To the Depression That Convinced Me I Was Hopeless

I’m tired of not being able to breathe from my inner attacker suffocating me.
Fighting for each breath, there’s only one way I will allow this to end.
I let you win for the past year and a half, but all this time is what I needed to realize the claim you don’t have over me.
How dare you try to overpower me.

Free from your restraints, I am strong enough with the anger inside of me to push you off – you no longer have control over me.
Defeated and broken down, your weight caused me to collapse, hopeless that I would ever get back up.
You convinced me to believe I was hopeless by creating dark thoughts, and you sent them running wild.
That was a clever tactic, but it won’t work anymore.

Unleashed, your thoughts latched on to every cell in my body, poisoning them.
Some thoughts stunned me with the fear that I could never be well again.
Other thoughts convinced me to never love myself again.

Overrun and too intimidated now to fight back, they whispered this was my new life now — this is who I was now.
Other thoughts got creative and painted an ugly duckling over the mirror for me to see, staring back as if it was my own reflection.

Instead of seeing me, you convinced me of my imperfections.
Hair was meant to be straight.
Skin was meant to be clear and tan.
Thighs were not meant to touch.
Disease was something you deserved.

I eventually realized these aren’t imperfections — you taught me wrong.

While I was waging civil war on myself, you went in deeper.
The thoughts you released continued to be destructive as they paced past my heart and into my soul.
Here, they convinced me I was unlovable — unfit for marriage because they promised me I’d only be a burden, and if I had kids they would hate me as a mother.

I felt stabbed by a double edge sword as my very dreams were ripped out of me.
You invaded me.
What an evil strategy to remind me that I shouldn’t have these thoughts with all my blessings.
I believed you when you preached my worthlessness.
But it was you who created these thoughts.

Stricken with guilt, I made the worst mistake by believing it isn’t worth anything anymore when you sang to me the song of death every night before I drifted off to sleep.
Why tempt me knowing it was release to freedom that I desired?

You so kindly offered me the tools I required.
Despite all that I knew, you still played me like a fool and showed me your version of the path to the freedom I sought.

I intended to follow your lead.

Then it hit me, and I remembered someone else that wasn’t in my head told who me there is always another option — and you only gave me one.

I don’t like that.

So I tossed you aside like a damn tornado in search of another one.
I cleansed myself of you even though the pain was a sudden rush.
I started to think for myself; I was determined to find a different option to liberation.
I promise these were not my own thoughts.

You were once a part of me, but you were never me — something I always have to remember.

Now this is me telling you: freedom doesn’t mean all things have to end.
Freedom is believing in yourself.
Freedom is breathing lightly without the weight of your own world bearing down on you.
Freedom is cleansing yourself of everything that isn’t you.

Now that I have pushed you off and I am no longer entrapped by the thoughts you put inside my head, I am free to gain my own strength.
After this last year and a half, I am done losing.

I have broken out of my chains — untethered now, I stake my own claim.
I am free.

I am no longer defeated.
I am no longer broken down.
It was easier letting you control me than fighting you each and every day, but now I am ready to be free.

I am free.

I am no longer defeated.

I am no longer broken down.

It was easier letting you control me than fighting you each and every day, but now I am ready to be free.

Follow this journey here.

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