Depression Beats

After 2011,(I was eleven years old) I had gone into sporadic bursts of depression and being completely anti-social. My family was a bit split up, yet we all still lived together. I felt a bit cast out, yet I was still there, eating at the dinner table with everyone.

My parents always fought over financial issues, and my father had alcohol issues (who is know sober and has been sober over 11 years now)... and my mother and I had just had a catastrophic domestic issue between us.

Before that, I had always been social, going out to friend's houses, small parties and in general, I was happy.

Summer's were fun, and they were filled with swimming, going to the cinema, shopping, lazy days with friends, biking, fishing, vacations and relaxing.

But after 2011, I found summer to be something that drained me. I hated the bright sunlight. I found it to be irritating instead of wholesome.

By the time I was a teenager two years later, summer was even worse.

My anti-social nature had gotten a hold of me---I enjoyed being alone, creating art, writing stories late at night, listening to music loudly----re-watching the same movies over and over----it was something that kept me feeling safe.

There were days on end, I would stay in, listening to the same music---just writing and writing, and reading too.

I look back at these songs that I used to listen to in my dark bedroom, at the computer---alone, and I think that yes, the times that I spent mulling over life and in that angst ridden turmoil, it was important. Things like that do help you grow.

If you never have any negativity or problems to deal with, you can never find ways to overcome your flaws and your own sense of hubris.

These three songs were ones I listened to the most during my deepest parts of depression, as a teenager. I listened to Evanescence as a whole, but these helped me to cope, appreciate and understand the complicated emotions I was feeling---represented in a simpler context.

Another song I listened to was Umbrella, but as a cover by Mandy Moore.

Her voice soothed me, and the sad sound of this originally popish song was intense and very cool to me. Her voice gave me a bittersweet hope---I loved it, and I played it often.

This song was one of the best to release anger and frustration for me in times of family related problems: (This song really evokes my teenage angst to me as it relayed to me something I wish I could tell everyone at the time. To have everyone listen to me and truly understand this numbing pain I felt.)

I'm so sick,

Infected with where I live

Let me live without this

Empty bliss,

Selfishness

I'm so sick

I'm so sick

Hear it, I'm screaming it

You're heeding to it now

This song I loved as a teen----and I still love today. The lyrics seem so angry and fast, yet when you break them down, they describe something that families go through all the time. Wearing masks, hiding scars, lying to create a new narrative for a broken family.

Grab a brush and put a little make-up

Hide the scars to fade away the shake-up

(Hide the scars to fade away the...)

Why'd you leave the keys upon the table?

Here you go create another fable

And lastly:

I loved this song in Donnie Darko. I loved this song all on it's own. I love it now.

But as a teen, it made me feel a tiny bit less alone.

And even now, as adults, I know that is what we all wish we could feel---less alone, right?

Music helps connect everyone together, let us never sever that beautiful connection.

-Melissa