I'm Having Another Episode

One of the worst feelings in the world is waking up sad. Usually the day starts off ok but gradually goes downhill and ends in me crying myself to sleep. I prefer those days to be honest.

I woke up this morning with a heavy feeling in my chest and a fuzzy feeling in my head. Sometimes it hits like this. The depression. I’ll be fine for weeks, even months and then one day everything comes crashing down. For example, before today I hadn’t felt suicidal in almost two months. I was naïve enough to believe that I might actually be getting better. I don’t know what happened to make everything go bad again. That’s one thing I hate the most about this. It’s not like I have a crappy home life or I get bullied at school or anything. I have a pretty decent life and yet sometimes I just want to end it all.

I haven’t actually been properly diagnosed with depression. I’m too scared to talk to my parents or a doctor about it. I’m scared that they’ll think I’m overreacting or just attention seeking. The only person I’ve told is my boyfriend Rian. We’ve only been together a few weeks but we’ve been friends for almost five years. I feel like I can tell him anything. He gets it. He doesn’t make me feel bad for feeling like this. He understands.

I pick up my phone to check the time. 12:30pm. Wow, I did sleep for a long time. I send a text to Rian.

Feeling shitty need you to come over 

He texts back almost immediately.

On my way babe

…

“Zack it is 1pm you are not going to waste your weekend lying in bed” my mom shouted up the stairs. I groaned and pulled my duvet over my head. I am so not in the mood for being yelled at today.
“ZACHARY!” she screamed
“What?” God I hated it when she used my full name.
“Stop being so lazy and get your ass out of bed”
I blinked back tears. I’m not being lazy I physically don’t have the strength to get out of bed. I laid back on my pillows, determined not to cry.

A few seconds later I heard the doorbell ring. My mom rushed to answer it, greeting Rian with a hug. Of course, she was always nicer when other people were here.
“Hi Mrs Merrick, I came to see Zack” Rian said, polite as ever.
“You can go straight up to his room Rian. Please try and get him out of bed he’s been ignoring me all morning”.
Yeah maybe if you were a bit nicer about it I wouldn’t ignore you. Bitch.

I jumped as Rian opened the door to my room without knocking.
“Hey Zack” he said softly as he sat on the edge of the bed.
“Hey Rian” I said. I opened my mouth to speak but burst into tears instead.
“Hey, what’s wrong Zacky” Rian said as he pulled me into a hug.
“I don’t know” I sobbed “I just feel shitty and I don’t want to do anything and-and I don’t want to be here anymore”
Rian held me tightly and rubbed my back.
“Shhhh it’s gonna be ok”
“It’s just nothing’s even wrong and I don’t know why I feel like this”
“It’s part of the depression Zee. Some days are just going to be plain shit” Rian said soothingly.
I sniffed and wiped my tears. Rian shifted so he was at on the bed next to me.

“Ri…something really scary happened last night” I practically whispered. He looked at me, brown eyes wide with concern.
“I-I wanted to hurt myself” I heard Rian’s sharp intake of breath. “I was sat in the bathroom and I saw a razor in the cupboard and I really, really wanted to hurt myself. I wanted to cut myself to pieces” I was talking really fast now, trying to get it all out. “It was so scary I was thinking of where I could do it and what excuses I could use like if I did a cut on my hand I could say it was the cat. And it was horrible because it was me, it was my own mind”.
Rian looked straight into my eyes “Please tell me you didn’t actually do it Zack”.
“No, I didn’t” I said, my voice shaky.
“Promise me you didn’t because I need to know if you did”
“I promise I didn’t hurt myself Ri. I knew deep down that it wasn’t a good idea. I knew I didn’t really want to do it”. Tears were building up again, threatening to spill over.
“Oh, Zack” Rian said as he pulled me into another tight hug. We stayed like that for several minutes.
“Right we’re going to do something today” Rian suddenly announced “Even if it’s just a 20 minute walk, you are leaving this house today”.
“But Riaaaan I don’t want to” I whined.
“No come on, I promise it will make you feel better”
“Okay” I sighed.
“Alright, you have a shower and get changed, I’ll wait for you downstairs. We’re leaving in 15 minutes” Rian left my room and shut the door behind him.
I showered quickly and got dressed in my favourite pair of jeans and a Fall Out Boy shirt. Wearing one of my band t-shirts always made me feel a little better. I took a deep breath, still not quite sure if I could even manage to leave the house. I’ll do it for Rian though.

...

I could hear my mom talking about me downstairs. Honestly, does she think the walls in this house are soundproof or something?
“I think he’s just being a typical moody teenager to be honest. Still, at least he has you Rian”
I quickly made my way downstairs to save Rian from my mom’s rambling.
“Bye mom”
“See you later Mrs Merrick”
“Bye boys” she waved as we walked out the door.
I slammed the door shut behind us. Rian grabbed my hand and led me up the driveway. We began walking down the street, Rian attempting to make small talk but finally giving up. I kept my gaze on the floor as we walked, still feeling miserable.
“You need something to take your mind off it all Zack” Rian said.
“Like what?”
“I dunno, is there anywhere you want to go?”
“Home” I mumbled. Rian sighed loudly.
“We can go back in a minute if you really want but it’s not going to make you feel any better”
“I don’t think anything will”
“What about this” Rian said as he put his hands on my face and kissed me softly on the lips.
I blushed and smiled a little.
“Hmmm, I don’t know if I’m feeling better yet” I said. Rian grinned and leaned towards me. We stood there kissing in the middle of the sidewalk, completely oblivious to our surroundings.

In that moment I knew that if nothing else, this was something worth living for.