During my encounter with depression, a poignant description from a friend has haunted me through the years: Imagine yourself on a steep mountain when thick fog rolls in. Your friends and family on the ledge below you can't see you, can't hope to reach you through the dense veil. And you're just too scared, too trapped, to find your own way out.  Isolation. Numbing cold. You're blind. Helpless. No one can reach you and you're left alone with no one but yourself.

Now imagine that the dense fog is the veil of your mind, shielding you from those you love, people who are desperate to save you. Imagine that the numbing cold is your own negativity, beating you endlessly with fear and anxiety. Imagine that the rocky embrace of the mountain is the prison that you yourself have created with the self doubt you continuously drill into your senses.

And that's just the beginning.

The above scenario, coupled with despair and a deep and nearly unshakable sense of being alone, is just a taste of what depression feels like. Until one has been there, or has lived through a loved-one experiencing it, depression is just a word. To us, the many, it is the dreadful toll of a bell singing a forlorn tune.

In the following posts, I hope to guide you through my experience of what depression was for me in hopes that it'll help a lost family member understand, or encourage the desperate inmate going through the ordeal to engage in an open dialogue with friends, family, or even themself.

There is a happy ending. The doors to that part of my life have been well-closed for years now. I have undertaken a project that inspires me to revisit that part of my soul, to take down the boards that has closed a forgotten room in my mind long ago; to a place of remembrance of those dark times, to dance with the shadows that had once held me down. At the end of the day, at the end of my posts, I know I can board that space in my mind back up, and leave those figures behind. Your friend, son, daughter, father, anyone going through the pain, can and will too one day.

Though it may be difficult for you to see, my weary friend, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Though you can't see it beyond the tears blinding you, you will recover. Your loved-one will recover. And one day, you too will see the sunlight.

Trust me. There's growth through pain.

Depression: Dawn of Something Dark (Part I)