I feel pretty confident in saying I am no longer depressed. Since quarantine began, I have gone from doing good to doing fine, then to doing okay. After I stopped feeling okay I was feeling a bit off, but nothing I couldn't blame on the pandemic we were currently experiencing and as a country, pretty much failing and becoming more and more divided. So I wasn't great, but it was also understandable.
Then I fell into my "I'm not depressed, but I also wouldn't say I'm not 'not depressed". There were a few months of struggling as I tried to figure out my future, where I wanted to work, what I wanted to do, who I wanted to be when this was all over. And I struggled.
As soon as I admitted to myself that I was depressed, things got both easier and harder. There was a certain detachment I could fall back on if I kept telling myself this was just a bad day, a bad week, a bad month, a pandemic afflicted world, a confusing future-- all the very valid reasons one could feel a bit off.
But I wasn't just a bit off. I was depressed. And now, from the other side, I'm writing to try and figure out where to go next.
At least I'm not depressed anymore, I tell myself. And trust me, that's a gift. That's a hell of a gift to get out of the Hell of your mind with a combination of pills and an amazing support system. And yet, I feel as though I still have a lot to unwrap.
When your world is colored gray from depression, nothing is good. Everything is simply varying degrees of bad, and not necessarily how one would expect.
I remember deeply and profoundly the moment I decided I needed serious help: it was my birthday, March 7, 2021.
I had narrowly avoided celebrating my 2020 birthday in quarantine, but 2021 I was gifted with an incredibly thoughtful and amazing zoom birthday party, celebrated with close friends and family. As I sat up in my room, playing trivia games about myself and receiving so much love and affirmation, I felt hollow. And worse, I felt terrible because I felt so hollow and empty.
The last question in the trivia game about Rivi designed by my sister Shayna was this:
"Would you like to be celebrating in person with Rivi instead of over Zoom?"
It was an obvious answer, pretty much a rhetorical question. And I clicked no.
I thought I could pass it off as a joke, like haha I'm so socially anxious I don't even want to celebrate my birthday! But that wasn't it. That was far from the truth.
The truth was I didn't want anything. It was my birthday and I didn't care. I was turning 25, an age I never even dreamed of. In my darkest days of high school, when I was only caring about the next 15 minutes, I had no idea my 20s could be so full of life and love.
I'm starting to get back there. After a lot of tears, a lot of hugs, a lot of late night crying facetimes and overwhelmed meltdowns, I feel confident I am healing. But there is still a long way to go, and a lot to learn.
It is the end of the week. I have been teaching preschool (subbing) all of this week and I am ready to collapse into bed and call it a night. I had a good cry writing this and I hope it can provide some clarity on the depth and hollowness of depression.
If you are dealing with depression, fight like hell. You may feel hollow and empty and uncaring, but do not let yourself be washed away with the tide. Tread some water, wave your hands, scream for help. It will be worth it, on the other side.
With love, strength, and tears,
Rivi
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