Purpose

I decided to go back through all the posts I've made in my blog and see what gets read the most. It seems those posts dealing with depression get more attention than the rest of the stuff I write on here, and I think there's a reason for that. 
I'm a writer. It's who I am. I've known it most of my life, but I didn't realize what I knew about myself...if that makes any sense to anyone out there! As a child I lived in a fantasy world inside my head, creating stories. I even shared ideas with my cousin, and we talked about writing books when we grew up about the ideas we bounced off one another. I knew I was a storyteller; I just didn't realize that meant I was born to be a writer. 
I was also sad, even as a child. It's not that I didn't have moments of happiness. I didn't know it was depression that I felt. I just remember always feeling alone and invisible. I still struggle with feeling alone and invisible. I was the invisible girl. I truly was...at least in my own mind. 
At the age of fifteen some things happened in my life that catapulted me into a state of deep depression. I thought I was handling the circumstances okay, but I wasn't. Things didn't get better; they got worse. I began a downward spiral, sinking into a dark abyss. I was so deep within the waters, the light had been snuffed out. It could not penetrate. That was my life for many years. 
I was sharing not too long ago about how I've battled depression for most of my life, and then it hit me. That was a falsehood. I didn't battle it at all during those years. I had given in to the weight of it all and allowed it to consume me. 
NOW...I fight it! I fight it with those things I've learned give me the strength to fight it. It took Light that was strong enough to penetrate the darkness I was drowning in for me to begin swimming for the surface. I learned that it IS okay to take medication if you need it. No one would tell a diabetic in need of insulin not to take their pill or shot, now would they?! I learned that when I take care of my body through eating properly and exercising, I have strength to fight, and I feel so much better. 
It was during the time I was finally overcoming that I wrote my first published work, Plain Jane, the story of a young girl who sees herself as invisible. As her life plummets into the depths of depression, her heart is shattered, and her soul sinks into the darkness. 
I've always heard people say: "Write what you know." How true that is, and that right there is why I believe that my posts dealing with depression are read more than anything else. I created this page because of being an author...because that's what you're supposed to do as an author. I think I just realized it has a greater purpose. I'm not saying I won't post other things, but from now on my purpose with this page is to be a writer who writes about what she knows, and she knows depression.

Monday Madness...Poetry

“Holy Hush”

Those who feel they cannot speak,

Are bound by chains meant to keep them weak.

Boundaries and walls to fence them in,

A muzzle set in place to hold back the cries

So that no one around sees where the darkness hides.

The heaviness of the chains breaks them down

The seas rise around them; in the depths they will drown.

The deeper they sink, the darker their world.

Weariness sets in as the weight of the waters crush—

Shutting off all breath, leaving their only hope a Holy hush.

                                                                            Schledia Benefield