
If you told me Iâd be living my best life after depression, I never wouldâve believed you. In fact, I probably wouldâve thought you didnât know the first thing about depression. âItâs not an illness you learn to be thankful for,â Iâd say, âYou just try to survive and live as normal a life as you can afterwards.â
Thatâs truly what I believed. I mean, I fought the invisible illness for years not having the slightest clue what was wrong with me until I finally broke. After that, I couldnât sleep. I couldnât eat. I didnât want to live. It was pretty terrible, to be honest with you. How do you come back from something like that?
Unfortunately, some of you know what Iâm talking about. You know what itâs like to fight every day against this âthingâ chipping away at you. It wears you down to the core until youâre a shell of your former self, and the only thing you can think is:Â What the hell happened to me?
Depression happened. Depression sucks. Itâs a lousy experience, and I wouldnât wish it on my worst enemy. But I donât want to just talk about how tough it is to go through depressionâ thereâs plenty of that all over the internet â I want to talk about the âother sideâ of depression. About finding life after the darkness, hope after despair, peace after turmoil. Thereâs something after that hell. And itâs not a mediocre hanging-on-by-the-skin-of-your-teeth existence either. Thereâs a great life â a full life â waiting for you on the other side of depression!
We all get through the illness a bit differently, and for me, it was basically a two-step process. The first step was to learn I was not alone. A lot of people struggle with depression. Like a whole lot. And Iâm not happy about that, Iâm just saying it was comforting to know I wasnât alone. Thereâs something about depression that makes you feel like youâre the only person on the planet who ever experienced it. That kind of isolation only makes the illness worse. So knowing youâre not alone is the first step towards healing. Thereâs an entire community of people who understand you, empathize with you and are rooting for you to beat depression.
Itâs great to know that and to feel just the tiniest bit connected to life again. Then thereâs step two, where the true healing begins. Step two is believing thereâs an other side to depression. Itâs allowing yourself to believe the day will come when the sadness and the guilt, the hollow emptiness that haunts you day and night no matter what you do, will be nothing but a memory. An unpleasant memory, but a memory nonetheless.
Thatâs where I am in life right now. I remember depression. I remember the days I couldnât get out of bed. I remember wanting to take my life because it was barely anything more than unbearable pain. I remember, I remember, I remember. But I donât live it anymore. Itâs in the past, and Iâm on the other side living my best life. I work a full-time job at a company I really like. I became a speaker with an organization called Minding Your Mind to spread awareness of mental health. I wrote a book about my experience overcoming depression and finding joy. Iâm living life! And Iâm happy and excited about that every day.
Iâm telling you this because I want you to know, and to believe that itâs possible for you too! I couldnât see it for myself when I was in the throes of depression. I didnât know there was something good after that kind of despair until people shared their stories with me. They gave me hope, and I
want to give you that same hope. So if youâre in a dark and despairing place, please know there is an other side to your pain, and on that other side is a rich, wonderful, beautiful, fulfilling life you deserve!
source https://www.programage.com/news/What_It_s_Like_on_the__Other_Side__of_Depression_1596286814705295.html
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