Guest Post: My Depression is a Needy Woman

Depression is such a time suck.

She loves to show up at the most inconvenient times.

You hear her knock at your bedroom door and you sigh, not again, and tell her you don’t have time today, to please go away or at least wait until life slows down a little bit. She doesn’t care how long your to-do list is. She doesn’t care how many other things you need to be concerned with right now. Of course, she lets herself in anyway despite your pleas. She plops down on your bed, tilts her head, and stares at you with intent; she knows you oh so intimately. Your stomach drops. You know what’s coming.

Depression is needy, oh man, is she needy. Especially when she knows how unwanted she is. Your hate and frustration towards her just fuels her need and her agenda.

She breaks her silence and tells you that she is all that you are; you and her are one and the same. You know it’s not true, not true, not true. But she keeps talking, keeps nagging, keeps reciting her typical script. She does not shout, however. Depression loves to cozy up to you, whisper in your ear, remind you of every single one of your insecurities and remind you of every single one of your failures. Her voice sounds like syrup, but it is poison. It goes down so easily, but burns like hell at the bottom.

You can’t help but listen to her because some of the things she says sound so believable. She chooses her syntax carefully, she knows exactly how to word things to convince you she is right. She is right, she is right, she is always right. (Depression cannot STAND to be wrong.)

“You are hard to love. You pull all the people you are close to down with you. People don’t care half as much about you as you do for them. Things aren’t gonna get better. You’re stuck with me every day for the rest. of. your. life.”

She pulls you into her, spoons you as your chest heaves, vision blurs, throat burns, and nose runs until you fall into a fitful sleep. Depression switches off your bedside lamp, smiles, and nuzzles into your hair because she knows that today, she has won.

-Emily Corinne Wallace, author of the blog Sunset on her breath.