Dear agony.

Look over there, that chirpy captivated girl/guy laughing along with her/his group of bosom buddy. Keep looking and you will find that girl/guy looking away and the smile gradually lose its brightness. That smile continues to grow dim and slowly a thin line appears. Have you questioned what runs through their mind at that time? What kind of thoughts that swims through the head?  What are they thinking about? You see them quiet and still just staring into vast space with a blank face. For a minute it seems like the whole world caved in around them and they are left detached from their surroundings. The next minute they are back to reality laughing, talking to their mates.

She goes back home and locks herself in the room. Behind locked doors many things happen. She could be talking to herself telling how bad her day was, how the teacher scolded her for forgetting her assignments, or how her mum was too busy to even acknowledge her presence at home not even sparing a glance , asking how her day went. She could be on her bed staring at the ceiling, thinking about how much burden she could be to the world, thinking how better to just end it all, or just thinking maybe tomorrow wont be as bad as today was, slowly into deep slumber. She could be on her roof staring at moonlight, talking to the man on the moon, inner voicing out her sorrows and troubles upon the moon bargaining her life for the happiness of the people she love around her. Behind closed doors she could be hurting herself letting go of the pain she been holding on.

Everyone struggles through something we might not know off seeing as they look fine on the outside, but what about how they feel? Opinions that matter or thoughts that should taken a count for? Some nights you can bear the whole world on your shoulders and some nights you just couldn’t take the agony. Depression isn’t sadness. Just as cell growth is normal in a person, we call out of control cell growth an illness, we call it cancer. Depression is exactly the same. Depression is when a normal, human emotion gets out of control to the point where it is no longer normal. Depression is a mental illness that affects our  way of thinking, emotions, perceptions, and behaviors in a way where we lose interest in everything we used to love once. It consumes our daily lifestyle whispering things behind our ears.

“Depression isn’t a choice. It never was. It’s the smile that seems too heavy for your mouth, it’s the breath that you can’t take. Depression is hearing a voice that no one else can hear. Depression is like a shadow. It’s always there, but you can’t always see it. Depression is the forest with the giant trees and the thorny bushes.  You can get out of it, but slowly and not without visible wounds. Depression is a cell that constantly gets smaller and I’ve swallowed the key of the only exit. Depression is like a tight rope around your neck, and the longer you try to fight for your life, the tighter the rope gets. Depression is like standing in front of an accelerating train and not wanting to step aside, because it seems like a relief. There are times when you fall back into the hole of depression and you feel like there’s no victory, but don’t think that you can’t go on. Like ants can carry 10 to 50 times their own body weight, you can carry the cross of depression. Fight every second of the day.” -Mugilan

“I put my earphones on and play a track that suits the situation I was in as I lock myself in a dark room with only minimal amount of light as it affects me emotionally.” -Fahad

To me depression was like a ghost of someone. A stream. It feels like I’m walking upstream through a current strong enough to pull me below. There are others with me, but they are walking along the banks telling me to “just get out of the water instead of helping me up. They would continue moving along the banks, leaving me to suffocate behind. Every once and then, I would find a rock that is strong enough for me to lean on so I can rest and recover from the cuts and pain caused by the stream. But the rocks always get tired of holding me up, and when they let go, I’m left asphyxiating, thrown 50ft back again. After everything, there’s nothing more harder than trying to stand up in that current when everything’s inside you is screaming to just let yourself get drowned.

Life is not easy living with depression. With every step you take there’s always someone or something inside you that’s telling you to not take that step. There’s always something holding you back from doing the things you love, from being genuinely happy, from smiling to everyone you meet. Depression is like faceless enemy but as God said to love your enemies, we should learn to love our depression, Yes, it might have brought us to sleepless nights, tear stained pillows, cold shoulders for everyone around us, masks to cover up how we feel, hurting ourselves, hating how we look and contemplating life but look where we have come up so far because of depression. We have survived the wrath depression. We understand how is it like to live with depression and how to treat people around us because we don’t know their story.

Dear depression,

Thank you for coming into my life and changing the way my perspective is. But I would like for you to leave now. Thank you for the times you made me understand  someone’s feelings. Thank you for the times you made me realized how much pain can someone go through with depression. Thank you for showing me how strong I can be. Now, tonight I just want you to leave. Enough sleepless nights where i contemplate my life. Enough of staining my pillows with tears of the silent cry from the pain. Enough of the time when I lay down on the bathroom floor bawling my eyes out for the past I had. 

 

Enough of the cuts I make to let the pain relief the pain I’m going through because of you. Enough of taking the people I love away from me. This time, I stand on my ground ready to face the road of recovery. I would not listen to your whispering’s anymore because I can make my own choice. I can learn to love again. I can be loved because I for one know there’s people out there that are capable of loving someone like me with my scars and  broken heart. I know there’s people out there who cares. And I know there’s always God giving us a second chance at life to see how far we can get through you. Enough is enough. I believe we are all strong fighters that can fight through you. For once, let us do it our way without your saying. 

Thank you.

To all the fighters out there, keep fighting because the road to recovery is still there and never gone.
Contact thehopeline.org if you need someone to talk to too (: