It starts as a fairly usual day. I clock out of my amazing job at Walt Disney World after making magic and causing smiles for adorable children. Through the Florida rain, I walk to my car and begin to drive home. Then it starts. Again. The lies that flood my mind and my emotions, forcing their way through my veins until they feel more real than the very air that I breathe.
My mind wanders to the box that sits somewhere in my mom's closet. A box full of trinkets, gifts and love letters. Love letters full of lies. Promises never kept. Dreams that died. Of friendships that should have lasted forever but didn't. The box of things I can't get myself to throw away but can't bear to look at. But now in my mind's eye, I am forced to look at all of them. And so the voice that haunts me continues:
Remember that time he said he loved you?
Remember how you were stupid enough to actually believe him?
As if someone like you were actually lovable. Ha!
Remember how so-and-so and him and her and that other friend and that one time... remember how they all gave up on you? They said they'd always be there for you.
They're not here because
you're.
not.
worth.
it.
And it's not like I don't know the truth. And it's not like I don't try to fight back.
Have you ever had a bad dream where you tried to scream, but no sound came out? No matter how hard you tried, you couldn't cause your vocal chords to react correctly? That's what it's like when you try to fight depression.
Depression takes away a person's right to choose their emotions.
When I first started struggling with anxiety and depression about 2 years ago, I freaked out. Having grown up in the church and being in school for ministry, I knew all the right answers. I had flashcards of Bible verses. I had books on how to choose to be happy. I had sermon after sermon downloaded on my iPhone. I spent hours in prayer. But nothing changed. It actually got a lot worse.
The reality of the situation is that I can't fix myself.
You see, my whole life, I've been the good kid. The worship leader. The kids ministry volunteer. The over-achiever who graduated high school and moved away from home to go to college at age 16. When I was like 14, I memorized the entire book of James from the Bible just for the heck of it because I was a weirdo. I think you get the picture.
Fast forward to my junior year of college. Long-story-short, everything went crazy in a really short period of time. 4 friends under the age of 25 died within a span of 9 months (random blood clot, car wreck, suicide...) and the cherry on top: the guy I was in love with dumped me.
I had nothing. My whole life, I had carefully built my identity around what I could give to the world. Suddenly, I found myself with nothing left to give. I would lay in bed all day, crying for as long as I was awake until I could make myself sleep again. I guess I dragged myself to class because I didn't fail any classes that semester. I didn't eat for 3 days straight because I was so upset that I thought I would honestly puke if I touched food (shout out to my friends who brought me chocolate and ice cream even though I didn't touch it. Also shout out to my friend who literally forced me to eat eventually.) There's a whole month of my life that I honestly can't remember.
I honestly, truly, with all of my heart wish I could tell you that God miraculously healed me. I wish I could tell you that I handed it over to him in some dramatic church service and the angels came down and took my depression away and my life has been rainbows and puppies and kittens ever since.
That's not what happened.
The process was long and painful and it's still not over. I fought for something like 6 months because I didn't want to get on antidepressants. I never thought I would ever need them. I soon learned that the only thing keeping me from the medicine I needed was my own selfish pride. I was contemplating suicide every day, but I didn't want to admit that I had a problem. Just like someone with a physical virus needs medication to function, people with mental illnesses sometimes require help from doctors. If someone has a broken arm, you don't say "just choose to not have a broken arm! Thing non-broken-arm thoughts!" that's ridiculous. Just because the pain of depression isn't physical, doesn't mean that it's not just as real.
Along with my much-needed medication, I also went to counseling. I have a whole soapbox about counseling that I'll try not to go into here, but here it is in a nutshell: counseling isn't for crazy people or those who have insane amounts of stuff to deal with. Counseling is important for anyone going through anything, no matter what it is. Just like people go to a doctor for checkups and not just wait until they're dying and run to the emergency room, I think it's important to take care of our mental, emotional and spiritual health with the help of counselors. But I digress.
Rather than healing me, God did something much better. He entered into my pain with me. He showed me that He is a personal and loving God who is willing to climb into the darkest pits of despair and just sit there with his hurting child. Imagine! A God who never has to feel any type of pain or suffering or sadness over anything; yet he chooses to bear my grief with me. He chooses to come to us as Jesus: "a man of sorrows, acquainted with deepest grief. (Isa 53:3)"
What I wanted more than anything in the world was to be able to feel happy again. But while my longings were legitimate and good, I was longing for pennies while God offered me gold. I wanted my fleeting little human emotions to change. God wanted to show me something of infinite worth: Himself.
I still don't know why certain things happened. I still have a million and one questions. But would the answers really satisfy me? If God were to sit me down and explain to me why everything happened, would that take the pain away? No. More than anything I need to know that someone is here with me. I need to know that my pain is seen and heard. It's noticed, it's important and someone cares. While I scream for answers, what my soul needs is relationship. And that's exactly what God gives. That's who God is. In the trinity, God's very existence is relationship. He calls himself Immanuel: God with us.
Now I'm sure you're waiting for me to give you a happy ending to this story. Something like, "After counseling and getting on medication and a whole lot of Jesus, I'm 100% depression free! I work at Disney World and my life is just pixie dust and smiles all the time now."
I'm gonna be real with you instead.
The struggle is still real. I'm still on antidepressants even though I'm working my dream job at "the happiest place on earth." the same old lies still haunt me on a daily basis. Sometimes the battle really sucks. But I am not alone. And that is enough for me to keep fighting. Or as Walt Disney said,
Keep Moving Forward.
- Suzanna
