fight the good fight

I struggle deeply with severe depression. The posts I write on here are primarily me preaching to myself the things I know to be true, in order that I might fight well. If you struggle with depression also, might I suggest to you trying some of the tools I found helpful in the fight? If anyone knows the despair of depression, I promise you I do. I have fought and fought for 9 years now, and with the most debilitating bout of severe depression I have ever experienced for a year and a half. Day after day I wake up dreading the fact that I have to live another day, and night after night I go to bed with the fear that I might have to wake up the next day and do it all over again. I live in the loneliness of the fight, because, although I have some amazing friends fighting with me, this fight is ultimately mine. The only hope I have found is that I am actually not completely alone in the fight- Jesus is with me in it more than I can imagine. I sometimes think about how it says in the Bible that Jesus has experienced every temptation we have experienced. Depression is a temptation, a temptation to despair. I imagine that Christ felt this temptation most when He was on the cross and felt completely abandoned by God the Father. Depression probably doesn't even begin to describe what He felt. I guess what I am not so eloquently saying is that He knows what I'm going through, down to the second. He gets it. And as with any disease, one of the hardest things about depression is that nobody gets it, which is even more alienating. But He does. That alone brings some relief. But what is even more, He is righteously angry that Satan would attack me in this way. He is furious that His beloved daughter is being blinded to the joy that is found just in looking upon His face. He will not leave me alone in this. Not only has he spared my life, literally, twice in the past year, He fights with me every day to preserve the life He has given me to live for His glory and my joy. Like I said yesterday, He LOVES me. Holy crap, that's crazy. I guess I don't have a point to this post. I thought I did.... but anywho, just some thoughts for the weekend.