The Process of Depression

Most people when they wake up in the morning find themselves, for the most part, in a good mood and ready to start the new day. There are many among us, though, that find the concept of waking up and facing one more day the most terrifying idea in the world. You might not understand these people, after all they live a good life; there really is not anything wrong with them. Well, for those of you who have never tasted the salts of depression, let me awaken your taste buds a bit.

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         Ashley lives in a suburban town where the rich show off and the poor are more then just the unemployed. Here, in a ‘smaller’ two story house, Ashley lives with her family. Her parents are perfect little love birds and had been since they met in 10th grade over thirty-five years ago. Her siblings were like any other pair of brother and sister; they like to terrorize each other and their little sister. Ashley, on the outside, like most human beings, appears to be normal, meaning that she looks like she’s happy in public places, even when she’s not.  Her friends would swear that her life was the life to have because her parents were still together, and that was something to be proud of. She got good grades when she tried, she was able to drive her sister’s car while her sister was away at college, and her friends were real people, who did real things, and had real fun. In a nut shell—Ashley should be happy.
         Happy is a general term, though. I’m sure if you looked deep enough, no one is truly ever, always happy. It just is not the way life works. Emotions are vast things that can shallow a person whole. Also, they are things that can be faked or completely genuine, depending on a person’s mood. Ashley was for the first half of her life, like everyone else: emotional, i.e. happy, sad, angry, ecstatic, flabbergast, annoyed, and any other emotion her body could muster. But there was a slow process going on inside of her, a process no one could see, and was barely noticed because that is how it is when someone descends into the hole that is depression. It is gradual, it is slow, and it is more sudden then falling off the edge of the world. For whatever reason that science can give a person, Ashley was spiraling uncontrollably down into the never ending pit that is despair. She did not realize until too late that she was no longer genuinely happy to see the sun rise, and when she did realize it the anger, the guilt, the annoyances of it all, took over her life in a way that she never knew they could.
         The day Ashley first noticed the anger it was a regular day, but she knew something was different. Maybe it was the way the sun made its way into her room, through her curtains, and awoke her five minutes before her alarm clock went off. Or maybe it was because it was cold when it should not have been and there was frost still on the grass outside as she walked slowly towards the school. Ashley, in her own assessment of herself, believed that by nature she was not a violent person, and that her patience out witted her anger. Yet, as her day moved steadily forward, Ashley began to doubt who she was. It was a small doubt at first, over simple things. At first it was what she was wearing: why was she not dresses like she felt? Then it moved into small parts of her own personality.
         When she walked into the school building, her senses seem to be going wild, a boy down the hallway coughed. The cough rang in Ashley’s ears as if it were the rudest thing she had ever heard. How dare they interrupt her train of internal mutterings. She was then disgusted and angry. She wanted nothing more then to slam the boy who coughed into a wall and tell him off for living the way he did. At this moment, Ashley caught her thoughts and was scared of them. Her heart seemed to disappear and was suddenly replaced by anger, guilt for feeling angry, and annoyance at the boy who coughed. Not knowing exactly what all these feelings were doing stuffed together inside her at once, Ashley ran to the nearest staircase and headed away from the coughing boy. 
         Ashley’s whole school day went like this. It was like some sort of deadly trap that was waiting for her to just make a wrong move. Every insignificant hand gesture, every ‘dumb’ thing her teachers said, Ashley found aggravating to the Nth degree. Then, she would catch her anger getting ready to boil over, she felt as guilty as though she had committed murder, then annoyed because she had not committed murder, and confused as to why these feelings existed. By the middle of the day, she had developed a system of how to deal with the way she was acting. She would close her eyes and stuff the feeling way down deep somewhere within herself, and then go on with her day, pretending life was great, and nothing was wrong. Her motto became: pretending is being. When she got home that day, she was an emotional mess. She still did not understand where all this was coming from , so she ignored the mess and told everyone she was fine—even though she felt that at any minute she could just snap.
         On that day, she had decided to ignore the situation, to let it sink somewhere deep down and simply forget about it. Days like this happen to everyone, right? But it did not go away. In fact it may have been worse the following days, but she could not tell the different. No matter what, thought, she stuck to her motto and made room within for the day’s extra baggage.
         Gradually, Ashley became numb. Numb to everything that was around her and how it was affecting her. Numb to her friends trying to ask annoying questions: “Are you okay?” “Are you sure?” “What’s wrong?” One day though, the questions got through to her, on some level, and all she wanted to do in the world was cry. It was this day that Ashley realized that she could not cry, as if the emotion was too deep down for her to pull up out of herself. It was on this day that Ashley decided she wanted to figure out if she could feel at all, and her mother’s sewing scissors disappeared into her room to be used in a manner scissors should not be used. It was on this day that Ashley first learned to lie and wear longs sleeves, even if it was getting warmer outside. And, it was on this day, as the blood rose out of the skin and dipped down her arm, Ashley was able to cry.
         Ashamed of what she had done, Ashley dug a new hole within herself and threw new baggage into it, then she filled the hole over, and tried to forget about it. But the more holes she dug, the number she became. The number she became, the more she itched to slide the blade of the scissors across her forearm. The more she cut the more holes she dug. The cycle was unbearable, but at least the more she dug, the less she had to deal with the reality she was falling into. Pretending is being.
         The passing year just made Ashley feel like she was slowly descending into hell. The cutting was not as much as a release on its own anymore. It didn’t let her cry, but it did help her know she could feel. A cut is a cut, but a cut under hot water is delicious.
         Then one day, maybe it was the next day, or maybe it was a year after that. Ashley’s depression went deeper. It went deeper then just anger and guilt. It was deeper then numbness. It was like a void, a void of life and everything a part of it. Everything was painful, not physically, but mentally—and yet still physical. Ashley was disgusted with herself, yet disgusted is not the right word. She was more then that, she felt heartless, soulless, worthless, and as if she was grabbing onto straws that were floating out in space. She was too the point where ‘self punishment’ was not enough. Beating herself up, scaring her skin, abusing her body, was not what she wanted. She wanted nothing. She wanted to be nothing. To be nothing seemed as if it would mean being something, and that was more then what she was now. Without a real conscious decision, Ashley wrote a note and put it under a magnet on the frig door. It was a strawberry magnet. The note did not say much. Only that she knew it was not her family’s fault; that they had been great and she had loved them, and knew they still loved her. It said sorry. She hung it on the refrigerator because that night everyone was out. Her parents were at the neighbor’s, her brother was at State college, her sister was in Washington, D.C., and her friends believed her to be wallowing in too much self pity to care. As if she had planned it ages ago, or as if God were commanding her to do so, Ashley went up stairs and into her room. She closed and locked the door, just incase they came home before she was finished. She went to her desk and got out her mother’s sewing scissors and lifted the sleeves of her long sleeved shirt. There were scares everywhere on both arms, but this time she knew these wounds would not heal. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply. She had heard once that to kill yourself one should cut down stream instead of across, but it never hurt to do both. Opening her eyes she slid the blade of the scissors down her wrist. She pressed hard so that the blade penetrated her skin deeply. Blood poured out. She could barely grasp the scissors to do the other wrist, but somehow she did.

***

         Ashley did not die that day. In fact she would not die for many, many years. When her parents got home and found their daughter bleeding on the floor near her bed, they did not hesitate in calling the hospital. They raised her arms above her head in order to slow the bleeding, putting immense pressure on the self inflicted wounds. For you see, they loved her, and wanted nothing more then to bring love back into their daughter. It took them a long time to see how far she had fallen, but now that they knew, they would do anything to help their little girl. 


Author’s Note:
This is not a true story. Please do not come away from reading this in a negative way. I wrote this short essay four years ago in high school in rebellion, I think. I’m not sure what I was rebelling anymore, I don’t think I knew at the time I wrote this either. I’ve recently edited the ending because I know some people look to writing and stories as the answers to situations in their own life. I do not want that to be the case here. I would rather this piece serve as a warning. For those of you who have a friend who is depressed, or is acting out to get attention, it is because they are lacking something in their life. As, a friend you should find a way to make sure that person gets the help they need. If you are one of the people who wakes up every morning and wants nothing more then to roll back over and sleep forever, because it would make things easier: it’s time that you looked at yourself and realize that you need to stop digging.