You May Skip This

Everybody always talks about life. Everywhere I go I always manage to see something someone has written about it, or overhear a conversation or see the gratitude written all over a strangers face when they narrowly miss death or injury. Life is kind of a funny thing, isn't it?

Maybe it's just me, but even though about 40% of my friends are depressed, I can't seem to escape from people who are so grateful to be alive. It's almost sickening, really. Because when they talk about how happy they are, I just want to smack them. Maybe it's the exasperation of hearing it so many times, maybe it's the superior sound in their tone, but it's more likely that I am jealous.

See, I have this feeling that that will never be me.

A very smart, very brave woman said "I was suicidal. If you've ever been depressed, you're eyes stopped at 'was' and not suicidal." And as I was reading that all I could think about was that holy shit, yes, yes, that describes it perfectly because those two sentences, my god they say more than a novel ever could.

It's like there are two groups; us and them. There are differences between the two groups and it's something you could only hope to understand if you've been there yourself. We can never be them, although at any moment, they could start becoming us.

I wish so badly that I could be one of those people. The ones that have the ability to say "was" when they are talking about their depression, their self harm, their suicidal thoughts and actions. But the hard fact of the matter is that I'm not. I don't have the kind of patience to "wait for things to get better". I do not have the perseverance, the drive, the ambition, the willpower, the hope.

I've had just about a million people who have said to me that they know what it is like to be this sad all the time. But they can't, they don't. I want to believe that I am the only person out there who has ever felt this way, because when I start to think about how un-alone I really am, I get scared. And I know that this is backwards, that the thought of acceptance and empathy should empower me, should give me some kind of hope, but it doesn't. It makes me sad that so many suffer and it makes me terrified that maybe that suffering could let someone understand me. I don't want to be understood. I do not want people to tell me their stories about what they've gone through because it will only reinforce what I know: I do not deserve this illness.

I am a middle-class, young, healthy white girl. I come from a family who never fully grasped the concept of love, but that's really nothing new in today's society. I come from a place that the other white kids call "the ghetto" but the black kids call "a good home." Our streets do not see deaths. Our children do not grow up with bars on the windows and a gun under their pillow. Everything that happens, happens behind closed doors. The neighbors will pretend not to hear your screams and when the cops come for the third time that week, they will draw their curtains closed and respectfully peek out from the cracks. I do not deserve depression.

Everyone will tell you that depression is an equal opportunity disease- that it can strike anyone, anywhere, anytime. And their right, of course, but for some reason I cannot shake the idea that some deserve this title more than others. Or, to be more specific, everyone deserves the illness more than me.

I've been told that I'm much to hard on myself, but the only response I have to that is something that I am not allowed to say in public or private. We can talk about gay marriage now. Abortion has become appropriate lunch time conversation. Poverty is gaining ground and mental illness is not such a silent topic. But saying that you want to die, that you honestly will not live past 25, that's taboo. People don't know how to react to that, and the worst part is, you aren't saying it for shock value. You're saying it because it's true, because you want these people to understand that you won't be around for much longer, so you have to be hard on yourself now. You have to be the best you can be right now so that when your funeral comes along, it won't be empty and your momma will be able to remember all the good you did.

And school always seemed so important, but it's occurring to me now that I will spend more time writing this blog entry tonight than I will on any one of the six essays I have to do and I cannot make myself care.

Being the best I could be in school was always my priority. I had to do well in high school so that I could get into a good college so that I could get a good job so I could send my kids to good schools and good colleges so they could have good jobs and so on and so forth but I'm realizing that none of that actually has to happen to me and it's a relief. I do not have to come home and cry about my homework and cry about how I cannot make myself do it because I am too busy planning my death  because I will not go to college, and if I do, it will not be for very long so it no longer matters whether it is a 'good' college or not. I will not have children. I do not have to prepare for their futures, or mine, because it simply isn't a problem anymore.

Today I joked about jumping from my balcony. The boy I was talking to told me to "stop being depressing" and all I could think of was "okay, soon, yeah" and then I wanted to laugh. I wanted to laugh because I was happy. Thinking about being so free- no more worries, no more tears, rest your head and go to sleep-well goddamn. That's better.

All my life I have been planning for the future and making decisions based on those plans. But when do I get to enjoy life? When I've already graduated from college and wasted the so called 'best years'. Maybe it's when I'm married, except by then I'll have to start planning my children's futures. Maybe after my children are grown, but I'll be too weak, too old, too cynical to enjoy much of anything. I can't do this. I have to start living so that I can die.

I used to think that I could just get through anything by waiting it out, by finding things to get me through it. But I'm starting to realize that I cannot write the way I used to. I've lost the beauty. I cannot read the way I used to. I've lost the comprehension. I cannot make friends the way I used to. I've lost the ability to connect.

I can't pick up the phone and text someone back most days, much less text them first. I can't focus on anything that makes me happy. My laughter sounds hollow, even to me and my smile hurts my entire face. I just don't even have the energy to fake happiness anymore. I can't do it.

-Lee

Little victories (RANT)

Can I just rant real quick about how hard it is to find pants that ACTUALLY fit me?

Okay. So I'm about 5'4'', right? (5'3'' and 3/4 to be exact, I'm pretty damn proud of my 3/4 inch baby (; ) For as long as I remember, my family has always shopped at Khol's.

(Quick side note. I fucking hate Khol's. Khol's is equivalent to Satan. Shopping there for pants or shorts makes me want to die three times more than usual simply because in that store ONLY do I wear sizes 5-9. Seriously. Size 3 is my actual size in every other store. Not sure what's up with that...anyway...)

So yeah, my family has always shopped at Khol's because we aren't upscale, and we don't have a TON of money. So, until recently, I had never bought pants from anywhere else. Since I am 5'4'', all the pants I have ever owned are about 4-6 inches longer than I am. So that leaves me with one question:

WHY. Seriously. WHY. I CANNOT be the ONLY chica who is 5'4'' and looking for pants. REALLY?! Really?! I own TWO pairs of pants that I can't step on. TWO. And one was bought today (at the wonderful Rue 21, for your information, which is THE best store in the entire world.) I just...You know, is this what I have to do? Do I have to spend HOURS looking for pants that actually fit me?? Why can't they just stock them in regular places? More importantly, WHY CAN'T KHOL'S FIX THEIR SIZES AND ALSO THEIR PANT LENGTHS?!

It just frustrates me because I'm extremely neurotic and I don't like going into typical teenage stores to buy my jeans because I feel like everyone is wondering why the fat girl is shopping in their store. So Khol's is pretty safe for me. Despite how suicidal that enterprise makes me, Khol's is nice. Khol's is familiar. But Khol's do not have my sizes nor my lengths.

So my options are to wear my pants as SOCKS AS WELL AS JEANS or to spend my entire day looking for (and having anxiety attacks over) places that sell SHORT PANTS.

asdfghjkdflvfoflgkvodflzgkodlkfl That upsets me. :(

Also, as a side note, I think Khol's clothes are VERY cute. I just cannot stand purchasing pants. Siiiiigh.

But I suppose that I should focus on the fact that I am now the PROUD owner of size 3s that end at my feet! (Okay, so maybe I'm not really proud of the fact that they are a size 3... but considering that up until then I thought I wore 5-9s... (FUCKING KHOL'S) I think maybe I have a lot to be happy about today...) All my time paid off today I suppose (:

Love you :D
-Lee

Here's to anyone who never quit when things got hard.

I don't really know what's been going on with me lately. It's like...I'm withdrawing against my will. I LOVE my friends. Really, I do. It's just that recently, whenever they text me, there comes a point that I just...cannot text back. I can't. I don't really know how to explain it. Things are just becoming too overwhelming I guess. Even thinking about school is enough to send me into a tailspin. I'm just losing my grip on everything in my life and I can't get it back.

I kind of really fucking miss my ex best friend. I dunno.

I'm tripping, I guess.

I just need to take a deep breath and get my head back into the game.

Love you
-Lee