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May 2019
About a month ago I cried because I couldn't find my favourite pair of socks. Last week I cried because I forgot my AP books in my locker, and I couldn't do the homework that I wouldn't have been able to bring myself to do in the first place. Yesterday I cried because my cookies didn't come out just right.

I cry. A lot. About everything.

I have been called everything from oversensitive to a baby to overdramatic. I
mean, haha, I clearly really wanted to wear those socks because now my whole day is ruined. I am extremely good at making something out of nothing.

Being this kind of sad is funny that way, no inconvenience is a minor inconvenience, it's all the end of the world or might as well be.

But I go with it. I joke about my tears and their daily visits.

I also joke about my anger and the chair I kicked resulting in a dislocated toe. I joke about the things I've thrown and the people that make my hands clench at my sides. I joke about it because it's easier than explaining it. I don't like my anger.

So, I've learnt how to turn my angry into lonely and my lonely into busy.
How do I explain that when I say I've been super busy lately, I mean I've been too busy falling asleep because drowning my pillow is tiring.

Depression is a monologue shot underwater, depression is sulking because I won't talk about it anymore.

How can I explain to my friends what is happening inside of my head when I can't even figure it out myself? How do I explain to them that I have been hit by too many people with "how dare you hurt me with your hurt" to not be convinced that I will accidentally do that to them? So we've grown accustomed to sulking. It has become a routine, joking about those ridiculous mood swings of mine.

My depression is a coat disguised as depersonalisation tendencies, "laziness,"
cries for attention and closed bedroom doors behind which continuous music
plays, harmonised with the sound of dripping cries of loneliness.

Of which the belt is anxiety. My psychologist has given it a name: John. Its
supposed to make me feel like anxiety is some exterior force and not something fogging up my entire inside. But he's better known as:

"Sorry.”

“Are you sure?”

“Sorry.”

“I know I'm being annoying."

"Sorry.”

I try not to acknowledge it. So, I leave my pen clicking. hair fidgeting, periods of breathlessness and restless tendencies as just that; inconvenient tendencies. Sorry.

I've been told to pray and trust in faith, but I only wear a religious necklace because if I don't, I go home with a neck scratched raw by John.

I wrap myself in this coat for comfort, which seems ironic. But really, comfort is found in familiar places and it seems I keep losing my jackets of happiness and liveliness, so this coat is all I know.

There are some days I am so sad I don't remember what it's like not to be. Like when you're really sick and you forget how to breathe through your nose and you're so sure you'll never breathe through your nose again and I'm so sure I'll never feel joy again.

Except when you're sick, you can go and get a doctor's note to explain why you couldn't go to school and didn't write that test. I can't tell my coach I missed yesterday's practice because I got hit with a wave of sad. I can't tell you that my homework wasn't done because depression kept me tied to my bed for the better part of the day

My psychologist once told me I was brave to seek her help. I didn't feel brave. I felt scared. And desperate. And lonely. And tired. I am so tired of trying to take care of this terrible body that refuses to take care of me.

My depression doesn't ask for much but when it does it is something I cannot give and that is the joke. It is just me asking for something I cannot give. My friends get mad when I don't give them pieces of me. I can't give them something I'm not sure is there anymore.
Jessica
Jessica
Written by
Jessica  18/F/South Africa
(18/F/South Africa)   
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