Depression

[benrichardson]

The title is so simple. It states a single word yet there are so many who understand this word's definition and then there are people who understand the word. Some people understand it better than others. I wish that I was limited into just defning the word as I once was able to do. People will yell at you and tell you things but none of them make any sense, at least not to you. I am not alone or a single drop of water. There is an ocean of people with the same minds as myself. I wonder sometimes of the human evolution has gone so far that this is as far as the evolutionary chain can go because the more we understand the nature of the world there is more we don't know and it slowly eats us away until our willingness to leave and live disappears. As if things evolve until their minds become too much for their body. For that is how I have felt now for almost coming on a year. My mind is destroying me and if I am the peek of the evolutionary chain then are we due to fall in this horrid way. All lined up in a row of dread for we can't understand everything and if we can't then we are too greedy for knowledge and would rather not live unstatisfied lives. Have you ever read the book where the red ferns grow. In that it would seem to me that animals can understand a little bit of sadness and happiness. They seem to pick up on emotions when they come flowing out of people. That would lead some to wonder how come I don't think that this word comes with other animals and not just Homo Sapiens Sapiens. Well I think this is where people who don't understand would define depression as sadness. Yes, I am sad, yes I do see all the great things there are. All of the reasons to be happy. I am not dumb and I am not retarded rather I think I am more intelligent than most. I have a poetic heart and logical mind. I have stood tall through many rough burdens and of course there are people who have carried more than me and have sang songs louder and have solved more difficult problems but I do not think I am at the bottom of the human pool. The fact is I am sad, I can't explain why. Why is the sky blue is because there is a chemical that makes it that way and that's what my doctor tells me I am sad, there is a chemical imbalance in my head. So keep taking your pills and everything will be alright. Well yes, I can get out of my bed now. Thank you very much doctor. With forced effort I can live each day, continue to walk and even at points smile and laugh. Plan for the future. Hold the ones I love, Then I am drowning under a chill of cold waves. Where did it come from and why is it here. I don't know but yelling at me will not help. Saying that I don't care will not help. Ask me why am I doing this to everyone. I ask why is no one helping me. For at that point I feel abandoned alone in my tunnel for none of you walk through the dark nights holding my hand. Then as if miracle or newfound medicine rebounding and fighting for me. All emotions fade. You lose feeling of hurt and of pain. My worse nightmare could play out before my eyes and I would stare it in the face. My happiest day I could live and I would not know it. For now you have made me numb for I lived with my heart bleeding and that was unhealthy. I couldn't handle the open wound. Someone had to close it. Then they wrapped me in bandages so that I would not feel even the air on my skin. Has anyone ever felt their skin actually crawl. I would have laughed at you before. I would have been like I was one of the many. "What do you have to be sad about", "Look at all the great things" "Are you stupid and blind". I hear my own voice echoing those things as people and now they are returned to me. No I will not understand anyone else's pain but again no one will understand mine. How come I feel so alone. I have people all around me. Constantly daily and nightly. I am rarely alone for more than a few hours. Not that it has to be that way but why do I still feel abandoned. How does one define their self worth. The number of dollars I collect, number of friends, number of wives, sexual partners, children, memories. Is it all a numeric game. Can it really be measured. Everyone thinks of numbers when they try and stack things up. Have we become that type of society. I have on average 2.5 good days a week and she only has 2 so I am doing better. What are we measuring? I mean I don't understand. How can you even compare these types of things. Aren't we all just living. Are we not all just making it through the day. Am I worth more because I make more money, Because I can buy the name brand cereal. Would another man's child cry more because I died than if he did because I made more money. Isn't our worth all relative. It's measuring from everyone else's perspective. So how to we calculate your average worth. Do we take your closest family members. Your best friends subtract 10 and divide by 5. No, I don't think there is a formula like that. So how do I see how am I doing? Is it because I am alive? No, I don't rate myself higher because of my survival rate. Darwin's genetics that I survived doesn't give me worth. Because I was not born with cancer or AIDS does that give me more worth. Because I was not hit by a drunk driver does that give me more worth. The life situation I was born in to where I did not carry a gun and I did not learn that it was right to kill. Does it make me have more worth even than a murderer. Can I really judge someone else's actions. Their eyes see things different. It's all relative. His friends would hold him high, and his family might love him unconditionally. The world wants to always measure everything. It can't be measured. The univerval fuzzy logic, or the standard binomial of right and wrong. The sky is blue. The ocean is blue. Is there a way to measure which is more blue. So the wagon is red or the wagon is not red. This wagon is a better red. Can I really ever say that. That red my be a norm to the perfect color of red but really who is to say that a different bit of red closer even to the color of pink it not fight for the wagon. The things are not comparable. I always hear that you can't compare apples to oranges. Can you compare apples to apples. You will tell me that this after on average person would be sweeter while this other apple is a bitter variety but does that measure the quality of apples to all. Are we going to settle and be content with that result. I bite an apple and it tastes. That is the only thing I can do or say. I ate the apple. We are given many words to describe all of the feelings of the humand mind, and body. Are these words really representative. Should they even exist. Should be have descriptive words. The words of don't make any sense to me can you define a word that is relative from person to person. Should we be able to say that I run fast without getting tired or is it just I run. He runs. Though that skill doesn't help me because how can I compare running to someone who is handicapped and can't run. Can you compared their quality of life their success versus mine because of defined terms as in I run. He does not run. I work. He works. Is that measureable now just because we pull out describtive words that we use for measuring. No it's not helping us to solve this problem. The question by this point I often get is. Are you really going to waste your life asking these questions instead of living life. Am I not living life. Is question asking not part of life what defines that trying to solve a question is not a good way to spend one's life. I can't find where people are coming up with these numerics to measure things. How can you tell me that because you don't spend time trying to answer this question that your life is not being wasted. The ability for me to solve calculus problems while you cannot. Does that mean your life is wasted. The amount of time you spend sleeping while I toss and turn in restless dreams, does that help you to measure me. You can't measure me and I can't measure you. How do we know what is right and wrong. The standard norm of what is right. If I would not have learned would I even know. I don't think so. I would have never known fire was hot without feeling the flames and having someone tell me that it was. So society defines what is right and wrong they tell me that. So how do I find this rule maker for sure he or she can tell me how to measure things. Then I can solve for why things happen. Why do I hurt when others do not. There must be something I have done wrong. But if I can only define wrong from my own eyes then I do not truly know the definition of wrong. So thank you doctor for you help. I take my pills and I sleep and I wake but tommorow I will cry alone again for when I share no one listens or they are tired of listening now. Thank you for giving me a half and cursed existence where i live as a fake and phony. A former version of what through my own eyes the definition of a good person was me. The world exhales from a long held breath and I can sleep for tonight I sleep not alone. I have friends where are they now. Are they the ones screaming how stupid I am. Are they the ones ignoring me because they are scared to hurt me more. Are they the ones who say help me now can't you see I am hurting more than you. Measure it up again. How do I know who is in more pain. I am in pain. You are in pain. Am I selfish for wanting you to help me? Are you selfish. Does it have to be about measuring it up. Is there anyway for me to stop my pain so that I can help you first. If I could stop my pain for the time it takes to help you would I not just stop it all together. Would I not just let it all go. I wish I could fix my problems with just a thought about them. It would make my life so happy. I would share that secret to the success with this. The amount of fear that circles one's sadness is great in measure. There are so many medicines so many doctors so many help books. Where was all this fear before. Where did it develop. did my ancestors have it and the history books just don't tell it. Did they understand too little. Were they not intelligent enough. The mind has always been the greatest advantage of human evolution or should i rather say the brain because most would consider those too different. Could a evolutionary trait also eventually be the downfall of that species. I know I am not alone in this. There are people who feel sadness and there are people who have depression. It is a disease and not easily handled or understood. A baby is born and a person dies. Is it my time to be happy or to cry? Should I not just only cry for that baby too will die. The end will come. How many people say it's my religious beliefs that allow me to be depressed. All the faith in the God has not saved everyone who has been depressed. I know the Chirstian Faith very well, and I know that God's hand can not interfere due to our free will. Then what are miracles but nothing but lucky chances for He can't interfere with everyday occurences no matter what. So praying does nothing to help me get better besides the mental aspect of prayers. Even if God wanted to help me he could not. It would not be giving me the free will of choosing to be ill. So then that is why both good and bad people die young. Before they have time to measure up. How can you measure them up. Can you say the were 21 times their average good year factor. This is how much this person was owrth on an average life scale. Did they do great things would they have done better things than me. Should I be dead for I waste my life away trying to find out the answers to all of these questions. The mind is a rough thing. The heart is a rougher one and today I will not speak of it.

-a blue boy