There is a plague spreading to all the people I love most in this world. They say it starts inside your brain and slowly begins to spread throughout your body. It kills your creativity, destroys your positivity and makes you never want to leave your bedroom. This horrible disease has been around for generations and they call it depression.

Despite all the people who call me an inspiration, I know I'm too sad to amount to any greatness.

When I speak about my depression to the ones I love they tell me that there is just no way, they say that I always seem so happy and I have too much potential to let my thoughts get the best of me.

But most days, I can't control my thoughts and I convince myself that what I have done is not good enough.

And maybe my friends are right, maybe I'm just overreacting and every day isn’t as bad as it seems, but on the bad days, I think about how the good days aren’t enough to make me want to stay.

And on those days when I’m alone, when I have no one who cares, I turn to my best friend but sometimes, she doesn’t know what to say and when she tells me she loves me,

I can’t say it back because when I get like this, I can’t feel anything but sadness. So she tells me I am strong, she tells me I will get through this and I wanna be like, you’re goddamn right I will because I am a badass who never lets anything get in the way of her success.

But just because I am hardworking doesn’t mean I am happy and just because I walk around with a smile doesn’t mean I’m not struggling internally.

And maybe it’s true that no one cares unless you’re on your deathbed unless you’re physically screaming at the top of your lungs for help.

But maybe it’s true that even then people will compare what you went through to themselves and fault you for not getting through it as well as they did.

And I completely understand how people forget to ask me how I am doing because they have their own lives to live. That sometimes lending a shoulder takes up too much energy when you’re this sad.

And I wish I could write an article to make it all go away but sometimes my writing fails.

Sometimes words fail and most of the time on the bad days, they do.

The truth is, you’re tired and I’m tired, too.

But that should never stop us from looking towards the light at the end of this cold, dark tunnel we are just stuck in right now. We must have patience with ourselves because no one gets better overnight.

So I promise, to my future self that I will stop creating impossible standards for myself to meet and learn to let go of grudges I am holding against my body.

I promise to recall to my mind that I have come so far, moved too many mountains and have grown too much to let the bad days win.

This is a new beginning for me and I intend on becoming the role model I always needed when I was younger.