Coming Out of Depression

Let me tell you about when a prolonged period of depression ends. You want to sing, dance, laugh, and scream it from the rooftops. I'm me again! I feel normal! The world doesn't feel like it's going to end anymore! I'm okay! The thing is, a lot of the time people disregard your excessive cheerfulness when this happens. Either they don't notice it, or if they do they simply think it's odd. But really it's the best thing there is. You're you again. The real you. Not the hurting, irrational version of you that doubts everything in your life and hurts the people who love you to see. I've sort of had a nervous breakdown coming on the past few weeks but it really took over my life this week. I was horrible. I said things I didn't really mean because I was confused and mixed up inside and I cried more than an entire theater of people seeing Toy Story 3 for the first time, which was awful because I'm really not a crier. I hardly ever cry so crying excessively just makes me feel even worse and less like myself. I was depressed and felt guilty about everything and was really beating myself up. Sometimes I'd get randomly really angry too. Angry that my life had to happen this way and that I had to be this way. During my nervous breakdown I did a lot of things I regret. Especially the fact that my pain was hurting my fiancé too because he was the one who held me as I cried. And cried. And cried. Tonight after I finally snapped out of it (it was pretty bad earlier in the day) I was laughing and baking and generally being a dork like I usually am. When my fiancé was headed out the door to go home he paused and said, "You know, it's really nice to see you smile again." That hit me hard. I am a pretty smiley person. I smile a lot, laugh a lot, goof off a lot. A lot of people have had a hard time believing I have depression because of the way my personality is when I'm not depressed. When I'm depressed I'm basically a different person. It was really nice going back to Happy, Goofy, Easily Excitable Mallory after being Angry, Empty, Hates Everything, Self-Loathing Mallory. Even nicer was that someone else noticed and was as happy that I had come out of it as I was. I really hate having depression, but I have to admit, I wish there was a way to bottle the pure joy you feel when you snap out of a bout of depression and share it with everyone because it's the one of the best feelings in the world. Yes, being depressed really sucks. But it ends. And when it ends everything is not just okay again, but wonderful. I wish there was a way to keep that happy high all the time, but just as surely as the depression always comes back, the feeling of depression ending comes back too.