How would you describe depression?

Depression is suffocating. It sucks the energy and joy our from both the world and within. I, like many, used to view depression as only sadness, but my younger and more naive self had no idea how debilitating the illness could be. There's no desire to move, speak, smile, or even breathe when depression is at its worst. It often feels like there's no escaping the darkness that consumes you.

For me, depression is not the feeling of hitting rock bottom. Instead, it starts from that point. As it continues, you feel the rocks beneath you give way, and you sink, gradually, painfully, but without realising; and when the rocks around you start closing in on you and start blocking the way of the sun, it suffocates you, engulfs you. That is what depression has been for me, a constant feeling of sinking and catatonia. And apathy. More than feeling sad, I have felt absolutely nothing.

Depression is when your perception is constricted. You're stuck in a dark, narrow place, you can't get out of.

Depression is feeling nothing; feeling like everything you do is pointless and there's no reason why you should get out of bed in the mornings.

A dull grey cloud obscuring my vision of the starting line and finishing line and tainting my thoughts.

A very heavy weight that follows you everywhere you go, like an unwelcome friend. It can be really painful.

I would describe depression as a weight. It pulls you down, constantly dragging you. It makes any movements exhausting, even simple things such as showering. It tires you, making sleep more compulsory than ever. But eventually, when you remove that weight, you are stronger.

Lonely. Nothing in the world is more lonely than depression, despite the often conscious knowledge that depression itself is a widespread mental illness that many people suffer from. Tiring. As a manic depressive, I could go from feeling incredibly full of life and laughter to apathetic and empty in no time at all, over the smallest trigger. To do so was exhausting beyond belief, and then to try and find the energy to somehow work through the low episode to get back to any kind of normalcy was even more tiring still. Manipulative. Depression makes my brain lie to myself, and tries to convince me of a perceived worthlessness while actively hiding all my worth. It blinded me to my own behaviour towards friends and family I cared about, and then it told me that it was my fault my relationships kept falling apart at the seams and that I simply wasn't trying hard enough. Frustrating. When diagnosed with manic depression, it didn't make my battle any easier to fight even though it had a name. Truthfully, all the diagnosis did was put a name to a face, if you will. The road to recovery is painful and long and one of the most frustrating things I have ever had to do in my life. Reconciling my behaviour, trying to find healthy coping mechanisms, combing through my life to identify where depression made itself at home and where I could take the fight to the illness. I had to have many failures before I even tasted a small amount of success. Painful. Even as somebody who is in a state of recovery, and no longer needs medication to help with my illness, depression was and is painful. Looking back on what I did is painful, because with the new clarity of vision my slowly recovering status brings me, I see how self-destructive I truly was and beyond that, how destructive that behaviour was in turn to people I loved. I sit in a ghost town of shattered friendships and bitter memories, and it will take a long time to breathe the life back into that town and restore it to even a small shadow of its former self. But ultimately, I will get there, and I will get there with the help of the relationships that survived the raging fire. Because despite the way depression lies to you, you're never as alone as you feel. And no matter how tired you get, eventually you will weather the storms and come out the other side with all the energy you felt you missed out on. So I guess I would also describe my depression, at least, as a learning experience. Because there is no better way to make your depression your own, than to turn it into a positive experience you can grow from.

Like your drowning and eveyone else is able to breath and you just have to watch everyone carry on with your normal life while you struggle.

When you have your favorite food everyday and then one day your favorite food is not on the menu anymore.