That Closed Dark Room: My Phase of Depression

We are a complex combination of different phases of life, feelings, relations, decisions, outcomes of our decisions, work and much more than we think. No one part of our life or one decision or its outcome or one feeling or one relation can define who we are. None of them can define our worth. A person who is happy, chirpy, confident at one point of life can be underconfident, timid, irritable, sad person at some other point of life. A person who is shy to speak in front of their family member in one phase of life can later become a motivational speaker addressing a huge audience in other. A person who is born with silver spoon can struggle later on in the life. A person who might see struggles in one phase of life can have relaxed beautiful time in other phase of life. Nothing is constant in life – Neither Your happiness nor your success or your sorrows or your failures.

I have realised that change is the only constant. Today, when I am in trouble or am sad, upset or face any failures or challenges, I tell myself this too shall pass. It gives me strength and hope in my life for another fight.

I do the same whenever I am happy or achieve success, I again tell myself that this too shall pass. It keeps me grounded. I love and admire myself; it will not be wrong to say that I celebrate myself, being me. I Thank god every day that me and my loved ones have lived to see another day in life, that we have a roof to live under and we have food to eat, water to drink. Most importantly we have hopes to grow and achieve much more in our lives.

Hope in life is the basic ingredient to keep you motivated, strive towards happiness and beautiful life. Other ingredients are acceptance, belief and gratitude- Acceptance of everyone the way they are, believing in yourself and believing that you are blessed and Gratitude towards god and everyone for today.

But there was a phase in my life when feeling of self-hate, self-doubt, worthlessness and feeling of voidness in my heart was prominent. Like I said no one particular phase of your life can brand you but yes, each phase good or bad and happy or sad is also a part of your life. We should wear it with pride. I hold this phase with a proud feeling and gave it a badge of being my biggest teacher. I am proud that I was able to overcome this phase of my life and was able to cope with the most terrible experience of my life.

I learnt a lot from this phase, a lot. I learnt that happiness is a state of mind which is dependent on your inner self not on the outer world. Happiness comes not from success or love but how you deal with your problems, with your attitude towards life and love for yourself. If you love yourself enough then any problem, any challenges, any insult, any denial will not affect your happiness.

Trust me I am saying this with an experience. Today I am not ashamed to share with you all that there was a phase when I was caged with this cruel experience called Depression because I truly and madly loved myself. I embraced each and every part and phase of my life. But at that point I was denying it even to myself self-love, self-acceptance and kindness for self.

I was a very happy, chirpy and confident kind of girl right from childhood, who loved her own company, who liked to watch and appreciate herself in mirror, who had no competition from others and who felt that she was the best. I belong to a humble middle-class family from small town where there was lots of discrimination between girls and boys. However, I was blessed to have a family where me and my sister were not treated differently from our brother. Rules were same for all of us. Right and wrong was not gender biased. Our parents always taught us to be independent. Learning and doing all chores were part of our growing age. We all learned to buy vegetable and groceries from market and we also learned how to cook. We learned to go by bicycle to school on our own and we also learned to stand in a cycle repair shop to get the punctures fixed. We had the liberty to choose college or coaching institute for enrolment, standing in along queue to submit our fees where mostly fathers, uncles or brothers were doing the needful for other girls. We were supposed to do it on our own, if our brother could do it, we also can do it. We have done it all.

I grew up with this mentality that everything and every work meant to be done by both genders. My life was moving in a fast pace from school to graduation to professional college to working in a corporate world. From independent single to independent married woman.

Life changed suddenly after my first baby. It caught a slow-paced train. While it was my decision to slow down, to quit the job and enjoy the motherhood but somehow, somewhere I was missing that pace.

Post-partum depression is very common when suddenly your life is dependent on that little bliss, when all the attention, care and importance that you get as a pregnant lady shifts to baby. When suddenly nobody is bothered about your rest, your sleep, your hunger instead what matters to everyone is baby care, sleep, hunger etc. Suddenly from a human you become the machine to fulfil the baby's need.

You seek that love, care, attention in everyone's eyes as you need that most at this point of time but you find it nowhere. I also faced this. For the first time in my life I was feeling the pain of dependency as any new mommy would have felt it. The seed of depression was sowed at that time and like other seed this was also not visible to anyone including me. I wish I could have understood at that time that it's just a phase, which too shall pass and wish that I could have understood that nothing new is created without pain. I wish that I could have realised that I am the reason of one new life.

Coming back to post pregnancy I decided not to join after my maternity leave as my baby was just 6 months old and I felt that this was the time that she needed me the most. It was my responsibility to be always with her as I had brought her in this world. I started enjoying my time with my little one - just loved watching her, playing with her or taking that afternoon nap with her just snuggling her tightly. But somewhere I was missing my independent self and that was time I think that I watered that seed pf depression unknowingly. I wish I could have explained myself once again that it was my decision and I am blessed to have that privilege to decide to stay with my little bundle of joy. Not everyone has that privilege. I wish I could understand that I am blessed.

My bond with my baby was growing with her. I cherish those moments of happiness with that little bundle of joy. My life was revolving around her and I was unaware that seed of depression kept on growing inside me. Soon the time came when baby started going to preschool that spares me with some "me time" which I was craving in my inner self. But I was so dependent on my baby that I actually couldn't do anything in that "me time" except missing her.

While she was away, I started noticing myself which was absent for last three years during which I was so engaged with my little one while taking care of her, in watching & clicking pictures and videos of her cute and adorable moves that I actually forgot to look after myself. And when I got a chance to look at myself, I was very disappointed with myself.

What have I done to myself, I couldn't find that happy, chirpy, beautiful, confident, independent girl in this fat, financially and otherwise dependent, not so pleasant looking woman with dark circles? I hated myself. There was sense of self-doubt, worthlessness and weird feeling. Now the seed of depression has sprouted, and it is growing into a plant. I was slipping into a black hole of depression and anxiety where no one can find me not even me. I wish I would have noticed that biggest blessing of becoming a mom that god had given me in that obese woman. I wish I could have felt the sense of achievement in bringing a new life in that financial dependent lady.

That cruel feeling was killing me from inside which was not visible to anyone on the face value but gradually my family started noticing the change in me. I moved from north pole to south pole. A happy for no reason kind of person to unhappy and irritable person for smallest of reason was painful for everyone around me but it was eating me from inside making me completely hollow.

I decided to come out of that room no matter how much my eyes would hurt from strong sparkling light of this outside world and I decided to take charge of my life. I was not ready for to keep on living that kind of life as I was not ready to accept defeat and stay in that dark hole. My family played a very important role in making me realize my true worth. They heard me which is the most important thing for anyone, sometimes we just need an ear to hear and that helped me a lot. I started addressing my all hitches, I stepped out and made new friends, learnt driving and started moving out all alone for that me time and for that independent feeling. I started enjoying those little gestures which I was making to impress myself, to make myself happy. Slowly and gradually I started appreciating things within me and around me, I started noticing my blessed life, I started showing gratitude for all the things I have. I started understanding that not everyone has what I have. Those little things made me a better, happier person who simply loved herself for what she is.

Take away from me for you all

If something is troubling you find a person who has the ears to listen and talk

Best person to help you is you. So, understand your worth

Give importance to everyone but you should be first on that list

Take out time for your health, your hobbies, your "me time" It doesn't matter how busy you are

Appreciate yourself often and don't seek acceptance from others

Show gratitude towards everything you have, not everyone has that

Always remember that your tough time is just a phase and it's just a part of your life, not your whole life.

No matter how dark it gets, The Sun is going to rise again

Would like to end with this quote "Always bloom where you are planted, don't look for season, don't look for place, simply just Bloom"