Defeating Depression

When I use to think of the word depression, I use to think of someone with a mental illness, someone who always wanted to kill themselves, and someone who was sad most of the time. But when I started suffering from depression, I knew that it was more to it.

In 2017 depression hit me hard. There were so many instances where I wanted my world to stop. Suicide for me always seemed like the answer, but for some reason, I knew I had a purpose on Earth. At the time I had two boys who needed me, but I felt so distant from their world, I didn’t feel like they needed me at all. I lost weight, and nothing seemed to matter to me anymore. I was sick, depression entered my world, and at the time, I didn’t know how to defeat it.

My depression started when I let someone enter my life and turn it upside down. To this day, I am still trying to pick up the pieces of me that were broken. There were so many things about me that changed. The way I dressed and the way I carried myself. Before 2017 I enjoyed life. I went through a breakup in 2015, and it had me down, but I still lived life. I was always having a good time with my sisters and friends, my oldest son and I used to have a lot of mommy and son dates. 2016 I started dating again, and sometimes I wish I would have continued to enjoy my life. Even though in 2016, I ended up pregnant with my middle son, my life experience was still great. I still had great days with my sisters and friends, always had mommy and son dates with my oldest son. Still, life was great even though I was having a second child, and I was going to be a single mother of two boys. 2016 ended great though. I graduated from college while I was about seven months pregnant. I accomplished something big.

Alright, let’s get to 2017. In 2017 I had my second son. But I started suffering from postpartum depression. I was dealing with that, and my relationship was going downhill. There was a lot of cheating, and then from there, things just got violent. So at this point, I am dealing with postpartum, cheating, and domestic violence. Then to sum that all up I got pregnant again. My life just from there went downhill as well. The cheating continued the domestic violence continued, but for some reason, I just couldn’t leave. I didn’t know what was keeping me there, somewhere in the back of my mind I was telling myself that I deserved so much more, I deserved better. Even though I knew it, something kept holding me there.

To put more stress on myself, I was dealing with issues with my apartment. My apartment at the time was infested with mice. It was not one or two mice; it was multiple. I had to find another place to live. At this time, my funds were low because I barely went to work, and when I did, I found a reason to leave early. So the process of this was horrible. I got behind on my rent because I wasn’t staying there and I didn’t plan to stay there, so I didn’t feel the need to pay them at all. Also, it took them three to four months to move me into a new apartment. At this time, my kids were living with my parents. I finally got moved into a new apartment in the same complex, but there were so many issues with this one as well, so once again I was still behind on my rent, and I had no way possible to catch up, so I had to go find another place to stay asap.

Also, amid everything I was going through, I got into a terrible car accident, I lost control of the car and smashed into the wall on the freeway. Then a month or two later, I got into another car accident where a man was trying to take off his boot and slammed into the back of my car really hard. My car ended up being totaled out. The guy’s insurance paid me, and I got money to get me a new car. A new vehicle was exciting, but mentally and financially, I was still struggling. I still wasn’t happy in my relationship, cheating was still going on, the abuse continued, and I felt like I had no one. I distanced myself from my friends and my family. A big part of what meant the most to me was gone, and I felt so alone.

In July 2017, I miscarried my baby girl. The day before and the day of the miscarriage, I was in so much pain. I was sick, but I still managed to fight through it and get up and go to work. I made it through the day, but the next day was when everything was horrible, I felt awful, but I still managed to get up and go to work. But the longer I sat at work the worst I felt. So I just went ahead and went to the emergency room. They checked the baby, and the baby had a strong heartbeat she was fine, but I didn’t know why I was still feeling like this, and honestly, they gave me no answers as to why I was feeling the way I was feeling. So I went home and just laid in the bed, I could barely move. My boyfriend at the time was there with me. I slept all day, and that night, I just wanted to sit in the tub and relax. Every time I think about this day, I can still feel how hot the water was that day. I sat in the tub and just relaxed, and as I stood up to bathe, I felt something slipping out of me. I was thinking maybe a blood clot or something because that was the only thing I could think of at the time. But I felt it, and it was hard, and my heart started racing, and at that point, I knew I had just given birth to my baby, and I was holding her in my hand. I called the paramedics still holding my baby in my hand, and I didn’t look at her once because I was so afraid. I couldn’t believe what happened. The doctor’s reason on why I miscarried was because my body hadn’t healed all the way from the previous pregnancy. I was so lost, and I wondered why me, why my baby girl. I always wanted a girl, and the one time I could have had one, she was taken away from me. That day July 28, 2017, will be a day I would never forget.

Even after all that. The cheating and the abuse continued. I moved into a different apartment complex on the other side of town. When I moved there, that’s when depression and anxiety started showing physically. I lost a lot of weight, I didn’t sleep at night, I didn’t eat, and nothing around me interested me anymore. I looked sick in the face. I tried to dress myself up, I changed my hairstyle, but nothing made me feel better at all, nothing. I still felt like I didn’t have anyone at all. The world seemed like they hated me. The person who I wanted to stop loving but on my own time moved on, and I didn’t know how to handle it. I wanted to be over him entirely before he moved on and I wasn’t. So seeing him with someone else broke me. But in my head, I told myself that I would get him back. I want to stop right here and make a point. I use to be the girl who called other girls dumb for staying with someone who abused them, but until you are in that position, it’s not your place to judge. But what I can say that if you are in a domestic violence relationship, work your way out of it. Talk to whoever it is you need to talk to and stay close to your friends and family.

I don’t really remember much about 2018 except that I was pregnant with my 3rd child and I had him on October 6. Towards the end of my pregnancy, I had a placenta previa. If you don’t know what a placenta previa is, it is when your placenta is low in the uterus, and it partially or entirely covers the cervix. Meaning that I would have to have a C-section if it didn’t correct itself because instead of the baby coming out first, the placenta would have come out first. This placenta previa made me bleed like I had a heavy menstrual cycle, and it scared me so much because I just knew I was going to lose another baby. But after being hospitalized a few times, I gave birth to a healthy baby boy.

Then came 2019 I declared before the year even began that it was going to be my year, I was going to work on myself and be a better mother to my kids, and I have stuck to that since. I still have my hard times, but I know I will get through. At the beginning of 2019, my apartment caught on fire, and it’s crazy how I saw it as a blessing. For one, we weren’t at home when it happened and two I got to move out of an apartment that I absolutely hated. Still, at the beginning of 2019, I suffered from depression and anxiety, but I decided to seek help. I was proud of myself for taking that step because it was part of the process of fixing myself and making myself better. I have made so much progress. I feel like a better mother, I feel like a better person, and I am starting to feel like my old self again. I start school to get my masters in education on October 1. Overall I am happy. There are still somethings that I want to improve, but I know it will take time. I am not where I want to be 100%, but I have a plan on where I am trying to go.

Sometimes it will take you longer to get out of certain situations, but you can do it, you just have to want to. If you are suffering from depression or have terrible anxiety talk to someone about it. That was my mistake, in the beginning, I held everything that was hurting me in out of fear that no one would understand and out of fear that no one would really listen. You are not dumb because you stayed, you are not dramatic because you feel like you are depressed, and you do need to talk to someone if you are feeling depressed and down all the time. My advice to everyone, not just women, but everyone, the moment you feel like you are depressed to seek help. Don’t wait for everything to build up and then it becomes too late. It’s okay to see a therapist. It’s alright to put your phone on do not disturb and have a day to yourself. It’s perfectly fine to remove people who you love out of your life. Don’t let depression consume you and defeat you. You beat depression.