise of deliverance from hideous sweltering humidity.
Sitting with a black dog isn't a personal attack on your lovely shiny black pooch.
If it's not for you that's okay though.
Aah, I live in England where it rains way too much. He is adorable and he'd cheer you right up!
I don't know a great deal about his pet ownership but this article suggests he owned a number of dogs which he adored.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2839146/Bulldog-spirit-Churchill-softie-came-dogs-former-PM-couldn-t-bear-prospect-losing-beloved-pet-poodle-Rufus-II.html
I have posted this in a time of great difficulty. I risked vulnerability sharing my passed. I believe your response reveals more about your character than it does Churchills.
Hey, I dislike his metaphor, nothing was said about his character but while we're on the subject I heard that he gave the orders to bomb civilians in Germany and that led to London being revenge bombed, so he sounds like a sociopath to me. There's better depressed people for you to identify with-just saying.
I think I would like to discontinue my conversation with you. You don't seem to have an understanding of how your words can be so very harmful.
I wasn't expecting this style of conversation when revealing my most vulnerable situation. I am in hospital awaiting spinal surgery and far away from my loved ones. The only comfort I had in my isolation was the occasional message on my phone. I was just attempting to express my feelings by utilising an image that helped me sit with my heartache. Now I feel like I have done something wrong,and have images of ww2 in the place of a benign dog.
I don't hold him in any particular esteem with regards to politics or warfare, I'm just trying to get through one of my hardest days of which the highlight was drawing in place of wallowing , but that is of little importance now.
I'm so sorry, it wasn't my intention to cause you to think of wars, I had no idea just how fragile and isolated you are right now.
I think your fear is affecting you more than you realise. Maybe try a little meditation and repeating a mantra e.g "My surgery is successful and I make a full recovery."
I hope you make a full recovery soon.
It is not effecting me more than I realise, I thought I represented the awareness of my dismal affect quite clearly. But I think the dog thing triggered you.
When someone shares themselves it doesn't always require critique. It's not always an opportunity to have a debate.
It wasn't a literal depiction of depression. A state of mood is not tangible.
You must know as a professed lover of dogs, if you are destitute within yourself, your dog will sit with you and mirror your mood, attempting to even absorb that feeling that he/she intuitively knows you hold.
I am a dog person. I have loved many dogs. When I was 16 I slept on the floor of a bay window, our dog lived outside and would sleep under me and we could hear each other breath through the floorboards. They were times of fear and uncertainty and she knew. She saw her mate hit by a car and died, we nearly lost her too through her grief.
Another dog died while I was away, the night she died she came to me in a dream and looked me in the eyes and without speaking I heard her words, "look after @##*", her main carer. I don't speak of profound experiences because I am by most accounts a sceptic when it comes to such things.
My favourite dog was like a brother, 3 years older than me I new nothing of life without him.
He wasn't black he was golden but he was my black dog. He just new when my heart was bleeding sorrow, and as all the humans around me kept on with there life he would quietly and almost unseen find me and would be by my side.
The night before he died I climbed in his kennel lifted his once heavy frame out, as he could no longer walk and put him in my bed. I held him through the last night of his life. The next day I screamed as he was lifted into the car, I was fourteen and I new it was a one way trip.
His name was Gough, named after an Australian prime minister who some believe was a great man who introduced public health and affordable education, and made steps towards reconciliation with the indigenous people, who are still oppressed. Others applauded as the representative of your Queen, the governor General, kicked him out of office.
His time in politics and Churchills were both before my time.
Perhaps a silent non judging companion of a silent illness is not such a bad metaphor.
And as for the colour, it represents the darkness of despair and nothing more. But too often white represents good and black bad and the connotations and implications of that is not something I wish to perpetuate, so I support your questions re colour.
So if I have unknowingly hurt you by using a colour and a beautiful being comprised of nothing but loyalty to represent something negative, I apologise.
I do believe I also made the mistake of referencing a wartime world leader. I poor knowledge of the man as a leader. I suspect you are right, the number of sociopaths in such positions is disproportionate to the general population. However it is reported that he had bipolar which suggests he felt emotion, so perhaps it could perhaps have been a narcissistic personality structure, but once again I have not studied that man.
It was not my intent to have a negative interaction, in fact a post a day was my goal to help me towards a more positive aspect.
My poetry is quite poor, you have informed me of that before, perhaps not in those precise terms. But in the future I will stick to ambiguous word jumbling to accompany my scribblings.
I only wish to find and share peace here.
You had no way of knowing, just as I don't know how your day is going. I'm sorry for my misdirected...stuff
Hit the nest limit.
Hey honey, hope you are recovering after your surgery. My original post was an opinion of Churchill's metaphor, never a critique of you, I liked your post and I said that straight off!
I can kind of see where you are coming from with the metaphor; I view dogs in the same way as you do but my understanding of depression is of people thinking negatively, hence my dislike of the metaphor because dogs are so loving and positive.
https://steemit.com/sorry/@girlbeforemirror/just-blowing-off-steem
An interesting insight, thank you for sharing. I hope you are starting to feel a bit better.