Bathrooms.

At 14, I was sitting in showers crying my eyes out while rivers of red were pouring from my wrists.

At 18, I was in the same spot in the bathroom. This time, passed out in a pool of my own tears and blood, from the same stream of red.

At 21, I remember how to take showers and sing. The walls no longer represent solitude.

At a week before I turn 22, these walls are no longer cages for secrets. 

Still wants.

I would like to think that I could be happy.
I would like to believe, to see, to be,
To be happy.

I would love to think that pain does not hold me hostage
but every time,
I try to take a step forward with happiness,
Pain shuts the barred windows and doors,
Trapping me in this vortex of what is eventually called depression.

I am trying, I swear.
For you, I'd try to scale the Empire State Building, despite my fear of heights.
No one explains how hard it is for you to explain yourself to others
Especially when you're in situations that they have yet to experienced.
I don't know how to explain my depression to you.
I don't know how to explain my pain.
I guess I cannot blame you for asking.
Like the others, I think you cared.

I still want to think that I can be happy.
I still want to believe that I'll wake up to a day with clear skies.
I don't know how to do all of this life thing
but I promise you,
I would want to be happy.

I still do.

Birthdays.

There's a reason why I love birthdays. It is another beginning, another point of life where you are reminded that you have another chance. I will celebrate your birthdays, I will be happy for you that you have another chance at everything in life. I will be happy that you are still alive, even if there are days where you wish you weren't.

For someone who suffers from depression, I am sure optimistic about having hope especially when it is about someone else.

Atlas and His Punishment.

When the Titans lost their war against the Olympians,
Atlas was condemned by Zeus to bear heaven's weight on his shoulders.
His punishment was a series of cramping wrists and stuttering kneecaps,
shaking arms and shoulders that bent over like all the apologies in the world.
No amount of suffering or prayers will ever earn him
the forgiveness of the supreme ruler of the gods.
I guess it's understandable that he suffers.
It is retribution for going against the most powerful god of all.

When I am curled up in my own bed, I often ask myself
if any of my wrongdoings has resulted in this form of punishment.
The weight of the day greeted my waking body like the aftermath of a hurricane.
My shoulders mirror the act of Atlas balancing the heavens,
except the heavens replaced by my anxiety and my desperate need to be good enough.
My arms cramped from the way I wrapped them around myself.
I bite my teeth down so hard that I was made believe that
my voice was never meant to be heard.
I broke and crumbled, without falling down.

Perhaps I am the daughter of Atlas, reincarnated
over the centuries to share the burden of what was once my father's punishment.
Perhaps my pain will act as the head of a decapitated prisoner, stuck on a pole
high up, as a warning to those who might stray.

Then,
Perhaps I am Atlas himself, wiped clean off all memories of the past,
with only the loud echos of never ending pain,
as a faint reminder of doing what I thought was right.

To those who un-intelligently refuse to understand depression.

The most frustrating part about having depression is when everything is going right, like absolutely everything is in your favor, you still feel your chest caving, you still want to die. When you explain it to other people who don't understand depression, they will tell you to stop thinking so much or to do something to take your mind off it.

They don't understand it. I am not thinking about anything. It could just be the beginning of the day. I would have literally just opened my eyes at the sound of my alarm. The feeling of a black hole in my chest will be there. There is no reason for it. Depression has triggers but at most times, they don't have a reason to be there. It's there and there's really nothing to do about it.

Then, to the "do something to take your mind off it", I can't. Like I've said, it's there. I could be sitting in bed, playing Pokemon or eating my lunch at a five star restaurant. I will still feel that cyclone of weariness and hopeless. It is there without needing you to acknowledging its presence. You just wake up with the hollow emptiness in your chest and the dread of the possibilities of the rest of the day.

I have woken up at times, unable to get out of bed because my body hurts. It is not the physical pain that immobilized me. I want to slit my wrists and bleed to death. I want to jump in front of a moving car and get run over. I want to feel pills going down my throat. I genuinely want to die. Now imagine someone's fist being shoved into your chest, then they continue to squirm around, twisting and turning. The place where your heart is supposed to be is replaced with a hurricane of pain, hopelessness and emptiness. You feel the blood draining from your face, your fingers, basically your whole body. You are left there, numb. You can hear the hum of silence in the air echoing in your room. You can almost hear the rise of fall of your chest as you breathe. With that, your brain just amplifies the feeling of sadness and hopelessness. You basically lose whenever you try fight with this.

So, to those who dismisses depression as an excuse for anything, fuck you. I woke up, got out of bed and went through life with ALL OF THOSE going on with me. Fuck you, fuck you, fuck you. You can go fuck yourselves.

We are fighters. We fight for our own lives. We fight to be alive.

Stuck Pt 1.

Have you ever been stuck?

Stuck? A couple of times. 

In potholes. 

In my car. 

Outside my house. 

Yeah, plenty.

So, to you,

being stuck is being physically restrained,

confined in a space that you can't get out of?

Being stopped from going where you are meant to be heading?

Well, that's one definition of being stuck.

What about you?

What is your experience of being stuck?

I have times where I try to stop thinking about something,

somehow it looped itself in my head 

and it ends up being the only thing I think about.

Then, there were days where I would drive aimlessly around the city.

Somehow, I would end up in odd places that still has fragments of what used to be.

Sometimes I would convince myself that I was okay.

I'll explore new places, new adventures, a whole different routine.

Sometimes it doesn't matter how hard I try because

it only takes something simple like the way someone's thumb looks like,

a phrase that was used,

It only takes very little for me to feel like 

I was back to the place that I try very hard to leave.

I think it's good that you try.

It means you stand a chance of getting out.

Getting out of anywhere is a hard thing to do.

So, I think it matters that you try very hard.

You know what is the worst part?

Being stuck feels infinite.

It's like you are blindfolded

and you are shortsighted.

All you can see are glimpses of what's in front of you

through the thin fabric of the blindfold.

And with your shortsightedness,

you are unable to even see what is before you,

let alone anything else beyond that.

And because of that, 

you're unable to get out

or get to anywhere else for that matter.

Reflection for my lack of writing

I will explain my lack of writing as a lack of things to say. However, I think I do have loads to say, I just lost my voice for a while.

My brain has been too numb to properly organized memories and mental notes made. For a long time, I have felt like a jumbled up, confused mush. Somehow, I have refused to put myself back in order. I really don't know why. There are so many things about myself that still confuses me on an extreme level.

I felt like I have grown and I have changed. I have yet to see it manifest yet but I feel the difference, I think that's what matters at this point. I have nothing to prove, at least not to anyone. I think as long as I know what I am doing things for and where I am going, I will be okay.

Eavesdropping Series: Love Edition

Since I always eat on my own, I get to be more aware of my environment and the people in it. I realize that people tend to have very interesting things to talk about and I will hear because I am sitting next to them. They are not shy about it so I sometimes just listen to their conversations. Sometimes, I get to have a few chuckles about it. I thought that it'd be nice to share it with my friends on snapchat.

So, I started my own series which includes my selfies captioned with information from the conversations I overhear. I never take pictures of the people that I eavesdrop on. No names are included either.

So here's the set that just happened 15 minutes ago.

When I am in a corner deliberately

Hi, my name is Tryphena.

My talents include redirecting conversation topics to food 

and making people feel uncomfortable with my probing questions about their life.

I am not here to meet people, 

Notice how I am standing in the corner,

avoiding contact with everyone else at all costs.

I am simply here because I am supposed to

or I'm doing a favor for a friend.

I do not wish to participate in your discussion of the weather,

or the debate of whether the iPhone 6 bends "for real".

We have two seasons, raining and hell.

It is not rocket science

and definitely not a good ice breaker.

Oh, did you know it rained today?

OH MY GOD, REALLY?

and here's a tip,

don't bend anything that is not supposed to be bended.

Don't get me wrong, 

I am a nice person but

if I am in the corner deliberately and you invade that space,

you better have interesting things to say. 

I am in this corner for a reason.

If small talk is the only thing that you've got,

don't take offense when I make an excuse to go to the toilet and never come back.

I would usually stay and chat but 

if I am in a corner, people watching, 

please leave me alone.

Unless you've come to join me in judging people by their covers for fun,

then by all means.

Breaking my own promise.

I promised myself that I wouldn't talk about her anymore, that I would stop dedicating words to her,  words she will never read. Then, it became evident to me that there were imprints of her everywhere. I see it in my stories, my poems, my conversations and even in my reaction towards a new friend. I swore to never talk about her again but she's everywhere.

When I see the word best friend anywhere, my mind still goes to her even though she no longer holds the title. The feeling of this is like a recovering alcoholic seeing a sign pointing to a bar. Their first instinct tells them to go in and order a drink. Then, their senses come to them and they have to consciously convince themselves to walk away because going in will not help them in any way.

Time and time again, my mind will unconsciously remember the good times that we had, which triggered a lot of the bad memories. I would usually stop myself from going down to memory lane but sometimes, I would allow myself a short stroll and everytime without fail, I will end up missing her.

We don't talk anymore. It's horrible because now, even our small talk is awkward. We couldn't get two sentences out with that gaping feeling between us. And every time she talks to me, I wonder if she misses me. I never understood how people can just go around pretending like they never once knew everything about this person. I never understood how they manage to put away all these memories and information like it never mattered. 

There was a quote that I saw on tumblr, I don't remember it exactly but it goes along those lines, "He always photographed the thing that he loved but he never took a photo of me". I was in a lot of her photos before. Back then, I will always be somewhere in the picture. Now, you can't even tell that we're friends. I was happy then. Spending time with her was nice, I could talk to her about anything and she always made me laugh. She kept me calm, she kept me sane. She was my own sun. Was. Now, I can't remember what her laugh sounds like. 

I would like to think that she was using me because believing that is less painful than to believe that I just wasn't relevant anymore. However, as much as I don't want to believe it, I know that at some point, I did mean something to her and she really did loved me. My judgement about people hasn't failed me yet. So, up until some point, she really was my friend. My only mistake was to believe that that will never change. 

I stop telling people the details of our friendship. It used to be long, detailed paragraphs of stories. Now I replace those stories with "We don't talk anymore" and "I don't know, she never responded and I gave up eventually". I stop telling the stories because relieving the memories bring me pain. I no longer see the reason to put myself through it anymore.  I'd like to think that she doesn't care because it will help me move on from this. However, I saw a quote that says this, "There are two reasons why people don't talk about things, either it doesn't mean anything to them or it means everything". I don't know which one is she.

I think, among all the friends that I've made over the years, I will always love her the most. I mean, how can I still, after everything? But I do, I still do.