Image by Stormseeker on Unsplash

Probably not ideal to publish this here, but couldn’t think of where else to get it out. It’s bleak, but is probably one of the best ways to describe what it’s like fighting the throes of depression.

You’re on the outside, staring in, separated by a thick tinted pane of glass. You can see everything on the other side. Beautiful meadows and landscapes, sunny days, warmth, happy people, living their lives, succeeding, being rewarded. People you care about and that care about you beckon you over, but despite how hard you look, there are no openings. That thick, cold glass returns a veiled vision of what could be. It blocks you out. Keeps you away from ever reaching your full potential.

Behind you, a deep, dark ocean billows, and it is angry. It’s ready to swallow you up with the slightest misstep. Rain pours from overhead. Not soft, cool, or refreshing, but bone-chillingly cold, hard as a rock. It pummels your skin, body and head.

No matter how hard you try to focus on the other side of that glass, on the warmth and positivity, the despair eats you up inside. That ocean roars, the rain pelts, and an uncontrollable brain fog sets in.

Medicine numbs it, maybe for a few hours, if you’re lucky. Alcohol quiets the senses, but the pain is still there. Therapy holds the despair and voices at bay, temporarily — it’s like bleeding an infected wound. There is no solution. You hope for some reprieve. You wish with all you have, your fleeting energy, that it would slow down, if only for a little while. Anything that could help would help, is broken by a growing tolerance in your body. A dam, if you will, pressed against the frigid waters of depression. Keeping those waters locked in on your side so you feel every ounce of pain and misery you deserve. The universe hates you in that moment, probably always has.

Someone on the other side of the glass waves. It reminds you they’re happy. Without you, distant, they continue their existence. You realize everyone would be better off without you; you’re just dragging them down into the deep like a block of cement tied at their feet. Your children and their smiles, your spouse and their cheer, your family and their laughter, it’s all joys and emotions you wish you could experience. But the pain, the sorrow, the darkness, it swallows you whole, refusing to spit you back out.

A multi-headed hydra assaults your brain. Different heads, all with different attacks, yet all joined to the same purpose. You are not good enough. You never will be. You’re a loser, a fake, a fraud. You’ll never see success. Everything you have, everything you are, is worthless. You’ll lose it all. You’ll lose them. No one can ever love you. You can’t even love yourself. You’re pathetic, sick, twisted, and ugly. 

On and on it goes, for minutes, hours, days. The words they ebb and flow, and your brain does its unholy dance. Your own body, your own organs, are your enemy in this place, in this zone. You might as well be dead.

“Just be happy,” someone calls out. “Life is good, what do you have to be sad about?” More words from people you know. People you need support from. “Maybe do this, maybe do that, maybe try this.” Suggestions flow like the insults before them, except no hard answers. Everyone is an expert, everyone is a critic.

Only those who have gone through it all before could understand. Even then, it’s something lost, not forgotten, but pushed aside when they are not sinking themselves. The world has learned to ignore it all. To bypass those suffering. To keep walking, existing.

You are alone, truly. Curled in a fetal position in bed, under the covers, shivering profusely, but only metaphorically. To others, no one would notice the difference. You look like nothing more than a broken, exhausted human with no external wounds and no visible scars. But inside, festering, swollen, pus-addled, your body fights to survive.

You fight to stand just one more day. Everything you love is dull, muted. You can’t find joy anywhere. Not in the people you love. Not in the hobbies you adore. Everything looks bleak, dark, and tainted.

Until one day, it subsides. The sun comes back out, and the warmth touches your skin. You risk a smile and feel the emotion behind it. The world is your oyster, again, and failures don’t seem so bad. Success is on the horizon, and a life of happiness is within reach.

Those who know you well look on in wonder. How can you weave between the dimensions with such ease? Weren’t you nearly crippled with despair days earlier? The voices, the pain, the darkness, they sit there just on the cusp, the outer boundaries, waiting to close in again. You have no idea how long they’ll wait. It could be hours, it could be days, months, hell, it could even be seconds. There’s no moving forward here. No carryover progression.

Doctors posit. Researchers explore. The healthcare industry profits. But no one really knows why the brain and the body does what it does. And neither do you. You just do your best to appreciate the warm days you have, the happiness you feel, rare and fleeting though it is. A seething rage and hatred for the universe is stomached, as best you can, fighting regurgitation.

There is no warrior here. Just a human. Broken. Incomplete. Sensitive.