For generations, depression has been seen as an illness, disorder or even weakness. Such an idea makes sense because depression causes suffering and even death. But what if we’ve got it all wrong?

The common wisdom is that depression starts in the mind with abnormal thinking. That leads to symptoms like headaches, stomachaches, or tiredness. Now, models like the Polyvagal Theory suggest that we've got it backward. It's the body that detects danger and initiates a defense strategy meant to help us survive. That biological strategy is called immobilization, and it demonstrates in the mind and the body with a set of symptoms we call depression.

When we think of depression as unnecessary suffering, we are telling people with depression that they are not part of the group, they are not right and they don' t belong. That robs them of hope. But when we begin to understand that depression, at least initially, happens for a good reason we lift the shame. Instead, people with depression are courageous survivors, not damaged sick people.

The autonomic nervous system (ANS) is constantly scanning our internal and external environment for signs of danger. If our ANS detects a threat or even a simple lack of safety, its next strategy is the fight or flight response, which we often feel as anxiety. Sometimes the threat is so bad or goes on for so long, that the nervous system decides there is no way to fight or to flee. At that point, there is only one option left: immobilization.

The immobilization response is the original biological defense in higher animals. It dulls pain and makes us feel disconnected. Think of some reptiles (爬行动物), which shut down their bodies to avoid cold temperatures and the lack of food and water. In humans, people often describe feeling “out of their bodies" during extremely unpleasant events, which has a defensive effect of reducing the emotional shock. This is important because some things are so terrible, we don't want people to be fully present when they happen. What incredible capacity of our biology to find a way in hard times!

I work at a grocery store in Montreal's Plateau neighbourhood, which gets a lot of regulars. On March 12, the Quebec government announced to close all public places to stop the spread of the pandemic(流行病)of coronavirus.

The next day the store was the busiest I've ever seen. The six cash registers had to be kept open from 10 a. m. until close. It was nuts. I didn't have time to eat lunch, and whenever one of us on cash had to use the bathroom, we^’d have to bring in a coworker off the floor to cover for us.

Since then, the atmosphere in the store has been different. Customers are mostly considerate, but whenever someone coughs or sneezes, everyone turns around to make sure that person sneezed into their elbow. I've even seen customers come in wearing some strange get-ups. One guy even came in with a plastic Walmart bag wrapped around his entire head, with a slit cut out for his eyes.

A lot of my coworkers have left to avoid a public-facing job during the pandemic. Grocery store workers across Canada are putting their health at risk every time they come in to work, but a lot of us are still making close to minimum wage. I realized that I feel more exhausted than normal even though I'm working the same hours.

There still have been some moments of kindness in the midst of the chaos. I've overheard people talking on the phone who sounded as though they were organizing grocery deliveries for those stuck at home. And this past weekend a very nice lady thanked us for continuing to work. I know everyone is worried, but it's uneless having the same scary conversations day after day. Instead, tell us a funny anecdote, or about Homething nice. We'll appreciate the distraction, and you'll make our day just a bit brighter.

My twin sister is in therapy (治疗). The other day, she missed an important appointment for no good reason. My therapist said it was “time blindness”.

I’m living in New York, 3,000 miles away from my twin. We video chat every day, but I haven’t seen her in person since Christmas.

Time blindness is a term invented by doctors who treat people with ADHD (注意缺陷多动障碍). Psychologist Ari Tuckman says adults typically develop an awareness of time and an ability to track its passing. Some people have what he calls “harder” or “sharper” time awareness: they know when they’ve been out for lunch for too long, or when something hasn’t been in the oven for long enough. The others have much “softer” time awareness: they can miss appointments and trains. Time blindness can greatly impact someone's life if they can't ever meet deadlines. People with ADHD are often more time-blind than others.

Besides our own time awareness, Tuckman says, context plays a role: sleep loss, anxiety, being drunk and anything that might impact how we process the world can make us feel more time-blind. Without the usual time-marker cues we might use to divide up our days — the school bus arriving, the line at the coffee shop, or weekend nights spent at restaurants with friends — we’re swimming in a sea of sameness.

Sorrow is one of the biggest causes of time blindness, according to Tuckman. Holding onto time is a skill of your mind, like doing math, and sadness reduces its computing strength. It's why time goes faster when I talk to my twin sister, when I’m not so sad.

Tuckman says it might be nice for more people to understand time blindness.