Maggie AstorCompte certifié

I remember passing nights this way: count to 300 in my head, then take a deep breath and do it again, because I couldn't contemplate feeling the way I did for more than five minutes. All night was too long. I had to divide it into tiny pieces and choose to endure each one. 2/

When semicolon tattoos became a thing, I remember some people mocking them, saying it was a stupid trend, or cheap imagery. But I think the symbolism is tremendously powerful: "A semicolon is used where a writer could have ended a sentence, but chose not to." 3/

I used to wear a semicolon ring. I don't anymore because, well, I gained weight and it didn't fit anymore and I never got it resized. You know. Life. I still think sometimes about getting that tattoo, though, and that's saying a lot for someone as scared of needles as I am. 4/

I always want to end posts and conversations about depression with, you know, "please keep going! It gets better!" Which is true but also meaningless, almost offensively so, when you're in the middle of it. 5/

The deepest, most evil thing depression does is tell you that it can't get better, and that even if it can, you can't possibly survive until then. So what I say is: You don't have to believe it will get better. Bear with me. 6/

You don't have to believe it will get better. You just have to keep choosing to endure for whatever amount of time you can stand. And then do it again. Again. Again. Help is available. Treatment is available. It will get better *whether you believe it or not.* 7/

There are many, many resources out there. I don't pretend that there is a magic resource that is perfect or will help everyone, but I absolutely believe that, for everyone, there exists at least one resource that will help. 8/

But the formal resources are only part of the story. You also need to read this thread from @abbyhonold.https://twitter.com/abbyhonold/status/1074318188505124864 …

Above all else, I want to dispense fully and forever with the idea that depression, or any mental illness, = weakness. This is why people blame themselves. This is why people are afraid to ask for help.

You are not weak because you're depressed. And you don't have to believe it will get better. I wrote a long essay about this a few years ago. I didn't, and have no intention to, publish it anywhere other than my personal Facebook page. But I will share how it ends.

I wrote about the years I spent thinking of the girl I once was, and wishing I could help her — wishing I could convince her that life would get better, but knowing she would never have believed me. And I wrote about what that semicolon ring meant to me.

"When I look at the ring," I wrote, "I see that girl on the kitchen floor, but I see her in a different light. I don’t feel the sudden, explosive ache, the desperate need to reach through time to help." (1/2)