What I learned from 4 years of depression
I was honestly hesitating to post this, because this topic is kind of delicate. One may think he’s helping, but the truth is he may be causing more damage.
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Read carefully.
I’m sure that you while reading this right now, you probably suffer from depression. And maybe you’re trying to find a way out of it. I know this, because I was the same, I was seeking advice from anywhere, just to get my life back.
Unfortunately, I won’t be giving you any advice, what I’ll share with you are things I wish I knew when I was in your position. And I’ll tell you my story, heart to heart.
Will it help you get better? I don’t know. But what I’m sure of is that you’ll realize we all share the same feelings, we all hurt the same, and if one of us can heal, then surely, all of us can.
I’m hoping that this won’t sound like gaslighting, my only intent is to share with you things that I wish I knew before it all started.
I hope that you seek help as soon as possible, if you think in any way that you are a danger to yourself right now.
I suffered from depression for 4 years, I’ve been feeling better for the last 2 years now, and I don’t think I’ll suffer from it again. The thoughts that triggered my depression are still there, and they come to my mind regularly, but they don’t have the same effects. My mind developed a kind of resilience to them, and just instantly shuts them down or ignores them.
I remember that I hated living, it was so painful to not want to do anything or to not be able to get passionate about something. What used to make me excited ceased to interest me, I didn’t want to hang out with people and yet I didn’t want to stay alone. It was an impossible situation. Just a painful struggle with myself.
The most extreme moments were when I started to hate my thoughts, to hate what my mind was telling me, to get bored with my own person. It was hell.
All I wanted was a switch, a button to turn me off, to stop the suffering, to let me take a break from life, to not feel like that anymore.
Looking back at this now, I believe I know what got me into this. I remember the first time I felt depressed was when I was 10 years old. It scared me, I freaked out, because I didn’t “desire” anything. I told my mother about it, and she calmed me down. It didn’t last, it was about 2 days of depression if I recall. But this was my first encounter with it. And it came back, 10 years later… stronger than ever.
The thing about depression is we don’t know about it, until we experience it. It’s like a cramp, you don’t know exactly what it is, until you get one, and they tell you it’s a cramp, then you make the association between the word and its meaning.
So when I felt depressed in my early 20s, I didn’t know what was that exactly, and when I did, it felt like I was going to feel like that for the rest of my life.
And that’s the key depressing thought which made this even worse than it is.
I thought that this was a permanent thing, once you have it, baaam, it’s stuck for life. I felt that If I have 50 years more to live, I was going to spend them just like that. Struggling to find joy in something, and trying to find meaning in all of this.
This was all due to my online research about depression, I found that psychologists labeled it as a “permanent mental illness”. This put the cherry on top of my depression cake, and led me to 4 years of unimaginable pain.
I was the kind of guy who was carefree, nothing could actually stress me or put me down. I thought that I was unbeatable, that life gave me a good hand, never have I thought that my most fearsome enemy lies within myself.
When looking online, I was trying to find stories about people who won against depression but I didn’t find any. I guess because no one actually wants to talk about his weaknesses in front of millions of people, and that’s fair. But that also gives the impression that no one actually has beaten it, which is wrong.
What I really wanted to hear back then was the fact that depression, as bad as it looks, is nothing more than a feeling, and feelings come and go.
I wanted to be reassured that anything has a solution, no matter what it is. And I wanted to feel better, that’s all.
So I made it my life passion to get better.
I remember times when I wished to die, to just sleep and never wake up. But deep inside, I knew that even when I was depressed, if someone threw me in the deep ocean to drown, I would fight to survive. Even if I was totally feeling empty, my body will grasp life and aim for that little breath of hope.
If you think about it, everyone wants something, even depressed people want something, they want to get better.
What actually helped me in the end was time and my resolve to get out of this. I’ve worked on myself and improved my mental state. What was left for me is to find meaning in life. For me it was religion that put me back on track and gave me purpose. For you, you’ll have to find your own meaning, no one can find that for you.
I still feel depressed from time to time, but this time it’s different. I learned to listen to my soul, whenever I feel depressed again, I know that it’s just my mind trying to talk to me, telling me to change my behaviour, to improve my routine, and to switch lanes, because certainly, what I’m doing with my life right now, is not working for it.
Depression made me feel more grateful for living, just being alive overwhelms me with extraordinary feelings of wholesomeness. It made me connect with my loved one more, and I started noticing the little joy of life again. Each morning I wake up thankful that I’m not depressed anymore.
The most painful fact of existence is having all the goodness of life yet being unable to enjoy it.
I wish I knew back then that time would heal me from this suffering, that even though I didn’t notice, I wasn’t depressed actually, I was just growing up.
From the deepest part of my heart, I wish that you’ll get better, I wish that you’ll find your desire for life again. And I wish that someday, when you’ll find your passion, and when all the fibers of your body are in tune with life again, you’ll look back to these depressing days, and you’ll realize that things had to get worse for them to get… better.
Ands as always, many thanks for reading.
