What It's Like in the Void of Depression

It’s just you and that wall; you are staring at that God damn wall.

And you don’t know why you’re staring at that wall. Maybe you’re looking around and your eyes land on your dog looking back at you sadly. Or that plant in the corner that needs to be watered desperately. Or those dishes on the floor that need to be put in the sink. Those pieces of art to the left that you finally pushed yourself to finish… you feel a sense of “good job” come from it but nothing more. What’s seen as a big accomplishment by others in regards to you, is simply a feeling that keeps you reigned down to nothing much.

Your legs feel heavy and your heart feels slow but hard. And you’re well aware that the best thing to do right now would be to go for a walk, but your eyes are gently falling asleep even though you slept for too long.

“Why do I feel this way?”

You get the strength to move about a bit and maybe put those dishes in the sink. You shake the soup out of the tin can and feed yourself; maybe too much or maybe not enough. You sit down and try to meditate but your thoughts are racing in consistent intervals. Through existential crises, anxieties, feelings or complete dissociation. You know you have maybe a couple people to reach out to but this happens too often that… what would you even say? What would they even say? Or ask?

“Why are you feeling this way?”

I don’t know.

So you don’t reach out too often if at all. You know they have their own tumultuous shit too, and since this happens so often you don’t want to be a bother. An anchor. Even though at the same time you’re literally dying for someone to just hold you like you were 5 years old; to tell you that it’ll be alright. Especially one or two people in particular who come to mind. But you know you’ve been like velcro for far too long and don’t want to get too close by habit. You get thoughts of losing them and begin to feel sick. Or if you do let them in, you begin to push away eventually and don’t even know why. Bother. Bother. Your thoughts begin racing even further until they go to that dark place. Bother. Am I a bother? Nah, I’m not a bother. “Yes, you are,” your thoughts scream.

That dark place begins to reel you in deeper but suicide is no longer a friend necessarily but merely an acquaintance. Sometimes. Which is good. Progress. You wouldn’t want to hurt the ones you love either way. You don’t know what the future could hopefully hold. But at the same time… it’s you you need to live for. Sometimes you can. Sometimes it’s easy. And other days, you ask why bother? Sometimes you wonder if this whole time it seemed “easier” because you were just filling the void. Am I even getting better? Or am I just lying to myself?

The minutes on the clock pass and you feel that skin-ripping void within your heart; that void that you’ve tried your entire life to run from — that void that you do not know what it is or whom it is or why it was created or for what reason. So you blame it on the diagnoses, your past or your family or lover. But in all actuality, all you want are answers. Sometimes this void you let yourself fall into becomes a friend, but when it begins to swallow you whole… it brings back that oh-so-familiar feeling that you’ve been trying so hard to hide. It feels like you are drowning deep within the ocean and while you’re panicking, no one can hear you from the seabed.

That… unknown… feeling.

I still don’t know what that feeling is. All I know is that it’s such a bother to me.

This piece originally appeared on Medium.