If I had to give it a time period and date, I’d say that my first experience with depression was back in 8th grade when I was 12 yrs old. I distinctly remember coming home from my school, sitting on the edge of my bed and clutching my pudgy little belly in despair, tears streaming down my face.
Growing up, I was a super active outdoors kid. My younger sister and I were only allowed to watch so many hours of T.V. during the week so once that time period was up for the day we’d be outside on our bicycles, playing with the other kids that lived on our street until the sun went down or the mosquito bites became too much to bear.
Even with all that time outside, as I got older, my body started going through all the weird changes that would lead into my teenage years. I look at pictures of myself up until about 5th-7th grade, and all you see is a skinny little kid, with my slim figure being the result of countless hours of P.E. and playing in my front yard. Then around age 10-11, I just started getting chunky, and to this day I still can’t remember what caused that weight gain.
I was never actually “Fat” just chubby. A little pudgy belly and chubby cheeks were really the only features that came with the weight… No double chin, no abnormal shortness of breath, or single-handedly shutting down a buffet… and my biggest “bully” of that time was my younger sister, who would tease me about my weight. Even still, I remember sitting there thinking “Why am I so fat?! I’m never going to be skinny again, no matter what I do I’m just going to get fatter and fatter.”
In retrospect, it’s not the most traumatizing story but that’s an easier statement to make at 25 yr old than it is at age 12.
By the time the next school year rolled around, puberty was beginning to have its way with my body, and I was suddenly skinny again but you could say that the ‘seeds’ of despair had already been planted within my head.
People generally tell me that they see me as an intelligent guy and while it’s all subjective opinion, I do know that I’m nobody’s idiot and whatever I can do to make myself less ignorant of certain subject matter it will get done. Because of this mentality, I’m inside of my head a lot, which is both a good and bad thing.
Overall, I think things through and avoid a lot of mistakes and bad decision-making BUT one of the factors that has always contributed to my bouts of depression is focusing too much on the times that things do go wrong and bad decisions are made. Best example I can give is feeling like you can’t forgive yourself when everyone else that was involved in the situation has not only already forgiven you but for the most part has forgotten about whatever happened.
I’m fortunate enough that my bouts of depression are usually light and don’t last for long time periods. I can’t say that I’ve ever considered killing myself, but I do understand why someone could feel that way… I can’t imagine having to deal with a longer lasting and more intense version of the feelings that I get whenever I let my thoughts get the best of me.
There are so many thoughts and opinions that I’ve had about my struggles with depression over the years that I’m not sure which one to bring to this post.. The fact that I find it ironic and amusing that people tend to tell me that I always seem like I’m in a good mood and happy and me,with my tendency for dark humor, I just want to respond with “I guess that just makes me one of the greatest actors of all time then huh?”
Or that I actually moved past the “Woe is Me, My life is so Hard” stage of depression a long time ago, and most of my struggle now is with levels of Self Doubt mixed with not meeting somewhat unrealistic expectations set by myself. “What if all my attempts to do something great with my life end up being meaningless and I end up living a pointless(to me) existence?” –the types of thoughts I wrestle with on an almost daily basis.
Trying to motivate yourself can be difficult. Trying to motivate yourself when your brain is telling you that everything you do just MIGHT be an exercise in futility is a little more tricky.
I wish I had a dope wrap up for this piece but I was able to write it despite going through a “bout” today, and that’s a dope feeling in itself.
-A.Grant
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