Trigger warnings: depression, medication, alcohol/drugs, anxiety
Sometimes I just stare into space. Lost but not really looking for anything. A glassy stare into nothing. The whole world feels useless. I set goals sometimes. I rarely complete them. It’s not laziness but more of a lethargic questioning of why things should be done. I guess this is becoming another journal entry. It began as a poem. I’m back on pills. I guess I feel better. It’s difficult to tell. I really do hope I write a book someday. I’m scared I will start one but never finish it. Maybe I should read a book today.
I don’t feel like I’m becoming happier. I feel like I’m becoming better at being sad. Yet, while I am learning to adapt to my depression, to twist and conform it into something manageable, I am becoming complacent. I am accepting that this is a part of myself. I am giving up on being happy. The sadness has become a part of who I am.
Sadness is the most genuine emotion. You can fool people into believing you’re in love, that you’re happy, that you are doing okay. But sadness is real. Sadness burns away the facade you present to the world and leaves you raw and vulnerable. In this way, pain is seductive. Being in pain means you are being your most genuine self.
Maybe I am comforted by my sadness. Being happy means you can fall. Being sad means you can rise. Being sad means I can act true to myself. Because I don’t feel like I’m becoming happier. I feel like I’m becoming better at being sad.
Depression, anxiety, mental illness: it’s tiring. It’s exhausting. Every single day is a battle in a war that never seems to end. And the worst part is acting like it’s not even there. Putting on a face for your friends and family, only to break down when you are alone. Lying in your bed for hours, spiraling out of control. Drinking and smoking to feel okay. Wading in and out of bodies because that brief moment of connection takes your thoughts away from your own. Sometimes depression is a cycle of chasing a new obsession because without constant movement, you are left alone with your thoughts.
I believe, at its elemental nature, there are two forms of pain. On one hand, there is a sadness that stabs, seeping into every cell, scraping away your life source. Sharp, painful, and agonizing. And all you want is to not feel, to be numb and apathetic; because every feeling cuts like a knife. On the other hand, there is a sadness that freezes, flowing through each vein, paralyzing your senses. Blunt, painful, numb. And all you want is to feel, to be reminded of liveliness, because you are slowly forgetting who you are.
I believe the latter is more dangerous. When you become numb, deadened, and indifferent, you become apathetic. You accept your existence for what it is and no longer strive for something more. Just take it one day at a time. I seem to tell myself this every day. Just make it until tomorrow. But, I am getting tired of this mentality. How much longer must I take it day by day? I want my life to be more than what it is. I am existing, surviving, enduring, but I am not living. I am not enjoying what life should be.
Depression is my truest companion and the only relationship I can sustain. It was with me throughout high school and has faithfully followed me to Yale. The summer before my first year of college, my therapist asked me something that left me fumbling for an answer:
“Do you feel like your old self? Do you feel happy now?”
I couldn’t answer those questions. I still can’t. I don’t know who I am without depression. I can’t remember. I can’t remember being happy or feeling okay. I can’t remember who I was before this cloud enveloped my glow. All I know is what I am. What I’m trying to be.
In my complacency, pain has become my norm. In a twisted way, I relish the feeling of sadness because it is comforting to be in a familiar state of mind. Despite the suffering and struggle I have lived through, depression has become a home, and in this home, I feel I am at my most genuine self. When we share our pain, we are in our most vulnerable state, truly professing our most harbored dilemmas. Thus, when I am at my worst, I feel like my work is at its best. In this mindset, only when I am truly sad can my art flourish. Personally, I write when the act of speaking loses meaning and my thoughts become too loud. I write to sort through the mess in my mind and to try and articulate feelings that I don’t know how to define. Writing is therapeutic, an outlet in which I have control over the outcome.
Throughout recent years, I’ve learned how to become a high functioning depressed individual. I’m not saying that this should warrant praise, I am simply stating the truth. And while that in itself is “fine,” it is not what I want my final form to be. My goal is not to be the best at being sad. My goal is to be happy. Sometimes I forget this. Yet, I think it’s important to remember that we can still grow and change, even during the times when the world seems in stalemate.
Sometimes I feel less sad, and sometimes I feel more sad. And maybe that’s okay. And while becoming better at being sad is a step toward happiness, it’s not the final destination. It’s just a long, long layover.
By KJ Richmond.
