Everything I discuss on my blog is a realistic representation of how my mind works. It’s evident I think contrastingly to everyone else around me and I feel like I isolated myself from society. Everyone talks about money making, their partners and ex-partners, employment, clubbing, funny videos, funny memes, shopping trends and popular restaurants and cafes whilst I talk about a unheralded mixture of miscellaneous topics like psychology, the animal kingdom evolution, natural selection, neuroscience, theories of the universe, society, courting, philosophy and anthropology, vast general knowledge including facts no one bothers to remember, and trends. I feel some people think I’m too aware and conscious of the little things that occur in every day tasks and I feel this makes me unapproachable and unwanted in the friendship groups alike. Even though I’m curious and know so much about the world around me, my parents seem to label me as dumb, arrogant and stubborn because the system I’m studying under doesn’t illustrate my potential in academia. I just don’t understand their way of thinking and neither could them. I can’t comprehend how they come to a sudden conclusion that learning about the brain, Stephen Hawking’s theories of the universe and undertaking a scientifically philosophical perspective of everyday human phenomena would make people around me think that I’m dumb. That is what a depressed and anxious person like myself goes through every day.
There is always miscommunication between myself, my friends and my family. Everyone’s responses are passive, sharp, short, blunt and somewhat inconclusive without a care about indirect outcomes whilst my responses are longwinded, analytical, calm and collected, occasionally witty. If you know me personally, our Facebook and Snapchat conversations are an illustration of the different styles of speech and vocabulary. Most of my friends swear a lot, whilst I can swear in my mind I somehow was trained not to swear whatsoever and I thank (sarcastically) my mother for that. It’s like swearing has become the norm and criterion for nomination of a friendship group. Although a few of my friends are sympathetic and are willing to help me out, they fail to fully understand the situation from my perspective no matter how descriptive and emotive my story is. They also fail to come up with fruitful step-by-step solutions that I could follow in order to get myself back towards parity. I’ve been visiting a psychologist lately and I felt I was on the pathway towards a comfortable playing field. Although I had a chance to reveal my story and the possible reasons for my mental dilemma that I was trained to resist revealing to the public, along with prescribing antidepressants to keep my mental condition at bay, the solutions I was given didn’t really suit my age group to say the least. The social groups I was recommended to join consisted those who are in their 30s and 40s experiencing domestic and family violence, drug and alcohol abuse, sexual assault and financial difficulties which doesn’t match any of my problems and age group. This is pretty much my life motto.
Given my experience, age, appearance and general knowledge, I don’t feel like I could immediately fit into any friendship group, anonymous social group, or team of colleagues in any workplace. Again this feeling of alienation, isolation and dependence in this society is reinforcing suicidal thoughts within my mind. I feel that nobody around me has the knowledge nor the experience to resolve a predicament clearly affecting me mentally that I feel people like me think we have no place in society even our family. We seem to feel more negative, sense more conspiracy and less inclined to change by gradually following society’s terms and conditions hence we seem undeterred by positive, sympathetic messages from our friends and family. Even though they feel they are providing the long-lost love we are desperate to experience, in reality the love we need is more sophisticated than just those 3 words spoken unconditionally. We try to utilise the things our mentors, peers and family members have taught us that allegedly brought them ultimate success but we are rarely warned of the arduous hardships and testing challenges that may come about. During those experiences we realise that despite our best efforts fate doesn’t seem to grant the successes we thought we were destined to achieve. Those patterns of failure are lodged in our minds for eternity and we feel our efforts are meaningless, worthless and neglected by society’s authorities no matter how hard we work. We feel our position in society no longer matters, no longer seems genuine and we are overshadowed by negative self-judgements. They conclude that the best and quickest way to halt the pain and suffering of this reality is to end it all in one blow. What I’ve described to you is the thought process of a depressed person and I experienced this before. This is their reality and almost no one seems to empathise with them. They feel that speaking out will not change the course of their life because they are afraid of the traumatic life patterns they had experienced in the workplace, family home or in public. That’s why they are keeping an extremely low profile in society and most of you would not be aware of their presence because media doesn’t think their story is newsworthy. Most of them don’t even use social media the way you use it everyday. They perceive Facebook Friend or Twitter Follower as a real-life friend and they will be deeply offended and devastated when you unfriend or unfollow them. With a click of a button you have aggravated their feelings of loneliness and shattered their opportunities for new social connections. It’s only a matter of time before the person you just unfriended or unfollowed will cease to exist. I don’t blame you if you nonchalantly claim you don’t know this person but I want to alert you and make you aware of the psychological impacts of your actions on the person you cut connections with depending on their psyche. I know this because I felt this way before many times.
This is why I’m fascinated with mental illnesses and conditions like depression and anxiety. So far scientists still haven’t pinpointed the exact causes and biochemical pathways within our central nervous system is still not well understood and requires more research.
Despite all the preposterous theories and misconceptions on the causes of depression being thrown about by the ancient Greeks and Christians, the beginning of the Renaissance marked the beginning of recognition of depression as a biological disease. Scientists suspected that low levels of Serotonin, a neurotransmitter responsible for feelings of elation and happiness, was the main cause. However the size of their Hippocampus was something out of the ordinary. Those who were depressed tended to have smaller Hippocampi than those who weren’t depressed. In the human brain, the Hippocampus is part of the limbic system which plays crucial roles in memory (short-term or long-term) and in spatial memory that reinforces navigation. The causes of the reduction in size of the Hippocampus is still not well understood in the context of depression and other mental illnesses like Epilepsy and Schizophrenia but the presence of Gluco-corticoid receptors that bind to stress-related steroids may be a clue to solve the scientific mysteries of depression. Here are some studies I discovered that may hold the key breakthrough:
http://www.iflscience.com/brain/scientists-find-the-physical-source-of-depression/
http://www.health.harvard.edu/mind-and-mood/what-causes-depression
Every year about 350 million people worldwide are currently depressed and only about 50% of them are receiving treatment, let alone any treatment. Treatments include antidepressants to increase Serotonin levels and psychotherapy. That number is so large that it’s too hard for me to ignore. People seem to believe it illustrates the poor choices these people made and the depressed victims feel they deserved to experience such a life. However I see it differently. These figures illustrate how the society our ancestors built over the years is flawed from the beginning conceptually and it fails to account for those who are resistant to society’s expectations and aren’t receiving the sympathy, empathy and understanding regarding their social dilemma. Saying “get over it” or “keep your chin up” to your depressed friend will virtually make no difference to the cause. If you want to help them. help them. They are on their last haunches and sharing loving and caring messages isn’t going to cut it for them. Some of you will see this as attention-seeking but I see this as a last ditch effort to save themselves from self-imposed obliteration. But you are all entitled to your opinions and you might be on the way to unintentionally nailing down the last screw on your friend’s coffin. I know deep down regret and shame will come back to haunt you for failing to be the guardian of someone who nominated you as their last hope of ever living on this planet. The reason I'm still here breathing and typing this post is because my psychologist gave me an inspiration and a suitable platform to share the things I enjoy sharing with you all on a blog such as this. It doesn’t hurt to be the hero of someone your own species.
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