What It's Like to Wake Up to the Heaviness of Depression

Nights are hard for a lot of us, I think. For me, my depression is always the worst at night. Everything feels heavier at night. The dark sky seems so daunting and the light from the day seems so far away. The darkness surrounds me so tightly that I’m not sure I will ever see the daylight again.

Right now, as I am in the depths of my deepest depression, this is a nightly occurrence. I spend hours fighting off my thoughts and urges and use every distraction skill I have to try and keep myself safe. My main goal right now is just to stay alive. That may seem dramatic, but when a depression so deep and so dark has completely taken over every aspect of your life — the most important thing is staying alive.

This morning, I woke up hoping the heaviness from the night before had lifted and that the weight of my depression would be a little lighter. Unfortunately this was not the case. I woke up struggling even more than the night before and every move I made felt too heavy to bear. I think I would describe it as carrying extremely large weights on your back — every single moment of every single day. Imagine having to go about your day-to-day tasks carrying hundreds of pounds of weight on your back. Seems daunting, doesn’t it?

That’s what depression is.

Today will be a difficult day and I acknowledge that. But all that matters is that I get through the difficult days and I don’t allow them to have complete control over me. Because as hard as it is to go through a day with the heaviest weights and the most discouraging thoughts, I have to.

I have no choice but to fight.