The peculiarity of Depression is that you won't see it coming. It would feel like you are being hit by a rod on your head from behind. You would wake up with severe pain and start wondering from where it is coming. Realizing that pain and approaching for help was the best decision I took in my life.
One fine day, I and my friends were practicing dance which was planned for an upcoming event. Even though I don't dance or am artistic in any form, I was with my best friends and it was a fun thing to do. While doing practice, I couldn't follow a step and my friend was trying to teach me. After trying two times, I started crying out of nowhere. Even I didn't realize how I reached that emotional state. My friends got scared and even wondered why I am pulling off such an emotional drama for such a silly thing. But what I felt was someone telling me from inside that I am good for nothing and that is why I wasn't able to follow those simple dance steps. During the later practice sessions, I didn't cry but I felt so tired and low all the time. I thought it was because of the fact that I was out of my comfort zone. Days went like that and I tried not to overthink what I was going through.
Finally, the day of the performance came and my tension was at its peak. I could literally feel my heart thumping all over my body and that was surely reflected in my performance on the stage. After the performance, all my group members were laughing about what all the stupid mistakes they did on stage. I went to a corner of the room and started crying profusely. How much ever they tried to console me, I couldn't stop crying. I was in so much pain. I wanted to run away from that hall. I took the first chance to escape from my friends and I ran to my hostel room. When I reached the room, I just sat on my bed with no emotions. I felt numb and I can't remember how long I sat like that. The next day I felt very guilt that my friends couldn't take a group picture since I ran away. Even though they understood my situation, I couldn't forgive myself and that remained so heavy inside me.
Slowly I started noticing the changes happening in me. Being a huge food lover, the thought of eating itself became repulsive and my body weight started dropping significantly. Always loving to be around people, I no more could stand around a group of people or even talk to my closest friends. I even started taking routes where I will have to face fewer people while walking. I could hardly sleep for 2-3 hours and ended up very cranky for the whole day. Getting up from the bed itself became a battle. Spiraling of my negative thoughts became an unavoidable part of my life. The final nail in the coffin was when I got a panic attack just from the vibrations of my phone. Since I was alone in my hostel room, there was no one I could seek help from and I couldn't even reach the bolt of the door to open. I didn't know then what a panic attack was and I thought I was dying. Till then, I ignored the suggestions of my loved ones to seek counselling for depression. But everything changed that day I got a panic attack.
Finally, I realized that I can't handle this alone and needed help. I never looked back after that day. Even though my recovery was a slow and excruciating process, I am so glad that I decided to seek help. Whenever I see any news about someone's suicide out of depression, my heart goes out to them thinking about how much pain they would have gone through and how lucky I am to be in my present position.
-Anusree Radhakrishnan
