Angels Of Hope

Chapter 34

Depression means that without sound, the mind plummets downward into less and less light, and darkness beyond measure. Is there a bottom to the mind's pain? Is there any branch of hope, or something to catch or hold onto? Is there some rescuing idea that can come into the thoughts of the victim? How much darkness can one take without any light? It seems that hope cannot come from within us, so it has to enter from outside. If one can turn his thoughts toward the Almighty One, even for a flashing moment, then that will be a moment of relief. Why? Because a small light will appear in the dark thoughts, and this thought allows us to see the greatness of Him who loves us. The Light morphs into more rays of hope. Even a small ray of hope will revel His power, when we have none. In our downward plunge, a strong hand reaches, catches us, and halts our drowning in bottomless gloom. He pulls us up and we breathe in His Light. It is not total relief yet, but it is a start.

Crying had always been a healthy release, but for me it was a habit now. The blue feeling washed in like an unwanted wave, knocking her sandcastles flat. Then what? Was I supposed to construct them again? Get that bucket and spade out and make it pretty all over again? I sat. No more building, no more castles. I sat and stared out of the window, more tears, no surprise there. I let them fall, not raising a hand to stop them. They splashed down onto the couch in a rain-like pattern and soaked in leaving dark splotches on the coffee coloured fabric. There was more where that came from, what percentage water was I anyway? Less than a cucumber but certainly enough to cry for hours. And what then? Then I'd drink another glass of water and start all over again.

There's nothing tragically beautiful about depression. It's not sad songs and poetry, shy glances or drowning in the bath. It's not ghostly white skin tainted by charcoal circles under sad eyes and large purple bruises stretching viciously up your arms. It isn't lonely walks, vacant coffee shops or smoking dusty cigarettes.

Depression is unwashed clothes and flaking skin. It's over eating and the inability to even get out of bed. It's giving up on yourself and not taking pride in your appearance anymore. It's empty inboxes, bursts of anger and late night tears. It's a feeling of disgust within yourself that makes you want to tear off your own skin just so you can feel clean. It's uncertainty and confusion. It's losing weight, long showers and greasy hair. It's constantly wishing you could be somewhere or someone else. It's losing the will to even live.

Depression is not tragically beautiful, it's just tragic.
I know everything about my darkness, yet I know nothing about why it haunts me, nothing about why it sometimes settles for days and other times appears for a fleeting hour. There is only one way I can explain it. You know when something bad has happened, and the next day when you wake up in the morning, for those first 3 seconds your mind is deliciously blank, you remember nothing and nobody? Then it hits, your heart drops, your stomach sinks and you squeeze your eyes shut, hoping it was all a bad dream? When the darkness comes, that is what I feel like, every moment of everyday, until it passes. My body feels hollow and full of sadness all at once, I can't remember ever being happy. I don't know what I'm sad about, but it's bone crushing sadness, the kind that makes you clench every muscle in your body to try and squeeze it out. The kind of sadness that makes you unable to think about the future. The kind of sadness that makes you feel like you're alone, even when you're surrounded by friends or family. It's the kind of sadness they send you to a doctor for, as if a walking PhD will be able to solve everything by prescribing the right pills to lull you into the only state worse than depression -- unfeeling.

Sometimes, I wonder what it would be like. To still love the sun and the rain, and be able to dance with the breeze. It's still now; I haven't seen it in a while. Suddenly, the time became measureless, and it dissolved into itself, as shapeless as the rain. I'm tired of waiting for the breeze to come and disperse the fog that brings the rain. I'm tired. The rain seems to be a constant. I hate this, that I find no more joy in the sun and the rain, that dancing through the trees with the breeze no longer compels me. Things are changing; the world no longer moves as it once did, the trees no longer whisper their secrets to me, I no longer see the fairies in the blades of grass. Maybe I'm growing up. Thoughts of the rain cloud my delicate head, invade my fragile thoughts - they become me. I can only think of the rain, because the rain is inviting, and the cold makes my breathe catch in my chest and I realize I am alive - I am breathing which means my heart must be beating, which means I must be feeling but I am not feeling - why am I not feeling? I am not living. This is not a life, a life with the rain.