For months I woke up in the morning and expected the same old thing, more clumps of my hair to continue falling out from my anxiety. I prepared myself for another day of feeling less in control than the last. I looked in the mirror one last time and noticed my shaky hands. It was going to be a rough day.
For so long I was an optimistic person. I didn’t let the small things in life get to me. But as I got older and the reality of life set in more and more, it got harder to fight off the feeling of not being enough or messing something up.
I was on edge, and I always hid away in my room. Away from things that could flip my mood in a matter of seconds like my mom asking me to do my laundry or clean the dishes. My anxiety wasn’t a feeling I could control. I was helpless by myself.
My mom and I decided to ask for medical help, so we called our pediatrician. It almost seemed weird to me that I was calling a kid’s doctor for what always seemed to be an adult battle. When I got to the doctor’s office with my dad the doctor asked my dad to step out of the room as she asked me a list of questions.
After I finished the yes and no portion, she called my dad back into the room. She crossed her legs and said, “Well what we are going to do is put you on some medication to take care of your depression and anxiety.” She smiled at me.
What was there to smile about putting a 15-year-old on medication that I might have to take for the rest of my life? I put my head down. I felt embarrassed for being different and needing help.
I feared being an outcast from my siblings for the battle I had started fighting alone. Since my older brother was a big time football player and my little sister was great at archery, I felt like the fool of the family. My friends and family told me I really didn’t have a reason to be depressed because I was always such a happy girl.
Many mornings I woke up sick because of my medicine. I felt like I couldn’t go to school. Some days I woke up happy and at peace with myself, but other days I just wanted to go back to bed and hide in my room forever. I didn’t want to be the girl who looked happy on the outside but felt lost on the inside. I was lonely.
My parents watched for signs of my depression getting worse. I didn’t want to make it more noticeable than it already was.
The whole situation was already like an elephant in the room when I was with my family. No one wanted to say something that would set me off.
Everyone danced around it and treated me like a fragile doll. But I just wanted to be treated normally.
For seven months I was getting better, and I was able to get my anxiety under control. It seemed like a miracle to me. My family and friends finally stopped treating me so differently, and we went back to our old ways of joking around every chance we had.
But when the stresses of teenage life overwhelmed me, my hair started falling out again, and my mood swings were off the charts. It was time to go back to the doctor.
A year later, I’m still on my medicine. Sometimes I’m embarrassed when people tell me I have no reason to be depressed or anxious because they think I’m always happy.
The feeling of not being good enough for anyone still lingers, but I’m starting the process of learning to see myself for who I am. Through all of my struggles, I realized I’m perfectly fine the way God made me, and I need to see myself in the way He sees me.
