“Why did you stop writing for the Odyssey?” It’s a question that I never expected to be asked by so many people. To be honest, when I started writing I didn’t think anyone actually read my articles. I mostly wrote them for myself and my family. Then slowly more people started to read my content and talk to me about it. I got compliments about my strength for opening up to the public and talking about such serious topics.That gave me the encouragement to continue to speak about mental illness and how to help someone cope with them, specifically depression. However my second semester at college set me back to a point where I felt entirely too weak to write about the strength needed to get through depressive episodes.

For months I returned to a state that is a little hard understand from the outside. I would miss classes because I couldn’t get myself out of bed. I would spend at least 14 hours a day just sleeping and when I wasn’t sleeping, I was crying about nothing and everything. I would eat maybe a candy bar and some chips, but that would be it for the day. My self doubt took over; I felt like I couldn’t go on. I tried to be positive around my friends because I didn’t want them to worry. My problems weren’t theirs to fix. Being on my own was probably the worst thing I could have done to myself. That is why I stopped writing. It wasn’t because I didn’t want to or that I ran out of ideas. I physically didn’t have the strength to pick up my laptop and write a simple page of words. However now I’m better. Not perfect, but definitely improving.

This past school year has been a “shooting star cutting through the atmosphere and fucking crashing into the ground,” in the wise words of one of my best friends Charles Mahoney. It may sound ridiculous, but it actually couldn’t be more true. I have had some of my happiest laughs, but also some of my darkest cries. I learned things about myself that I couldn’t have found out if I was trapped in a school for 7 hours then living with my family for the other 17. A major discovery I made was that I’m not as okay as I thought I was. That isn’t a bad thing by any means. Learning that I still have a few serious changes to make in my life in order to reach a state of content is a good thing; going on pretending that I am completely fine is quite the opposite.

This goes out to the boys and girls struggling to find the will to continue on. Sure it gets extremely tough sometimes, but things do improve. It takes hard work and dedication to push yourself to ignore the constant negative thoughts running through your head on a loop. Just remember to that every day is a chance to prove your mental illness wrong. Aspire to the positive, happy person you know you can be! Believe in yourself like I do.