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Depression

The Invisible Illness

By Lanique RuffinPublished 3 years ago 5 min read
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For years, I've been dealing with this invisible illness. I kept it to myself because I didn't want to be judged. I don't think anyone would've believed me. Where I'm from, if people can't tell you're hurt by looking at you, your problem doesn't exist. I even hid it from my doctor. What's even more crazy, I've kept it hidden from the man I've been with almost half of my life and I'm 38 years old.

I woke up one day and realized that I was tired of hiding this mental anguish that I have been dealing with on my own. It's time that I put things out in the opening and face my issues. October 2020 is the year I was medically diagnosed with depression and now I m ready to tell my story.

The year was 2004 and I had just found out that I was pregnant. This was one of the happiest days of my life. Before I knew it, my emotions were all over the place. I just figured that my hormones were out of control due to my pregnancy. Little did I know, I was in for a huge surprise.

September 2004 is the month I gave birth. I was so happy. A few weeks later, I realized that I was having the same emotional issues. I was crying all the time and shutting everyone out. I thought it was postpartum depression. I was told that after giving birth, it could happen and it wasn't out of the ordinary to have it. After a year went by, I knew it was depression...when I had my first noticeable episode.

I was at home alone because my child's father was at work. I was feeling fine and out of nowhere, a wave of emotions hit. I began to cry so hard I instantly had a headache. I didn't want to eat or deal with anyone. The only thing I wanted to do is, spend time with my child and sleep. My baby gave me comfort and was the only reason I kept it together. That didn't last too long because shortly after that, I tried to commit suicide. I didn't know what was going on with me mentally, but I felt like if I ended my life, It would keep me from dealing with the problem at hand. I didn't realize it then, but now that I look back on that moment, I am glad my attempt at taking my life failed.

After some time, I started having panic attacks. If you've ever had a panic attack, you can understand what I went through. Your heart starts beating fast and you feel as if you cant't breathe. I've had so many, I've learned to cope with them...the same way I learned to cope with depression. I hid my depression behind a fake smile. I would walk around as if I didn't have a care in the wold but deep down, I was slowly falling apart. no one could tell I was mentally sick. If you deal with anything for too long, you learn to adapt. I know that's not a good thing to do, but it helped me protect myself from the outside world.

My depression had become so bad, I began to lash out at my spouse. He thought I was crazy. We would be in a great place and the next thing you know, I'm jumping down his throat over something unnecessary. After it was all over, I did feel bad but within that moment, it felt right.

This depression had taken over my life. Even till this very day, I still suffer with it and that's why I've taken the necessary steps to work on me. It's crazy how depression sneaks up on you like thief in the night.

The one thing that people should understand is that depression doesn't always come from trauma. That's the first thing people think when they hear you're depressed. My upbringing wasn't perfect but I didn't experience anything to trigger my depression. My mom and grandmother made sure I had everything I needed and made sure that I felt loved.

You have some people that can look at you and tell you have depression because they make it obvious You also have people like me that can hide it very well.

People with hidden depression were wearing masks way before this pandemic started. We go out and we have the biggest smiles. It seems like we're always happy. Every time someone sees us and ask how we're doing, the response is always good or life couldn't be better.

We're the main ones that love to give advice and we're great at it too. We have all the answers in the world when it comes to someone else's issues but we can't seem to manage our issues but once we get behind closed doors, we let our emotions flow. It could be crying or simply locking ourselves in the room so that we don't have to explain how we feel to someone else.

Some people will turn to recreational drugs to ease the pain. Others may turn to food or even intercourse. All this does is put a band aid on that wound but once you come down, the cycle starts all over again.

Withhe emotional eating, it's almost like comfort. We know that w shouldn't eat as much as we do, but it makes us feel so much better. The next thing you, you've gained weight. Now you're even more depressed because you don't like the way you look and it makes's you eat even more. To the average person, this sounds crazy but for some of us, this is our everyday lives.

My advice to anyone dealing with depression is to speak to someone that can help you. Seek some form of therapy. Even if it's you talking to someone that you can trust and will allow you to vent to them. Don't let anyone make you feel crazy just because you've decided to seek help. Talking with someone will help you get what you're feeling off of your chest. It's not good to hold feelings inside because it cold makes you feel much worse than you did in the beginning.

IF YOU ENJOYED MY STORY OR IF YOU JUST WANT TO, PLEASE LEAVE A TIP. IT WOULD BE GREATLY APPRECIATED. ALL TIPS WILL BE USED ON MY CHILDREN DURING THIS DIFFICULT TIME IN MY . PLEASE CLICK THE HEART IF YOU LIKED THE STORY. THANKS IN ADVANCE.

depression
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About the Creator

Lanique Ruffin

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