Endings.

Endings are always hard. They throw up so many emotions, from intense affection to total abandonment. They can make you doubt yourself and your feelings and can make you question your ability to cope with hardship. For me, next week will probably the hardest of my life. I find endings and goodbyes torturous and I am beginning to realise that I am grieving the relationships that have been so helpful to me and, now that I am getting older, have to end. I have to say goodbye to two people who have been instrumental in keeping me alive these last two years. I have relied so much on these relationships- they have helped me to survive my despair and build resilience to my distress. They have shown me that in the future, I could have a life full of happiness, friendship, love, comfort and satisfaction, instead of the turbulent, unstable and utterly miserable life (if you can call it a life) that I have been living for so long. I also have to say goodbye to my school, which used to be my paradise and in more recent months has become my hiding place. The thought of not ever seeing these people again is so painful; it makes me want to die- I do not feel as though I will survive these endings. I am terrified that I will be forgotten and that once I leave, I will cease to exist in their minds, which is a grim thought for me, as I derive comfort from knowing that people are thinking of me. What I have been noticing, however, is that while endings will inevitably be painful and full of raw emotions which sometimes will make me want to destroy myself, they can also be incredibly powerful and helpful in building inner strength and moving on to a better place. For although these relationships have been immensely helpful, life saving in fact, the truth is that I have not recovered and that I seem to be stuck in this rut, and this is where an ending can be important in the healing process. If I do not move on, although these relationships may help me to survive the pain, it can mean that the pain does not go away. It is only when these relationships come to end that I have to learn to stand on my own two feet and move on, to grow and to thrive. It breaks my heart to have to say goodbye to all of these people who have meant everything to me, and although I feel such a terrible loss at these important relationships coming to an end, I know that, unlike genuine grief, the people who mean so much to me are not actually dying; they will survive the ending, as will I, and all people involved will continue to benefit from the relationship for years to come. I will never forget the people who have meant so much to me, and I hope beyond all hope that they will not forget me. Even though the next seven days are going to be agonising for me, I will be a stronger person at the end of next week than I am today. These endings mark a new, hopeful beginning for me, one that may lead to a happy life and that is a tiny ray of hope to hold onto in the darkness of the coming week.

Strength.

Living with a mental illness is all consuming. It drains every drop of energy you have and leaves you feeling hollow, numb and utterly miserable. So often, the hardest thing to do is to carry on living and attempting to function as normal. Sometimes, it seems impossible to do. But I genuinely believe that within all of us lies an almost superhuman strength. It is this strength that drags you out of bed in the mornings and that makes you smile even though you're dying inside. The strength comes from a place no unchallenged human mind can unlock, but in the face of adversity, we discover that we are far stronger than we ever believed possible. It is this strength that has kept you alive thus far, and this strength will continue to pulse through you when life is unbearable. It does not make you feel better or make things easier but rather gives you the ability to work through the hardship with the hope of a life that, one day, may be worth living. The really wonderful thing is that this strength is by no means separate from you as a person. You are the one who is immensely strong and powerful. You are the one who finds the ability to carry on living when you would rather be dead. You are outstanding, beautiful and you have the power to conquer the unbearable pain that for so long has crippled you. And you must remember that you are not alone. Your strength will naturally draw other people to you, and together, you can climb your Everest. 

Warp.

One thing I have come to understand in the past months is that depression drastically warps our outlook on life. 

It is as though you are looking at life through a kaleidoscope, the only difference being that while a kaleidoscope turns light into beautiful mosaic like patterns, depression makes light look dark, colours look grey and the most beautiful of things look, at best, ordinary. Depression warps one's perception of the world around us: Filtering out the good, positive, life affirming things so that what we are left with is a hopeless cavity into which all things are drawn and warped to appear negative, hence compounding our view that there is really no reason for us to live at all. Whatever we have previously enjoyed, believed in or relished is sucked from our world; we lose, in essence, the ability to derive pleasure from anything or to hold on to any hope that life will be good again.  

And regardless of how well my head knows the fact that it is the depression taking away my will to live, it doesn't change the fact that I CAN'T see the point to life. I can't tell the depression to leave my head, simply because I have recognised the cause of my despair. The fact of the matter is, depressed people still FEEL the despair, the loneliness, the hopelessness, the futility, the sadness, the frustration, the impulse to hurt and even kill themselves, the emptiness and so much more. Regardless of what causes these emotions, they are very much present and dominant in the lives of so many people. Depression warps everything good in the lives of its sufferers into something unbearable. And that's hard to live through.