The Path to Nowhere: A Tale of Life, or the Lack Thereof

           First off, let me be clear.  This is not how I feel now.  However, I have unfortunately been down this road before, multiple times in fact.  Depression is a condition that is hard to deal with and many people feel awkward and even embarrassed talking about it.  Why?  One out of every ten Americans has this disease in some form or another.  You are guaranteed to meet many people who have struggled with it.  Be accepting.  Try to understand a little.  That is ultimately my goal today.  I don't ever wish any of you to be empathetic, but hopefully I can help make a few of you a little more sympathetic.  Have any questions?  I am always willing to explain it a little better to those who wish so.  Don't be afraid to ask.

           Also, I just want to warn you that the below post may not make much sense and may leave you feeling even more confused afterwards than you did before.  Please just accept this and take it as my very poor attempt to try to begin to describe an indescribable condition.  Therefore, let us begin.

Have you ever felt out of control?  Has your own mind ever betrayed you?  Do you ever get stuck on the outside looking in on your own body with no say on how it is run?  I have.  It’s called Depression with a capital “D”.  You see, the funny thing about Depression is that it doesn’t play fair.  It isn’t ruled by simple logic and consequences.  For example, when someone gains a physical sickness, the person rarely assumes that something is fundamentally wrong with them.  With depression though, it’s all you assume. Depression is a can’t win situation full of pitfalls convinced to make you believe in whatever the depression wants to tell you.  Your mind becomes a booby-trapped lair where careful steps needs be taken to avoid becoming the victim.  Yet, if Depression is anything, It’s patient.  It doesn’t really mind that you don’t believe Its whisperings the first time, or the second, or even the fiftieth.  It doesn’t have to worry, because it knows that eventually you’ll stumble a little.  You may start out falling into a little pit.  Soon though it’s a bigger one.  Then it becomes an even larger one.  And more than anything else, the Depression knows that you WILL succumb.  Wearing down walls takes time, but they will be worn down, until soon, you’re doing its job for it.  You create the whispers, you believe the lies, and you start the path to self-destruction that you’re not entirely sure how you got on.

If this was all, though, it would simply be depression.  Not Depression.  Everyone experiences depression, sometimes extended bouts of it.  Trust me, I know.  I’ve been constantly told that everyone suffers from depressive slumps.  The problem of Depression begins when you are sitting at the bottom of that pit, and you look up and see nothing.  No way out, no way down, no light.  You are stuck in the recesses of a hole so deep that even the thought of it starts to fill you with despair.  Worse, that not-so-little Depression is back, whispering again.  This time though, you don’t recognize it as what it is.  The only voice you hear is your own, mocking you.  Telling you that you deserve to be down here.  That no one can or wants to rescue you, because you’re worthless.  After all, didn’t you dig the pit yourself?  Did you not secretly know that this is where you belong?  Isolated from everyone and everything else?  You deserve the darkness, you are the darkness.  This pit is simply a reflecting ground for you to realize your infinite worthlessness.  And because these thoughts have become your core truths, you believe.  You no longer doubt the voice, as it is you, and all it does is simply tell the harsh, bitter truth.  You don’t matter.  You don’t belong.  You don’t even fit in with yourself.  What light did you ever see?  The problem exists with you, you don’t deserve it.  You don’t deserve anything.  Your life is an annoyance.  A bother.  You are bothering other people simply by being there.  Although you’re down in the bottom of the pit, it isn’t enough.  Somehow, you’re still bothering people.

…

So you change your patterns.  You lose resistance and will.  After all, it’s simply truth that I’m speaking.  So I become quieter.  I don’t speak up as much.  I tend to hide more in the corner.  Soon, I simply stop showing up.  This way I won’t be a bother at all.  But I live with others, and surely they too are annoyed by my presence.  So I retreat to my bedroom.  I begin to do only the basics of survival.  Everything hurts so much and I have lost appreciation for everything.  My world could be compared to a black and white, silent movie.  Then I begin to shut down my emotions, desperate for a lack of caring.  My every action is proving to myself that I was right all along.  That I am worthless, useless, defective.  Soon I cease to care about anything.  My days cannot even be called that and I am in a blank, empty canvas, void of even a splotch of paint.  My mind is numb, as is my heart.  Nothing matters.  Nothing.  And every day I pray for the chance to simply cease to exist.  To have never been.  And that, that is something no one should ever wish for. 

…

Your mind and life could all be summed in a welcome sign to a small town.  It says:

                Welcome to Depression.  Population: Zero.  The Land Nothing.  Don’t presume to enjoy your stay, but plan to stay forever.

It’s a pleasant little sign, isn’t it?  And it will stay that way until you can no longer stand it and start the long journey back to recovery.  Thank goodness though, there is a way to recovery.  A way back to the light.  You just have to be willing to take it.  It may take months, it may take years, but it is possible to taste and see color once again.  And once you do, don't ever let it go.