It’s been a few months since I started writing for HealthyPlace on depression at work, and there’s this topic that I thought needed to be discussed here too. I am talking about the coping mechanism called depression naps, which I define differently from the rest of the Internet. For me, a depression nap is not about sleeping for hours at a time to avoid dealing with the pangs of depression. Instead, it is about taking a nap of about twenty minutes at a stretch to give the mind a break from depression.
As someone who relies on depression naps to get through depressive episodes and even deal with suicidal ideation, I strongly recommend taking them even when you are at work.
When I expressed the same sentiment on my post ‘Should You Take a Depression Nap at Work?’, I got positive feedback from most of my readers.
However, when it came to the video, it was a whole other story.
Okay, I am being melodramatic. There was just this one comment that really got to me. Apparently, without watching the entire video, this guy thought that I was “teaching lazy people to slack off without facing any consequences.” Obviously, he gleaned this from the words “without getting caught” in the title of the video.
But his judgmental tone didn’t bother me. What bothered me was the fact that he equated people who have depression as people who are lazy.
Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against lazy people (unless they are stopping someone else from getting shit done). But to invalidate a mental illness like depression in this manner…it was so hard for me to not engage with that person! At first, I did think I should call him out. Then on second thought, I felt I should educate him. However, finally, I decided to simply delete the comment and move on. Because as hard as I would have tried to get him to change his point of view, his comment clearly indicated that he had made up his mind that depression is the same as laziness. It was either that or he was a troll.
But now in hindsight, I am wondering if I did the right thing after all. So now I want to hear from you: how would you have dealt with this guy and why? Let me know in the comments below so I am better prepared to handle people like him in the future.
You did the right thing. Engaging with him would have only been ugly and pointless. I am sure about this because back when I had my own blog, my explanation always fell on deaf ears. Most people who leave inflammatory comments like this are either trolls or alt-right people, neither of which respond to reason (at least not in my experience). Sometimes, the high road is the only sane option there is.
Thanks for the vote of confidence, Arun. The high road it is then.
PS If your blog is still live, do let me know its URL. Would love to check it out :)