At 25 I’m Supposed To Be Full Of Life But I’m Depressed

I’m depressed. I really don’t even want to talk about what happened. There wasn’t much that happened except that I was abusive to myself and incidentally another person. It was ugly and I have no interest in digging up my memories for painful feelings like I used to do. I have to say the younger me was bloody brave and strong. How could she write about every single heartbreak in details which was practically reliving it? At 25, I have no bandwidth for that. I find no pleasure in romanticising pain. I’m more realistic now. I look at reality and I see pain is pain and I want the warm, fuzzy feeling of love and happiness. I want to feel safe and cared for and loved — honestly, mostly by myself. I actually have plenty of support and love in my life. But I’ve been very cruel to myself. I didn’t protect myself. I didn’t trust myself. I didn’t give myself the treatment I would a loved one, and as a result, I also did wrong to others. It hurts me terribly because I was aware throughout the process. I was cruel to myself knowingly. I ended up losing my dignity, my pride, my confidence, and am now left with a shell of myself. How do I go up from here? I wonder.

I’m depressed. I’ve gone through days dreading waking up and having no interest in anything but sleep. Okay, not entirely. I do reasonably look forward to my therapy sessions and swimming classes and playing sports. I still can feel better by working on myself or learning something new — that’s probably so essential to me that even depression can’t take it away. But in a way, those activities are also ways for me to temporarily free myself from the spirit pain I’m feeling now, hoping that as time passes, things would change. But frankly, in the midst of this depressive episode, I can’t be sure it would get better. I don’t even want escapism. I don’t want food, alcohol, drugs, romance, sex, or anything. I just want to sleep so I don’t have to think. I’m just overwhelmed with this shitty feeling of having failed to serve myself well, of shooting myself in the foot again and again and realising I could be a fucking loser. See, even that sentence right there, it wasn’t kind at all. I’m still angry at myself. I’m still so disappointed at myself that I could burst into tears.

I’m depressed. Nothing could save me now except for me and perhaps time. I’m sinking in my own despair and strangely enough, I think it’s a good thing. Only by hitting this lowest of low could I start making moves to better things ahead, could I transform and grow and learn how to be me better. I’m 24 turning 25, I’m still so young, yet I’m so hard on myself. Sometimes I don’t know why I’m given this much complexity of a person to deal with. I look at some people and I’m so deeply envious of how emotionally light they are, how good of a childhood they get, and how easy it is for them to enjoy the simple pleasure of life like dating or getting in a relationship. Meanwhile, there’s me. The Vietnamese Cancerian INFJ, the textbook cursed child of Western modern dating with excessive emotions and mood swings and mixed background and layered psychology that is bloody hard to understand even for myself — no wonder why most guys couldn’t. No wonder why I screwed up most of my relationships with my anxiety. No wonder why I’m still single. Actually, it’s surprising I even got this far.

I’m depressed. But I’m grateful I have writing because otherwise how else could I be so completely myself and feel understood even just by putting the words out there? I know I haven’t really been writing for my audience. I have been writing for myself, but at least I hope that my authenticity, my rawness, my honesty could help someone. It’s hard, it’s hard for all of us out there. It’s hard to be a deep thinker with a bloated heart. It’s hard to be having anxiety and depression and emotional instability that makes us feel so out of control and alienated. In times like this, I’m so grateful for my sisters. We’re not completely the same but we share many traits in common and they make me feel so much less alone. I’m so happy we’re close and loving towards one another. They’re always there for me. They listen to me even when they don’t understand the context of what I go through. They love me and I love them. Family is just amazing. I know some people don’t even have this — I feel for them and I know how lucky I’m. I turn around and I have a whole support system underneath my feet, yet I’m still scared, still hurt, still allowing strangers to shatter my heart and spirit. How strange.

I’m depressed. But as I write, I start to feel slightly better. Writing is amazing in the sense that it always helps me sort through my thinking. I know I will feel depressed and sink into my mattress again but at least for now, I could see some light inside myself. I’m not worthless. All this empathy and emotional depth can’t be for nothing. There will be people who appreciate this. There will be times even people who right now can’t appreciate this will need this. But ultimately it doesn’t matter. I can’t expect everyone to like this side of me. It’s true that it’s a fundamental part of me and I can’t get too close to someone without showing it, but if someone doesn’t see this, it doesn’t mean they’re bad or our relationship is doomed, it just means our connection will stay at a certain level and it’s okay. There’s no point of forcing it any other way. It still hurts my spirit that I let my emotions and baggage get the best of me, but hopefully, as I get older, I will learn to manage this and be a better human — firstly for myself.

I’m depressed. I will be like this for a while, and I guess it’s okay. I know I’m 25, I’m supposed to be out there, full of energy, living the high life, but here I am, figuring out myself and how to live this life being me, most of the times frankly really heavy and sad. And it’s okay. It’s my journey. It’s my world as is right now and If I can’t even accept it and have compassion towards myself, what’s the point? I hope my life will get lighter, with more joy and less difficult emotions. I hope I will meet people who have been through a lot so they can understand me and appreciate my gifts. I hope I will be able to manage my emotions better towards people who are different from me and to enjoy them for their own special gifts. I hope I will be able to drop my expectations. I hope I will be happier, stronger, firmer on my feet — a mature, well-developed human. I hope I will get through this. It isn’t the first time this has happened, and I’m afraid it might not be the last. But I hope next time I will recognise it sooner and make better decisions for myself. All the psychic readings I’ve ever received pointed out that I would have emotional turbulence throughout my 20s but in my 30s, I would be able to enjoy a blissful, abundant life. Well, I shall live for that.