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Krrobi

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The Noonday Demon

Kim Sisto Robinson

At least -- to pray -- is left -- is left --
Oh Jesus -- in the Air --
I know not which Thy Chamber is --
I'm knocking everywhere -- Dickenson

Nobody feels as deeply and strongly and intensely as “the writer.” She loves with every element of her being, and she suffers in the same way. This may explain why she is more apt to suffer from depression.  Sigmund Freud, whom I typically refer to as Sigmund Freak, believed that depression was the result of stifled creativity. Yeah, I believe that, and perhaps this would explain why so many writers throughout history have chosen suicide to end their tormented souls. 

Plath tucked her children into bed, fixed milk and cookies for breakfast for the following day, and then proceeded to put her head into the oven. Sexton overdosed. Woolf crammed her pockets with rocks and walked into the waves she so dearly treasured. Teasdale lay down in a warm bath, took sleeping pills, and never woke up. Dickenson lived as a hermit.

Depression has been described as follows:

“I’m terrified of this dark thing living inside,” Plath wrote in her diary.

“I must hurriedly note more symptoms of the disease, so I can medicate myself next time,” Woolf confessed.

“This is an element of blackness,” Dickenson wrote.

Julia Kristeva called depression The Black Sun.  Hamlet named it, The Pale Cast of Thought.  Dante described it as Black Wood.  And writer, Andrew Solomon, states in his book “The Noonday Demon,” that depression feels like a vine slowly choking a vast oak tree.

When Solomon fell into the black hole of depression, he writes, “One day, seven years ago, hell came to pay me a surprise visit. In his memoir, he says he was so weak and filled with gloom that he couldn’t even cut his own meat.   “I’d call my friends and tell them I was having a bad day…I’m afraid of lamb chops again,”

Depression, if we think about it, affects all of us.  I remember sitting in class in middle school thinking, “What is wrong with me?  Why am I feeling this way?  Where did that black cloud come from?”  This is when I began to write.  When I looked back recently at some of my poetry and prose, I was like, “Hell, this isn’t me, It’s Plath!”  And although I never suffered as profoundly as she did, I identify with her poetry when she writes:

It stands at my widow/ big as the sky/ It breathes from my sheets/ the cold dead center.

Solomon’s book gives us information about unconventional avenues we can take to find answers for depression, a new path, which perhaps we’ve not explored: talk therapy, psychotherapy, positive thinking exercises, meditation, and Solomon even traveled to another country for cleansing.  He has no boundaries and uncovers every secret for his reader.  To be honest; I’m completely in love with his intellect and insight. 

One can either be diagnosed with bi-polar or experience the blues, as I did. It doesn’t matter a damn.  The Noon Day Demon is for all of us, relevant for everybody. I only wish it would have been in print when Plath, Sexton, and Woolf were around, because apparently, their poetry and prose couldn’t save them. 

Solomon unveils the black beast for all of us to see, and in the end, he comes up with his own medication, his own resolution. “The people who try to find a peaceful relationship with their depression are the ones who are most able to keep going and move forward," Solomon said. "If you suffer from depression, you need the ability to respond to it and make sense out of it."  

The first step is facing the beast dead on, and then making peace with the son-of-a-bitch; admit you have it inside of you. Then, as Solomon says, you can begin to move forward one step at a time. 

~~~whomever is reading this—remember—you are not alone, and you are not weak.  By facing your depression, you will find the power that dwells inside.  You can then move forward to seek your own healing~~~