Hello Karyn:
I saw this question yesterday and but I was on the fly (as usual)
(BUT today my cape is in the wash so I am grounded) LOL....
Your topic came to mind many times during the day as I tried to process the 'correct' answer...
I also think it is because their are similarities in our journeys so your question really caused some reflection.
1) We both lost our son's due to addictions & mental health and in large part 'failures within those systems'
2) We are both are full time volunteer lived experience/ family advocates
3)We both have had our own personal journeys with mental health (I also have 17 years in recovery from both alcohol and drug addiction)
4)We both have had multiple losses (my mom died of pancreatic cancer about a year after my son died)
5)Shortly there after, I was hit by a Pathfinder truck while loading my groceries, had my legs crushed and spent an excruciating year learning how to walk again....
And the list goes on....
I often wonder how I manage and there are days that just completely suck! And there are days when that depression and anxiety raises it's ugly head and then mixes with a massive resurgence of the grief and I feel swallowed up.
Many times I think to myself...I must be getting old because some days it feels like it is harder to cope with it all....
But...I always manage to bounce back...
In trying to think of a neat and tidy answer for you, I realized there is not one easy, neat and tidy answer.
I also am very careful about how I express my 'wellness' because I would hate for another to feel like.... "Well if she can do that, then why am I struggling?"
I think there are several factors that come to mind that might bring clarity....
a) We are bereaved mothers and that does not ever leave us. That can either break us or make us. It forever changes us and we are never the same again. With a lot of hard work, we learn how to integrate that loss into the fibre of our being (but the reality is...it is an ever-changing grieving process not only for our son's BUT for the loss of self and our mothering roles, and all the dreams that would have come with that)...
It is imperatively important to recognize what is depression and what is an exasperated grief 'relapse' or bubble. Or combination of both.
2) Multiple losses equal multiple levels of grieving (as in your mothers death, your sisters terminal illness, your marriage loss, your financial loss and loss of stability-security etc)
3) Hate to be the one to say this...but there is a hormonal factor that could be at play. We are no spring chickens anymore Karyn! LOL (Isn't there a blog somewhere in here about using humour to help depression??)
I just turned 57 and my friggin hormones have been all over the place this last couple of years. (Depression-Grief-Menopause....the trinity of yuckiness!!!)
I could go on but once again my post is getting too long...
So my not so helpful answer is that you are way more resilient than you think you are.
I am one of those people that is always thinking and purging and then allowing the process of 're-inventing' to allow my true self to surface.
Sometimes those periods of 'depression' are actually opportunities to 'move some of the crap and debris' out and allow the new to come in.
I find it can be quite difficult to negotiate because there are so many levels of horrendous life experiences that needs to move around...BUT...here is my 'key of Knowledge'....
I am no longer afraid of the processes!
I have discovered that I have enormous faith in myself
I have discovered that 'it is what it is' (some people find that dis-empowering, I find it Empowering)
I reflect on all the horrors of my life that started on the second day I was born (I am sure that is when I realized that the stork dropped me off to the WRONG family) LOL
....but I realize that I have enormous 'warrior' energy and now I have the wisdom to embrace my 'processes' (as much as they suck) and I marvel at the ability of the human spirit to rise over and over and over again.
YOU Karyn are a warrior, so full of pure love and good intent...that the world can feel very harsh and abrasive. Our reality of living as bereaved moms makes us super sensitized and really empathic but that is because we managed to keep our hearts open....
That is a really phenomenal feat...
And you take that big open heart and you advocate for others......
I think you are a 'superwoman' of sorts....
Well my cape is now dry and I am flying off again...
After 5 PM..I turn into Princess Willow (LOL)