One of my truest and greatest talents is putting on a fake smile and hiding how I really feel inside. I got so good at it that I lost myself within. I began to become ignorant of who I truly was on the inside and the outside. See, let me tell you a little story... In the summer of 2017, I was diagnosed with depression. That news hit me hard, but I don’t know why; I already knew that. I was sad all of the time and there were times I never wanted to get out of bed. I never wanted to eat or shower--really, I didn’t want to do anything. I felt like I was nothing and I felt like there was nothing else left for me in this world but to just waste every day away right there in my bed. The worst part about all of that is that wasn’t my first time feeling this way and it definitely wasn’t my last.
It all started back in elementary school. I was a victim of bullying--from being called “It” and “Mr. Monster” and being teased about my weight and my physical appearance to walking home alone every single day with tears in my eyes. I was forced to fight other girls. I also spent lunches with a teacher just so I didn’t spend them alone at a table separated from the rest of the class. I was insecure and I didn’t know how to fight back or stand up for myself. I felt the only thing to do was to just take it. Take the bag full of school supplies being thrown across the room and hitting me in the back of my head. Take the being pinned against the wall with five or six different girls in my face making threats and putting their hands on me. Take the being locked in the bathroom stall waiting on the girls to leave because they were waiting on me to come out to fight.
Back then, I was weak. It didn’t take much for me to realize how weak I was until I moved and started to make new friends. However, I then began to find myself as the bully. I didn’t have real friends growing up so when I became a friend, I didn’t know how to treat others. I did what I knew, which was how to bully. I would boss them around and if I didn’t want to do something, then we didn’t do it because I said so. My personality was very nasty. I hated that me even more than I hated the weak-minded me when I was the victim. Unfortunately, I was like this until I found my two best friends. They truly brought out the best in me. I started to find out who I was, started to realize how outgoing I am, and how wild and fun I am. I started to see how great my personality was and how I bounced from room to room shining because I finally found myself.
Somewhere, I lost that again. This time, I can’t pinpoint where exactly, but I became depressed and I hated life outside my four walls. The only place I wanted to be was my bed and yet, I didn’t even want to be there. This would happen again and again all throughout high school. This is where my greatest talent came in hand. I played sports and I was very active in school activities so I felt like I couldn’t just mentally disappear off Earth like I wanted to. I felt like people were counting on me. I began to start putting on the fake smile and continue to do what I do best--fake it till you make it. No one understands the phrase like I do. There were times where I was so low, I would release my pain by cutting into my skin. There was something about physical pain that made my mental and emotional pains feel so much better. Even better, still, when I would shower and feel the burn from the soap and water sliding into my open wounds. I then stared at pill bottles for hours, wondering how many pills I’d have to pop to leave this world. And as selfish as it sounds, no, I never thought about the people who loved me. I never thought about my family because when you’re that low and you feel like there is nothing left, you feel like they are better off without you. I never got around attempting suicide, but I sure did think about it a lot.
I lost someone very close to me two years ago and when I lost my best friend, I lost myself completely. Around the same time, I had already decided not to attend college and jump right into the workforce. So, watching my best friends enjoying their college lives tore me up inside. Meanwhile, I was living at home with my parents working a 9-5 that I hated. And for the longest time, I resented myself for making the opposite decision that my friends made. I never wanted to continue school after high school, so that wasn’t why I resented myself. I hated myself because everyone around me was happy--besides me. So yeah, on top of all that, the day I lost the person who meant so much to me was the day I gave up. I started drinking a lot, I couldn’t sleep, I couldn’t eat, and I couldn’t get out of bed for three months.
My mother then forced me to go see a doctor and that is when what I already knew came true. The words made me numb; it stung like a bee. “You’re definitely depressed, Tyson. How do you want to handle it? Medication? Therapist?” Meanwhile, I’m still in shock because that’s not a thing where I’m from. Depression isn’t real, that’s just a way of being sad. I took it as a joke! “I can do this on my own I’ll get better on my own,” I told myself every day. The repetition of the words didn’t help. I went to counseling a couple of times and I felt like it helped, but I felt like the rest was something I should be able to take care of. I was ashamed. Someone who had everything they needed and wanted couldn’t be depressed. I have a family that loves and adores me. I have a roof over my head, food to eat every day, and a pillow to lay my head at night. There is no way someone like me can be depressed. I was in denial.
It took, yet again, another episode of the cutting and thoughts of suicide and not eating or sleeping to realize how bad I really was. Only this time, anger played a really big part. I was angry all the time. Something so little would just set me off. I started snapping at my family and friends and it wasn’t fair to them. As I got worse, I realized that it no longer just affected me, it affected everyone around me. I began to start losing friends and began to hurt my family. So back to the doctor I went. “Medication? Therapist?”
No to medication. That would end my flying career--and that was something I loved to do: fly! It felt so real when I was in the air and all of my problems were still on the ground. I loved being up there, focusing only on my lesson that my flight instructor had planned for me that day. The take-offs, landings, maneuvers, and cross-country planning were the only things that I looked forward to every day. But suddenly, flying became another burden. It was no longer and outlet,but just another problem. Yet again, something that I loved so much was taken from me by this terrible disease. So, I went to my very last option: medication. I hated even the thought of it, and when I first started taking the medication, the symptoms made me want to stop. I didn’t feel any different than before. If anything, I felt just a little bit worse. But, the doctors’ orders were to wait it out and let it settle in my system before I just gave up. I listened and did exactly what the doctor told me to do.
This thing that I had been dealing with for years made me feel so empty. I lost who I was completely and I couldn’t find myself again. I tried and tried to search for that happy, little, innocent girl again. She was nowhere to be found. Who I was before no longer existed, but who I am now is someone I have never met before.
I have never felt this confident and I have never felt so comfortable in my own skin. For years, I battled with how I looked. My weight was the main thing that made me most insecure. It was something that made me feel so uncomfortable around all of my friends because they were always smaller than I was. I can’t begin to explain how happy I am now that I have finally found myself. All of the years I spent torturing myself brought nothing but misery to my life and I never understood it until I realized what I was putting myself through. I am happy that I can finally say that I am happy with being the size that I am as long as I am healthy. I have grown into this, strong, independent, beautiful, powerful woman and I couldn’t be more proud of myself.
I no longer have to use my greatest talent anymore. I have put my fake smile to rest because I have a real one now, and that makes me more happy than anything. I am happy that I take antidepressants every day to guide me into the person I am. I am happy to be able to say that I wake up knowing that I have survived something that I didn’t think I would be able to. I am happy that my parents and brothers look at me without worry. I am happy that my close friends have witnessed me overcome my worst fears. I am happy. I am free. I am me. I am me. I am me.
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