Depression

Living with depression is one of the hardest and most difficult things to live with in life. Depression is very unpredictable. You never know what your mood is going to be like in the next hour, minute, or second. Some people say that people who suffer from this are just attention seekers, well let me tell you that they are very wrong. Just because we need more reassurance than others and we might push you away, that does not mean we are attention seeking. Some people with this mental health problem cope in different ways, but no one should judge us for the way we cope because we are doing the best we can to get through this. We don’t need your input on the way we do things. I know some people hate talking about things like this, but this is a very important subject to talk about because it is a very common health issue with teenagers. Don’t get me wrong, you can suffer from this at any age, but it is most common for the teen years. This is something the whole world needs to be aware of because it’s a very useful skill to have if you have mental health training. One of the most annoying things that we are told is that “everything will be fine.” Don’t say things like that because that is not helping in any way. Another thing is “I know how you feel.” No you don’t! Everyone is different, no one is the same, and that is why it’s such a difficult thing to cope with. It is very important that if you suffer from depression that you have a trustworthy and reliable person to talk to, because no one should suffer in silence!! People say living with depression you should always try and find something to do or distract yourself. This is very hard to do because with the mental health issue, you lose a lot of interest in the things you like doing. For example, I used to listen to music as a way of coping, but now I don’t like listening to it at all because none of the different type of genres interest me. I’ll get annoyed at myself for it because I know I used to love it and now I would have to find another way to cope.

Getting help is one of the most important things to do when you suffer from depression. It could be seeing your local GP or talking to someone at school or work. Any type of help is better than nothing. There are always the helplines that you can call if you don’t feel confident talking about it to someone face to face.

Depression is a very confusing thing to explain because when someone asks you how you feel, you never know what to say or how to explain it. You could be in a room full of your family and friends but still feel so lonely and unwanted. Or it can feel like you scream so loud and everyone will hear you, but nobody listens. or you can feel like you have no emotions at all and you will do anything to feel something. You can be drowning in thoughts and trying hard to swim to the surface, but the thoughts are too heavy so they drag you down. But it’s important to know that these thoughts are just your imagination. You can beat these and they can mean nothing to you if you let them and believe in yourself.

Here is a list of questions you may ask yourself if you are living with depression...

• When will this feeling go?
• When will it come back?
• How do I make it stop?
• Is this my life now?
• Why am I like this?
• Why me?
• Am I good enough for anyone?

You could go on forever, but those are some of the questions that people with depression will ask themselves, so help them answer them.

Let me tell you this: people who suffer from this mental health issue are the strongest people that I know. They are amazing, beautiful, handsome, I could go on forever! But seriously, just bear with us because we are trying even though it may not look like it.