Relapses and Recovery

My life feels like a series of relapses and recoveries.
Physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually.
Life was okay up until 2008 shook my world from it's very roots and God saved me.
A year later I was slipping into addiction and didn't even know it. And from that addiction, my struggle with depression began.
In 2010 my health began going down when my chronic pain started.
For all these years I've been battling addiction, depression, and my health.
And finally, as I sit here writing this blog post in 2013, I've been totally freed from my chains of addiction, and on the very slow road to recovery physically.
My depression has been on and off over the last few years. But it's waves have gotten stronger and darker as time's gone by.
And though my addiction is gone, I still suffer from the mental and emotional scars it leaves, that still require years and years of healing. I am still recovering from that dark time, and haven't suffered any relapses from that, by the Grace of God.
But my health on the other hand has suffered through many relapses. Relapses in which I am most vulnerable to depression.
For the longest time I thought depression was just something I'd outgrow. And perhaps the depressing and suicidal thoughts will vanish entirely, but there are still traces of them here and there.
I was doing okay, keeping afloat until last summer hit and my health went the worst it ever had been and stayed that way. Depression hit again in a tidal wave and everything stopped.
My writing stopped. My close ties with friends seemed to whither. My reading stopped. To me, that was everything my life consisted of. All seemed to stop but work.
All because of my poor health and the depression I had sunk in.
Since then my health has had a lot of ups and downs. Many relapses on the road to recovery. And the depression has been on and off.
I've not gotten back to normal yet. Reading and writing haven't been the same.

All this to say is that my life seems to be made up with recoveries and relapses. It seems like there is no end. That there is no "outgrowing" my depressions. That there is no getting to be feeling 100 percent physically like most people I know.
I know that there are some things that will always leave scars on your life, emotionally or spiritually. There are some things that will follow you to the grave.
My health may never be 100%, and that could very well follow me to the grave. The bad perspectives and emotional scars that my addiction left behind might follow me for the rest of my life. The dark waves of depression might follow me to my death bed.
It is weird to think of my life in terms of relapses and recovery.
But perhaps that is what it's always going to be.
I know my life will never be the way it was before. I know there will always be scars.
And deep inside I think I know there will always be relapses on this long road to recovery.
And you know what?
That's okay.

God Bless,
  A.W.