How did I get here?
I realized that I’ve been motionless for quite some time because I suddenly felt cold. I’m in the bathroom, I realize. I’m shivering because I was in the middle of taking a bath. I’ve drifted so far away that I’ve forgotten what I was doing. How long was I staring at my hands? How did I even get here?
Flashback: I’m 18 years old and I’m living in a college dorm. My roommates are asleep. I’m contemplating suicide. I stare at this spot in our room where the moonlight was shining in, and I thought, what a perfect place to die. I look for something sharp. Nothing comes up. I lie down. How much blood will come out of me if I slit my wrists? Will it make a mess? Who’s going to wipe the blood on the floor?
Now: I’m here. But here feels so vague. Where is here? What is here? I am adrift. There’s a hazy fog that becomes solid when I try to blow it away. The clock ticks, I am idle. What was I doing again?
The thing about depression is that it creeps in so slowly. You won’t notice it until you’re on the verge of a mental breakdown when you’re supposed to be taking a bath. You won’t notice it until you’re crying while doing the work that you used to enjoy. You won’t notice it until you’re listening to the same depressing song for an hour, trying to induce a crying fit because you just want to let it all out.
How did I get here?
It’s so solid, tangible. If I reach out far enough I feel like I can touch my depression. If I try hard enough, I feel like I can grasp it in my hands.
How did I get here?
There’s a jolt that zaps me into reality. The moments of clarity are short and far in between and I am exhausted. I punish myself with work but I’m never satisfied with anything. I punish myself with food, but nothing tastes good. I sleep. I sleep and sleep and sleep and try to forget. I continue to function on autopilot. What’s another joke at work? What’s another laugh? What’s another yes to a task that I will use to punish myself?
The thing about depression is that it’s familiar — but never familiar enough to not make me blindsided. It comes in waves and drops and blows. In blocks of cement that weigh on my chest. In traps and cages and cuffs. It comes as a moment of silence that persists into days and weeks and months of nothingness.
I don’t want to die, this much I know. But right now living hurts hurts hurts and I don’t know how to keep going. Is there anything else but this void?
Fast forward: It’s Monday. I have two meetings lined up, drafts to write, posts to manage, concepts to think, pages to check, people to talk to. I finish my tasks in record time because knowing that I am useful keeps me going. I am a machine that’s worthless without a task completed. The day ends and I am exhausted. I stew in my sadness and keep it all in until the weekend. The weekend is the only time I allow myself to break down.
Aren’t I supposed to be happy now? With a job and friends and family and money and youth. Theoretically, everything should be rainbows and sparkles and warmth.
It’s cold up here.
Here is a Sunday night. Here is my room. Here is me trying to write my depression into destruction. Here is me trying so hard to tether myself in time.
How did I get here?
