"I imagine leaving the body and letting the soul out through the open window like a lantern."
Mirror: A Solved Equation of a Depressing Life
My body is just a body that is driven by three pounds of brain. Yet my life was unbearable. I lost hope. I lost the desire to live in a crowd of thousands. This was the time when all was numb. I have painted myself with some unspoken things that keep me away from the world and even from myself. I couldn’t share these unspoken things with anyone because I didn’t know what to name these things, how to explain them.
My daily routine, social connections, unbearable relationships, family, people, situation, manners, responsibilities, duties, career, doubts, questions, failures, errors and many more things make me feel absolutely useless. I was too scared to live. I was even too scared to give up my life. I didn’t want to commit suicide, but I really wanted to die.
Over the last 3 years I have started to experience feelings of big frustration and anxiety as well as some more mental health problems. At the same time, my hypertension started to take a toll on the toes of my daily life and it was horrible. I was having weight changes, sleep changes and concentration problems. My psychiatrist prescribed me antidepressants with beta blockers. A few months later, I was given the top dose of the drug.
No medicine worked at all. My parents said, "These mental and physical complications are the cause of your irregular routine of life." My friends said, “Everything will be fine. Chill!” Almost everyone else said, "Cheer up, "watch movies, read books, meditate, travel, etc." I tried my best to feel normal and I did what people told me to do. Trying to get rid of the weight I always felt on my shoulders was overwhelming. Even then I couldn’t concentrate on anything.
"I resigned!
I left the hull and started cutting.
Yes, I started.
I started cutting my hand,
To feel something different.
Because of surviving in those days
Every second was the worst nightmare!
Because those nights were terrifying
They brought my life to a dead end. "
I wanted to cry. I wanted to ask for help, but I felt like a constant burden. I wanted to tell people around me that "I really want to be okay, I wanted a good friend in place of those medicines. I wanted a bitter-free society. I did not want to live in a society where failure is punishable, where mental illness will be a crime. I didn't really have the courage to ask my dear relatives to stay by my side. Because they are also in this society full of disturbed harshness, full of mental stigma.
"I turned off my phone. I also locked the door. Like a fallen leaf in its own dark room. I imagine leaving the body and letting the soul out through the open window like a lantern. And with nicotine all my pain is blown away. The blade is swallowing all my frustration to touch the skin. I’m indulging in sharp thorny pain to get a little relief, just as we are indulging in the bitterness of the society even though we are innocent. ”
I cried every time I saw myself in the mirror, asking for help. The mirror did not respond. Again I asked the mirror, "Will something happen to anyone if I die?" She gave no answer. She kept showing me my scattered face. I asked her every day. She used to show me the same thing every day. One day, in the depths of the mirror's silence, I revealed the answer to my question, "You are the one who can help yourself better than others."
At one point I tried my best to become “okay,” but failed again and again. I kept thinking that since I had repeatedly asked questions in the mirror, I too could become frustrated with my mirror. But the mirror never cried or told me to go anywhere else. That mirror never fought with me. She never harmed herself. But why? Because she can't speak? Stay silent? So, why do I talk to my frustration? Should I stop talking? Shouldn't we move forward in life by letting go of our frustration, just like letting our hair fall out when we are older?
Eventually, I stopped talking to my frustration. I started to ignore her in the mirror. Instead, I begin to talk about my frustrations with my loved ones; I would tell the story of my childhood in our meetings. I started communicating with my friends. I opened up my stories to my favorites like an open letter. I fell in love with my solitude.
"Honestly, when you can't enjoy your presence, you start to feel bad all alone on the steps. But, yes! When you start enjoying your solitary life, you can't resist the urge to enjoy every bit of it."
Forcing myself to be right in any situation is imperative, because it's my life, and I can't get this life second time. Depression is always an invisible disease. I always have to take it with me. Survival with an invisible disease is full of struggle. However, I am the author of the story of my struggle. After a thousand bad days of struggling with my mind, I am now a completely different person. My frustration is still there, but now I know how to deal with it so that it can never affect my daily life.
Comments