I’ve spent so long blaming the people around me for my own sorrow. The hatred that consumes me whole is no one’s fault but my own.

But it took me so long to figure that out. I spent so many years changing different parts of myself. It was like shopping for the perfect me. Trying on a different leg, hand, mouth, eyes, face, hair, nails, torso. I was trying to change the outside to affect the inside. It hurt to look inwards, to look at why I hated her so much. What was it about her that deserved so much negativity?

I didn’t know what depression was until I was nineteen. And while naming your monsters cannot make them go away, it lets you get to know them better. Understand their mood swings and you’ll be able to handle the dip that’s coming up down the road.