About

Hello. My name is MA.

Well, no, it's not but it's a version of my name (aka my initials) that allows me to have just enough anonymity so I don't increase my name's google hits suddenly and irreparably.

I live in DC. NW, to be specific.

I grew up in New Jersey and went to college in Chicago. I lived in New York for a few years before coming to the District; I've now been here for more than half a decade. That's longer than anywhere else other than the Jerz, and I am simultaneously impressed and horrified.

I was diagnosed with Major Depressive Disorder, recurrent in 2010, and have in fact experienced recurrences of the truly dark periods of my life when I really just do NOT. Give. A. Shit.

But I was also prescribed Sertraline (the Zoloft generic) in 2010, and it has done an amazing amount for my sanity. I feel more myself than ever these days, although if you ask me tomorrow I could easily slip back into the horrors. Let's hope it doesn't happen, but such is a chronic illness. One day you're great, the next day, lying in bed with no hope of getting up - shower? Pah! - and the only desire is to close your eyes and trust fall back to sleep because seriously, why does it matter.

I don't buy the bullshit that depression and anxiety (especially but not exclusively the clinical kinds) are a self-indulgence meant only for the first world. Life is shitty sometimes, and if you've gotten cancer or had someone you loved hurt by something/someone else, you don't need to be told that. Depression (and anxiety, because at least for me, the two are nearly inextricable) is a condition I live with every day. I wish I didn't have it. I wish I didn't have to take mg of a medicine that people judge, I wish I didn't have to remember to take it every day, and I wish that despite actually TAKING it everyday, I still withdraw into myself and hurt the people around me.

Luckily! They are good peeps.

And so this is me. Oh yes. The extrovert part. If you met me tomorrow (unless tomorrow is a Dark Day, in the non-Hunger Games sense), you'd likely think I am happy! Bubbly! Cheerful! Glorious! all the time. I know this, because those are the words I use to describe nearly everything good. I am hyperbolic at worst, and who does that hurt? People like happy fun other people, and I'm pleased to fill that role.

But underneath that incredibly outgoing exterior, I'm sort of a mottled version of extroversion and depression. Happiness? Sure. Devastation? Yes. Most content with other people? Absolutely. Needing to be alone to cry into a pillow sometimes? You betcha.

It's a messed up life, but then, whose life isn't?