Flashback.

2018.

Feelings of being lost.
Feelings of not being enough.
Feelings of being … stuck.

Like I was moving through life, but not really in it.
Like everything around me kept going, and I couldn’t catch up.

I thought I had to let everything and everyone go.

So I pulled away.
I got quiet.
I kept everything to myself.

It took me so long to realize that doing so only made everything worse.

I felt like I couldn’t talk to my then boyfriend.
I felt like I couldn’t talk to my family.
I felt like I couldn’t talk to my friends.
I felt so alone, even when I wasn’t.

I had thoughts of suicide. Of death. Of not wanting to be alive…
I thought those thoughts were normal my whole life.

And at the time, I didn’t even understand why.

I didn’t know what was going on.
I didn’t know it was depression.

I thought it was just me.
I thought I was the problem.

If I had known then what I know now, I would have made different choices. I would have let in everyone who was willing to listen, and life might have been completely different.

But now that I know what to look for, I can see the signs.

The withdrawal.
The silence.
The heaviness that slowly creeps back in.

I’m back in that place.

But this time I know.

I know what this is.
I know what it tries to take from me.
And I know I don’t have to go through it alone.

So this time, I won’t disappear.
This time, I’ll speak.
Even if it’s hard. Even if it’s messy.

Because I’ve learned that letting people in doesn’t break you.

Staying silent does.