this is my story from last year. it’s not pretty; but i hope to make it poetic because it deserves that sort of recognition. even though it was hard and i didn’t think about it like that at the time, it has shaped me into who i am now. i have come out stronger, and i am still learning as i go. that’s life.

i remember being so excited for school; that nervous energy of starting something new coursing through my veins as i organized all my school supplies. i was beginning the start of a lifelong career—my classes were finally going to be something i would use forever. i had started training for a half marathon, so i felt as good as i had ever felt about myself. i was taking care of myself physically, emotionally and socially—making friends every weekend and getting out; something i didn’t do freshman year. i just felt like i had a hold on everything.

i was so naïve.
i should’ve seen the signs.

jacob and i had been slipping for awhile.
we were both grasping at straws that had long since disappeared.
i barely heard from him during the day.
we were just a slowly ticking bomb… bound to explode any mo&$%%#

the aftermath wasn’t pretty. i was in a continuous state of denial, happy, confused, hurt, angry, hopeful… never simply one emotion, but everything all at once. i didn’t know who i was anymore. all i had ever been was with him; and before that someone else’s. i didn’t know how to be myself—i had never BEEN just me. so i was lost.

and tired.
and unable to concentrate.
i couldn’t turn to homework the way i could in high school. words wouldn’t stick because i was too busy being lost in the past and what-if’s and maybes. what does one do when the one thing they were always good at was suddenly nothing to them?
they turn to parties and strangers and liquid courage and boys that will hold them at night because they are scared of being alone.
(i just wanted to feel alive.)

but even in those parties and lying next to someone, i was always alone.
it was inescapable.
it would slowly work itself from my head to my chest and squeeze my stomach so hard that i would cry out in pain. and i couldn’t stop. nothing made it better.
(alive shouldn’t feel like this.)
all i could do was cry and try to catch my breath….

until a ray of sunshine came into my life.

i didn’t know it then when i first texted him that he would completely change my life.
that i would be able to feel happy again; and how beautiful a true laugh felt with a genuine smile.
and things were good again.

until winter hit.
the air was as cold as the empty felt inside myself.
there was no joy, no happy; not genuinely anyway. i learned how to fake.
and i feel like i could justify it more if i said i had faked it for myself—but i didn’t.

i did it for everyone else.

i was just a body going through the motions.
my mind was always back in bed, asleep like i was for a good majority of the day.
or lost in the clouds like it was when i was awake.
i wasn’t really present.
(alive seemed like a made-up fantasy.)

and rock bottom for me was lying on the floor by myself,
crying and screaming and moaning and feeling like nothing would ever be okay again;
that no one would come back for me.
i have never felt a fear so real or so intense.
(is this alive?)

but looking back, at least i can be thankful that i was feeling something. i welcomed any feeling that wasn’t empty.
and after this incident, i knew things needed to change.
half a year later, i’m glad to say i’ve finally found my way back.
i know who i am and what i’m not and what i want out of life.
and sometimes the bad feelings come around and try to take what i’ve built.

and some days i let them.

but most days i fight it.
depression is not a one-time battle;
i just take it one day at a time.
(alive is beautiful.)