When most people think of a person who is depressed, they think of someone who is genuinely sad all of the time and spends their days curled up in bed missing out on life's opportunities. While this may be true, depression comes in all sorts of shapes and sizes, making it somewhat impossible to seek out those suffering from it. Have you ever stopped to think about the amount of people around you that are battling depression? Maybe it's the girl from your math class who answers every question, or your professor that is cranky all of the time, or even the quarterback of the school's football team. The fact is that many teenagers suffering from this illness try to constrain their feelings, refusing to speak out due to the fear of being judged or labeled as depressed. I'm here to educate the unknown and to speak out for those who are suffering in silence.

As I mentioned before, depression is much more complex than crying on the couch while eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's. It is an actual mental illness that interferes with your daily life and causes constant feelings of intense sadness and hopelessness. It is caused by genetic, environmental and biological factors, making it somewhat impossible to control. While some might be able to identify a possible explanation for their depression (divorce, death, etc.), many cases of depression cannot be explained, making them that much harder to identify. Seems pretty scary right? It most definitely is.

Living life has transformed from a privilege to a chore, making one feel as though they are simply wandering the earth without a purpose. Think of it like this, your body is there, but you are not. You feel as though each day you are fading away, causing extreme feelings of emptiness. Waking up in the morning becomes a constant task that seems to reoccur, making the days drag on. You begin to lose interest in things that once interested you, and interacting with other people becomes a bother, causing your social life to slowly disintegrate. Your desire to be left alone grows so high that the next thing you know you've built a wall of isolation around you. But for some reason being alone feels very safe and comfortable, but it can also feel very dangerous.

The mask you wear in front of your friends and family slowly becomes worn out after many uses. Due to physical exhaustion, you can only resemble a happy individual for so long. You stop caring about your appearance and hygiene because you figure there is no point in trying to display a positive image of yourself. The grey cloud that floats above you may not be visible to others, but the shadow it casts on your life is undeniably noticeable to you.

The negative thoughts circling through your mind are so powerful they become paralyzing, leaving no room for happiness whatsoever. You are sad, but not the type of sad that makes you want to cry. It's sort of an indescribable sadness, one that makes you lose hope and feel worthless. Fear begins to build up inside because you don't know what the future will bring. You wonder if things will every get better but you also wonder what will happen if they don't. Before you know it, your life has flashed before your eyes and you've spent some of the best times worrying about the worst times.

My hope was to accurately portray what is inside the mind of a depressed teenager because as I mentioned before, it is extremely difficult to tell. One in 10 Americans will experience some form of depression in their lifetime, leaving them with feelings similar to the ones listed about. Be kind to others because you never know what is going on inside of their head. If you know someone suffering from depression, let them know you love them. They need it more than you think.