What My Depression Feels Like

I wish I knew how to explain depression, my depression. Whenever I think of putting it into words all these cliches run to the front of my mind. I have a feeling I won't say it right the first time around, maybe after a few tries I will have gone a bit deeper. 

Oh, off topic, but, after looking at some past journals stowed away in my old room I have realized that when I used to write as a teenager I was more honest, even cruel with myself. I was a straight shooter. And maybe that is because I was so depressed, I don't know. Lastly, it seems, according to my journals, that I've always wanted to be a writer and tell stories. 

My depression. My depression is like a veil, a scrim, going over my eyes, blocking out sunlight, distorting how I see the world. The color drains from everything around me and all I see is a dull and hopeless surrounding dying before me. Nothing has happiness, everything is there because it is, it has no purpose. I go through the day interacting with so many people and things, and yet they all feel grey, colorless, empty, foreign things that don't speak my language. I am alone and the world is lonely. Everything tainted with a dark shadow. 

The cruelest part is that when I'm there in those moments of despair, when everything around me is part of a daily strum with no direction, it is in these moments that I am blinded by my own illness. I can't even realize and or understand what my mind is doing. To me it's not a trick, it's my reality. In that state of mind I am not cognitive enough to see that it's my depression making everything gray and bleak, and rather the world is truly not that way. I can't even tell I'm depressed. To me, it's normal. It feels as if I am on a track, spurring along with no decided direction, rather something is pulling me and propelling my body to whatever is next in the game called, "life," but I do it mindlessly, but not with ease, without motivation or hope. I do it because I know nothing else than this repetitious behavior. 

I just wish I could emphasize more how my mind does not work properly, or how it plays tricks on me, or how everything feels like a silent movie with me on a conveyor belt going through the motions because that's all I've ever known. Being depressed and in that moment not knowing that it is your mind telling you to put the lighted fire closer to your skin is the most frightening and bewildering thing I think I have experienced. It's like being mind raped while you are immobile and petrified. 

During that second when I think about burning myself never do I have the second thought of, "this is my depression talking." It's taken over my sanity. "I should not burn myself not just because it is wrong, but rather because I am in an altered state of mind that does not match what I feel in my soul." I don't trust my mind. In fact I don't even know if I can call it my friend. It frightens me and tricks me as if I'm a fool. No, it's my depression. I am smart, not only with my mind, but with my heart. You might be able to pull the wool over my eyes, and whisper my fatal and upcoming tragedies in my ear, but you cannot take the essence of me, the thing that survives the rubble every time you push me off that god damn cliff. 

I hate you. I hate that you make me think I am nothing. I hate that you make death seem like a peaceful slumber awaiting me in the distance. Just past those trees you will find your happiness. The trees are crowding the good. There's good in there amongst the dark and the only way to find it is through. It's hard, and I hope your mind never wins that battle where it takes you and leaves just a memory of who you wanted to be. Keep going. 

The light pervades. 

What the future holds...some prose

Before I start I'll say, "This is me processing my feelings. No, for now, I will not kill myself."

Each day I walk in
the doorman says, "Hello"
I smile and pretend
telling myself to be happy
act like you are happy,
even though you are not
engage with people
say, "Good morning"
and, again, don't forget to smile
when they look away you can stop
drop it all and go back to your sadness
but whenever someone looks your way
"play it again, Sam."
because you can't let them see it
sucking the life out of you
drowning you to the deep bottom of nothingness
how every day is torture
being there, where they don't want you
dreaming of somewhere else
a place where you can take the next step
but, instead you are here
and every bit of me says, "Be grateful."
good money, nice people, still in the industry
I am screaming, but I am silent
"Get me out of here."
These times, dying feels like heaven
my worries would be out the door
and the anxiety would cease
I'd be dead and silent
in peace
away from adulthood
away from responsibilities
all of you try to help me
but a part of me is willing to leave it all behind
just to get some quiet
because I don't want to be tormented
torn in different directions
pushed one way or another
when I am trying my best to move forward
yet no one will give me a chance
they see through me, my desperation
and I am not good enough
or something else that disqualifies me
so, I think, death would be the alternative
and my will to kill is so little that it won't happen
for now
but, maybe in a year
who knows the landscape of my mind
once again digging for happiness
and coming up with dirty hands
no rubies or jewels
nothing
then you say, "I want to be nothing."
this weight is too great
I can not handle another day
struggling to get by
pulling out my teeth
asking, "Do I look happy now?"
a fool amongst the foolhardy
yet no one kills themselves
it's just me
forever depressed
constantly a mess
no way to move forward
stuck where I am
anxiety ridden
a villain conquered at the end
goodbye to dreams
hello to peace
awaiting me on the other side of
what's good and what's not good enough 

Abby Normal

Sobriety, what a tricky little bugger it is.


I feel as if I was raised with a martini in hand, not because of my parent's teachings, but because of the media and what society preaches. Especially in the way our culture reacts to addiction of any sort.


It is made a mockery of, a huge deal, a conundrum of some sort. Look at the coverage celebrities get when they go into any kind of rehab. It is a huge fucking deal that is broadcast over tabloids and social media sites. Please, don't get me wrong, I love gossip and scandal as much as the next person, but America's knee jerk reaction to it all is not healthy for addicts nor our society.


In my world when you tell people you don't drink the majority are shocked and confused, and their lack of compassion can lead to you being chastised for being different. This isn't everyone of course, but there are people out there. Most people just aren't educated on the disease of addiction. They think, "oh you can't be an alcoholic you're only 15." "One drink won't hurt." "You're way more fun when you drink." "I'd Love to see you drunk." "You don't smoke? WHAT?! Girl, you fucking up." "You think you're better than me just because you don't drink?" "Wait, why can't she go with us to the bar? Oh, she has a problem? Well she can still come, she doesn't have to drink."


People don't get it. As if drinking makes everything better. People shy away from you when you don't drink with them and feel less inclined to drink, plus no one likes to drink alone.


I have multiple friends who either don't drink, are supportive of me not drinking, or who never even breach the subject with me because we have fun without alcohol.


This is not an attack on all my amazing friends. This is just what I have experienced throughout the years.


Half the time I want to be sober and the other half I want to have some tequila with a lime and some salt.


I was thinking on it today and looked up sober celebrities and it surprised me how many there were. Whether they had had issues with it or had never been interested in drinking or doing drugs at all, they were sober.


I guess you come to a point when you realize that drinking does nothing positive for your life, and instead just shits all over it. Some people can handle it while others are just, addicts. No one person is better nor stronger than another.


I was sober for a year and now I drink every once in a blue moon. Drinking is part of the world I live in and I would love it if it wasn't seen as abnormal not to drink. It is hard to stand alone in a bar with all your friends who are wasted off too many shots. I'd like to point out I don't expect anyone to accomodate my choices or to take care of me, just be respectful of everyone's own life decisions.

Lastly, I am sober today, and that's good.





Want to know more? I believe this site covers a lot of unanswered questions.

http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/info/addiction/

"Yeah Bitch!"

Being comfortable is comfortable, obviously. So, why relinquish the static habitual bliss ? Same is good, but more often than not I find that change is better. Therefore, to grow you have to move and stretch like the ever reaching branches of a tree. I have yet to see a tree have down turned branches.

You must move forward, mix it up, do it differently, or whatever it may be. In order to get a different outcome you must choose different actions. So, here I go into a slice of adulthood that holds my hopes of a future. It may be terrible or totally grand, it's an experience none the less, and that is priceless.

My point is don't be afraid of being uncomfortable.

The other day as I hung in a rock climbing harness that looked like a diaper climbing halfway up my ass while it squeezed my bloated stomach out of the cover of my shirt, I struggled to find the right route to take without falling backwards into the void of loserville. People at the rec center could see me from all angles, pretty or not. Despite all of these grand perks, it was extremely thrilling to be scared. To be vulnerable. To be at the hands of another person's ability to belay me.

I somehow climbed to the top of the rock wall and squeezed that ridiculous bike horn. Yes, I looked like a demented spider with its legs turned backwards, but I did it. I conquered the fear, or took a bite of it and spit it out like a badass. As Jesse Pinkman would say, "Yeah bitch!"

Make life your bitch, not the other way around. Ya dig?

Heroine

Sometimes I think it would be fun to still be the villain, and also the victim of my own clandestine self destruction. How can someone play both parts at once? I don't know how I did it for so long. I would viciously tear myself down and build myself back up with a foundation as shaky as my confidence and much smaller than my self loathing habits. I never understood the self depreciating Isabella Swan or Anastasia Steele (who are basically the same character). Always thinking they are less than what they're supposed to be or could be. I hated seeing a woman yank herself out of the game because of some convoluted notion of not being good enough. I despised it because I was the same way. All I had done and everything I believed I was brought me pain and a faulty perception of what I one day could or could not be. I'd say,"why would you let him do that" or, "you're so fucking dumb, you can't even keep up" or, "I am weird. I am wrong." Some variation of self hatred.


I let my villainous self massacre me. I was the victim to my own crime. How twisted and bizarre of a time it was when death seemed like an answer because reality was my hell.


Now, here I am 6 years later and a heroine to my own story, my own life. As a heroine and warrior I know the battle is never over, things will come and go, heartbreak and tragedy will ensue, but also that the light I keep in my heart will somehow prevail. Instead of hiding and shrieking for a bottle of beer to solve life's calamities I am now tensing up and waiting for the hit, packed with armor and a sword all welded with my bare hands. Life may annihilate all I have but I'm still the heroine, holding myself up, looking towards tomorrow instead of the past. Life is a bitch, but it is far more pleasant when you are the heroine of your own story, instead of prey to your own folly. Don't believe what they tell you about not reaching these invisible standards. You are your own worst enemy and your best supporter. Do yourself a favor and give up on being helpless. Simply be your own heroine.

Misogyny Unleashed

I may not post as often as I'd like to, but when I do I make it count.

Today I encountered a group of misogynistic men in their 50s. When I offered them complimentary dessert for the one man's birthday, they asked whether it "came with a spanking." I courteously and maybe too politely laughed it off and said how that was not part of my job description. Looking back I regret that I didn't say something like, "What the fuck is wrong with you, you misogynistic motherfuckers. Are you sick in the head? Who told you it was okay to sexually harass me?" I didn't though. A missed opportunity I suppose.

Those pieces of shit weren't worth me losing my temper.

Some might say these men were joking or just poking fun. Since I have been in a situation before where a man has undermined my gender with his idea that it was okay for one of his company workers to comment on my "tits," I know how infuriating it is to be so appalled in the moment that you end up speechless. The kicker was the fact that he expected my answer to be a placid, "thank you."

What hurts is that these men, grown men, thought it was okay to say these things. What is even worse is that they expected me to accept it. Although I did become silent, I learned even more so what to do in these situations.

This sort of touched on the topic of rape and unwanted sexual comments or behavior from a man or woman. People make arguments about the validity of rape with the comment of, "Was she asking for it? Was she wearing sluttly clothes?" Some people respond with indifference to what the girl (or guy) was wearing and instead preach that men (or women) should be raised to respect everyone regardless of how they look, talk, dress, etc. So, was I asking for it? Was it my bright coral lipstick that seduced them into thinking I was open to their chauvinistic comments? Who can say, but I know that that is not okay. Their comments are not okay.

Respect everyone. Men and women. Gender should not determine what you do or don't do to someone.

50 Bucks of Kindness

They say money can't buy happiness, and I would say that is mostly true. But 50 bucks can prove that humanity and unbridled kindness still exists. I was working a shift. I'm a waitress you know. Every god damn shift I have someone who is complaining about something or pestering me about an item I have yet to bring. Sometimes they are just plain standoffish, giving me dirty looks and questionable stares. Yes, I am there to serve you, but remember I am a human being and not your slave. I forget things and make mistakes, let me fix it without you giving me the nth degree death stare.


Needless to say I really dislike my job, yet I also love it. The people you meet whether it is your co-workers, managers or the customers can secretly be a blessing in disguise.


Now, back to my story. I was working a day shift and I had a table of two. They were older, maybe in their early 50s. Both of them joked with me and were appeasable customers, and when a table like this comes along you don't mind hustling your ass to get them extra ketchup or even another plate. While I was chatting with them I found out that one of the two men had just recently got out of a coma. He was in a serious motorcycle accident where he broke his jaw, all his ribs and had internal bleeding. By the description of his injuries it sounded like he should've been dead instead of sitting there talking to me. I was amazed at his story and his willingness to be open about it. It was an important meal for him because for awhile he was only eating his meals through a tube. He of course got a rack of ribs and ate every last bit of it.


At the end of the meal I dropped the check. He handed me a folded up 50 dollar bill and said, "this is for you, not anyone else in the restaurant." I was shocked at his generosity seeing that their meal was about 40 dollars in total. He said he understood great service. I thanked him profusely and just walked away, eyes watering and all. I know what you're thinking, 50 bucks is chunk change. For me 50 bucks is a lot. And not a lot of money to buy things n such, but 50 bucks worth of kindness. So, what if he had left me just a regular old 15 percent tip? I would've still have been happy to have met him and had him at my table because he reminded me that life is precious, appreciate people because you never know what may happen next. Sometimes we get lucky when we don't deserve it, therefore pay it forward. And, for your information, I did.