YOU ARE!

COCO JONES- Depressed

I cannot count the amount of time I put off writing this episode. Ive made excuses and even tried to change the topic of the episode but it is totally unavoidable.

First off, Happy Detty December! If you have any interest whatsoever in making my december detty, please feel free to ask for my account number because the only thing living in that account is air.

Merry Christmas to all the Christians! Did you know that Christ was actually born sometime in October? Well, He was! In truth, we do not celebrate the birth of Christ but the coming of Christ into our hearts. So,Merry Christmas folks.

Back to the drabby depression episode. Can you count the number of times that you have said to yourself or to others ‘I’m depressed’? Like you just feel down and then you just keep tagging it depression. The moment when you realize how depressed you are is the worst moment ever?

All my life, I have lived with someone who has chronic depression. I never really understood him. I just felt like most people around me were treating him like an egg and I felt like he had to toughen up. The strange thing is that he had to use meds too, meds that made him gain weight. I always doubted if the pills were helping him in anyway. I just still felt that he had to toughen up. I mean life is hard for everyone as it is, why did he get to be treated differently.

The thing about depression is how it is not a thing. I had a friend who lived with me years back. She was the life of the party, always helping me through boy drama and all that stuff. She literally always had boys swarming around her so much that my mom had began to think that she was a bad influence on me. And then one night, we could not find her anywhere. She was just gone like that. We all thought she was out there being wild as usual but we were wrong. She had attempted suicide and we only got her notes to us the following day. We searched for her everywhere and eventually found her in her class auditorium, unconscious. While everyone was fussing and looking for ways to carry her to the clinic, I stood there paralyzed in shock. I do not know the moment my parents took her out but I did search for her bag. Therein, I found her account of what had caused her to believe that this was where her life was to end.

Ordinarily to me, the reasons seemed like the pettiest, pointless,solvable reasons ever and so I formed the notion in my mind that she was seeking for attention. A call for attention is also a form of depression. I have come to learn this. When you begin to feel like no one can see what is happening to you without your risking of your life, you might be depressed but I’m no doctor. She scaled through and I have tried to bring myself countless times to ask her why she could not talk to me,. Did I fail her as well? At this stage in my life, I understand how she felt. Depressed. It is the lowest stage of living.

Here are two life lessons i’ve learned from depression. We all get depressed. Sometimes, I feel so out of place in the world. I always tell my mom that I cannot envision my future. I dont see anything in front of me. Sometimes, I feel so down that I feel like this could be the end of my life. I would not want to see anyone and I tend to cut people off a lot. I see no need to invest in friendships or relationships because I feel like my life is a whole wrecking ball that just wrecks stuff that are precious. Even if that is how my life might be, Im still here. What do I do when I feel very down? Literally nothing. I just sit still in my bed and try to picture how different things could be in a different world.

I remember this one time, I felt so much sinking pain that I had to urge to just cut myself a little. It was not like I wanted to die. I just wanted a reason to cry my pain out. You know that deep feeling of pain you feel when you give yourself a deep cut,the shearing pain and the red blood running. I sat there on my bed thinking about how one cut would change my life and I began to talk to God and ask him to make someone call my phone. I did not have airtime or data. Somehow, Tomisin called my line and said something very odd, I just started laughing at how insignificant it was compared to what my thoughts were minutes before he called.

The first lesson is we all get depressed. Some of how are not brave enough to get the help we need. So we hold on to bits and pieces until we can summon the courage to seek for help. There are great days when we want to live forever. There are also bad days when we want the world over. Just hold on to the next day and the next.

Focus on your happiness. Make your happiness undependable on other people. In all the gloominess, create a world of your own that is euphoric. Let out your pain in safer ways. Cry all you want to. Most importantly, find someone to talk to. Someone who truly listens and understands. I might not know how it feels for others but because of that one man I know that has thrived against all odds and all meds, I know I can do it too.

Also, cut them off. Cut all the parasitic people off. It took me a whole year to learn this lesson. When you are depressed, you often find yourself trying to help other peope. You want to make the world a better place. So, you’re burning yourself on both ends to make people better. You have to stop it! No one is saying kindness is a fault but you have to focus on yourself. You cannot help others when you are broken. Fix yourself up sis! You also have to discover something to believe in, something that makes life worth living in. It could be love, God, art, family, anything, Find something to believe in that makes you happy

I am not guaranteeing that this would help you feel less depressed, i’m just accounting life lessons I have learned. I hope the world can become a better place with more of smiling than sadness.

MAKE SMILES, DON’T FAKE SMILES- Oluwayemisi Fakeye, 2019

What on earth does that quote mean anyway?

Unfortunately, I don’t have any wise ass quotes about depression. I do have a suicide hotline number that works 24/7. If you ever feel like you are at the end of it all, it wont hurt to make one last call. So please, save this number to your phone like you saved the number of the girl you hit on last week. You could save it as ‘last quickie’- 08062106493.

I appreciate, love and respect everyone that has followed my blog journey for the past 4 weeks. We have two more to go people!

And this folks, is the end of my TED talk. See y’all next week if you deem it fit to come back to my space. Please, make use of the comment section.

With all love,

Oluwayemisi.