Aurora Magazine 2019

goes on.”

I thought back to a week prior to this visit – to a conver - sation that led me to schedule this meeting with the man in the white lab coat. The conversation started with a psychology- related topic, though I couldn’t remember it in leu of the subject that followed. I’d been sprawled out on my bed, mentally cursing the ever - persistent sinus headache that made my fatigue seem even worse, when my roommate turned the topic to her struggle with depression and anxiety. I sat up, every muscle in my body protesting. My vision grew dark and spotty and I knew that if I’d been standing, I would have collapsed as another wave of light- headedness hit me. The same internal question kept plaguing me in moments like this: What was happening to me? She talked about how her depression and anxiety made her feel like a completely different person; how she was only a hollow shell of the person she was before this mental illness dogged her every step, stripping her of that confidence in herself. She told me of how she had almost ended everything when she was younger, and I saw how she wore exhaustion like it weighed her body down. She explained how her mom had cried for a week straight when she’d found out, a reaction that showed my roommate that her mental illness was not to be trusted – that there were reasons for her to be alive. Something in the way she spoke made me want to talk about what I was feeling – something I rarely did, because bot - tling up what I was feeling seemed easier until it came bubbling out in unstoppable waves that made me feel like I was drowning. I told her that I hadn’t felt like myself in a long time. That I was both so mentally and physically exhausted that I didn’t recognize my own body. Each morning when I awoke, I felt weighed down and should I try to move, every muscle protested like they were fighting a battle between life and death, leaving me in agony with each breath I took. I’m sure she’d noticed that I replaced every one of my hobbies with naps that never helped and stopped 7