I wasn’t always like this.
I used to actually be a really happy person. I never went to bed feeling like I wasn’t enough. I used to never wish I wouldn’t wake up the next morning - and trust me, I think about that a lot. But you see: depression doesn’t just mean “I’m sad." It has much more meaning to it. I think many people get the idea of being sad and truly having depression messed up quite a lot. If I could go back in time and stop my mind from ever developing this disease, I actually wouldn’t have stopped it. Having this issue has definitely stopped me from doing a ton of exciting things in my life, but it has also saved me. My mind would constantly tell me I was never allowed to be happy. Why would someone who does nothing but overthink have the right to have a smile on their face? Why would someone who can't love herself have the nerve to think they could go out with their friends and have fun? I spent almost all of my weekends trapped inside my room and wondering why no one would ever make plans with me. Little did I know, I was about 70 percent of that problem. My friends eventually stopped asking me if I wanted to hang out because they got tired of me always saying I wasn’t happy or just couldn't take the pain of social interaction. Eventually, they just got tired of dealing with my issues and making sure I was even okay. But that is not what friends are. They are not supposed to just leave you because you are ill. I was sinking more and more into self-hate and thinking of ways to simply just end my life because I could not take the pain that was going on in my life. I spent hours crying my eyes out wondering why no one even talked to me anymore, or why no one spent 5 lousy seconds to ask if I was okay. I felt like my life was one big nightmare, and the worst part was, when I woke up, it was still a nightmare.
The thing with depression is, sometimes it can last a few minutes, hours, or even a day days.. And sadly for me, my life. At the age of 13, I was diagnosed with depression, and many other mental diseases that can be counteracted with that. When I reached out to my friends for help, I was nothing but invisible to them. All they would do is nitpick at me, telling me I was “depressed girl.” They always told me I would be nothing more but a failure if all I did was cry randomly. But they didn’t know me - they didn’t know that I was a fighter, and I will not give up. At this point, I knew that the only way to even feel better had to start with myself. Depression will not just leave my brain one day, but I knew I could at least fight it. Every day I found myself falling even more and more into the hole and the sad part is, I didn’t know why I was depressed. I felt dull, useless, and completely at a loss for any thought - I wanted nothing more but to give up. It took a lot of battling with myself to fight through these fake emotions and become the survivor I truly am. I will prove anyone wrong who tells me I can’t do it, or that I will never succeed. I suffer every day, but you will never know the pain it takes me to even crack a smile. You do not know the battles I am fighting to better myself, or even just be happy for a few hours, so please just watch.
I am not my depression.
I am a fighter and a survivor.
Love,
The Survivor
