"Please. I need someone. Anyone. I need someone to hold me. Tell me everything is going to be okay. Will it be okay? I just don't know anymore. Embrace me. Hug me. Until this toxin is released from my mind, soul, heart. Cleanse me from this poison. It fills me up more and more every second I'm here. It's filling fast and I feel myself getting too full. It's becoming dangerous. Please suck it out of me. I'm drowning from the inside, out."

This is an excerpt from my journal back in June 2016. I was living with depression and I didn't even know it. I knew something was wrong, but I pushed it away in hopes that it got better. It didn't until I got help.

When some people hear the word "depression" they might not think much of it, they might even roll their eyes. They might think "It can't be that big of a deal." I used to be that person.

Before I was diagnosed, I never thought depression was something that could ever happen to me. Throughout my life I always found myself to be a genuinely happy person. I mean, of course, I felt sadness and loneliness like any other person, but I never envisioned my life to be completely enveloped by those two feelings.

Someone once said to me, “People with depression and anxiety don’t talk about it if they actually have it. If they do talk about it, they just want attention.” I now realize that that this is completely false. When you actually do have depression and anxiety, you do want to talk about it but sometimes you just don’t know how. Because even you don’t understand what is going on. Most of the time you feel so confused and lost. You spend hours sobbing into a pillow, thinking about nothing and everything. You can’t really pinpoint your reasoning for crying other than just existing. You have anxiety attacks when you have to go out into public, especially bigger crowds.You need constant reassurance on your relationships with people. You are in a constant state of loneliness even when you’re around others. You feel so lonely, but you also hate being alone at the same time. You just want to be better, but you don’t know how. You feel like you’re battling the world on your own. Sometimes you wish you weren’t even in this world at all.

I am no doctor or expert on depression nor anxiety, but what I do know is that when you have clinical depression it’s a chemical imbalance in your brain. There is a reduction in the amount of certain neurotransmitters, such as serotonin and norepinephrine. This is why a lot of people diagnosed with depression take medications, known as antidepressants. For me, I am thankful for these medications. Just a few weeks after finally seeing my doctor and being put on my medication, I saw a drastic change in myself. I actually wanted to get out of bed in the morning. My crying fits were becoming less and less as time went on. And overall, I had a generally happier and healthier mindset about life. But, I must admit. Not every day is easy to this day. I still battle with my bad days. I sometimes still feel lonely and sad and hopeless. But, I try my best to push forward and remember that tomorrow is a new day.

Depression is real. It’s something that cannot be ignored. An estimated 350 million people worldwide suffer from depression. Even though so many people have it, you never truly understand it until you have the misfortune of going through it yourself or know someone who does have it.

If anyone reading this is battling depression, anxiety, or both: please know you are not alone. If you think you’re suffering from either but haven’t gotten help, please do. You deserve to live a happy and healthy life.

And to everyone else, be mindful and patient to those battling depression. Treat every person you meet with a kind heart and know that each and every person out there is battling something deep within themselves.