Healing depression – goodbye black dog
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Healing depression – goodbye black dog
When I first saw Serge Benhayon in early 2004, I had been suffering from depression since my early teenage years. I was so used to feeling miserable and depressed that I did mention it only at the very end of our chat and well after the pain in my right shoulder, the uncertainty about life, my future and my occupation – after all the main reasons for my visit. I had never planned to get rid of my depression let alone heal it; I had always expected it to be a major part of my life.
A mixture of curiosity and my aching right shoulder had prompted me to break my resolve to never ever try anything again, be it mainstream medical or so-called alternative, as nothing had ever really worked for a sustained period of time. My shoulder, although much improved, was still aching and I only had a limited range of movement. I initially had a frozen shoulder but never called it that as I was embarrassed about what I had allowed to play out: years of massage practice and lots of tree planting and heavy lifting had taken their toll and I felt that I should have known better.
And thus the bit about my depression came at the very end. It sort of slipped out. I had never considered that it could be otherwise and my generally low spirits, if not misery at times, the teenage suicidal ideations and the bi-annual bouts of an even deeper and darker state of despondency and hopelessness had become like a second skin to me. When I was not acutely depressed I was very serious, glum and outright pessimistic – whilst trying really hard to be as normal as I possibly could and carry on with life regardless. I sought medical help only once and was never officially diagnosed. Someone suggested to me a few years ago that I might have been bipolar: if I was, then my ‘highs’ were very, very low.
The medical route I did not pursue after an experience with our family doctor, a general practitioner whom I had told how miserable and down I was. The man must have felt overwhelmed is all I can think now, as he told me that I was lucky to be alive, to be able to study at university and that I hadn’t lived through the war years with the hardship and deprivation his generation had endured. I couldn’t argue with that, but it wasn’t any help either and further cemented my opinion that medicine couldn’t help me.
I never chose to have medication, having observed clients and friends go on anti-depressants and the ensuing fog that seemed to come between them and the unrelenting blackness. I had a very strong sense that medication alone was not the answer, albeit a very welcome and undoubtedly much needed break from the intensity and relentlessness of the black dog for many.
So I had my first session with Serge: after some talking, he gave me a hands-on session on the treatment table. At one point he said, “...and that was your Soul.” I had definitely felt something, but soul didn’t really mean anything to me then.
I had met people and teachers who spoke in glowing terms of the Soul and what it meant and others who ridiculed the notion of Soul and its implications. And then there was soul music, also a confusing concept but its sounds, even though I was not a fan, were somehow befitting of my heaviness and misery. Nothing ever really made sense to me and I had concluded that I was the outlier and everybody else normal and seemingly coping well.
I felt great and a lot lighter after my first session with Serge, waking up much earlier than usual and with more energy than I could remember in a long time. I attended to a lot of things in the house that I had not been able to take care of and that also felt great. The increase in energy and general vitality lasted about two and a half weeks and ten days later it was time to see Serge again. I had about four sessions, each one leaving me feeling stronger and more energised.
Then I realised that, miraculously and nearly unnoticed, I had missed my second really depressive period that year. Each bout would normally last two to three months. In my twenties there were times when it was so overwhelming I would hardly get out of bed, except towards evening when a cloud seemed to have lifted off me. In later years I got used to just keeping going, no matter how terrible I felt and how all-consuming the bottomless black void engulfing me was. I knew then that suicide wasn’t the answer, but living at the bottom of a black pit for about six months each year was terrible – and I feared that it would become worse as I grew older. I had already started having unexplained panic attacks in the middle of the night and waking up with thoughts of death and doom on a daily basis.
Since seeing Serge Benhayon for the first time in 2004, I have never had depression again. At first it seemed nearly unbelievable and I thought that maybe I had missed just one such bout. After my initial surprise I paid closer attention to what was happening and how I was feeling. For about two years after that first session with Serge Benhayon I used to get a sensation of the threat of the black dog, like a kind of shadow, a distant possibility around the times that I would normally get very depressed each year. This phase lasted for about two years and then it also totally disappeared. No more looming threats, no more such shadows, no more depression.
In the years following I learnt a lot from attending the Esoteric Sacred Healing workshops. Totally gone are the down times, the depression and the misery.
Instead of isolating myself and keeping people at bay, not wanting to answer phone calls and thinking that I was a burden, I now have a big circle of wonderful friends from all age groups and right across the globe. I don’t need to hide behind a shaky self-employment shingle these days and certainly do not think of myself as unemployable. Not only have I been working for the last 9+ years but have been engaged in community work and voluntary projects as well.
I don’t wake up with images of gloom and doom these days and haven’t for ages. Instead I wake up early, get up and start work before I go to work.
There is purpose in my life now whereas before there was none; nothing had ever made sense to me until I came across Universal Medicine and the teachings of The Ageless Wisdom My thoughts are not all over the place any longer and gone are the days when I needed very detailed daydreams to escape into a better and more acceptable version of the world.
I am alert, my vitality is through the roof and sleep feels like a wonderful restoration now rather than a virtual collapse and escape from the preceding exhaustion. I have healed my chronic depressive state by making different choices… and without trying.
My life is a joy now and I have forgotten about the black dog; even his shadow is gone – gone forever.
Filed under
Depression, Mental health, Soul, Universal Medicine, Ageless Wisdom
