Fighting Depression: The Battle For Mental Health

Editor’s Note: The Battle For Mental Health

Depression and other forms of mental health issues have plagued the world particularly over the last couple of years, and probably even more than the pandemic itself. Since we are culturally not attuned to speaking about mental health issues, it’s prevention, diagnosis and treatment become all the more difficult. It takes a lot of courage to open up and speak about it, and the results are most likely to follow suit. We applaud our young author, Devishi Aggarwal, for taking the bold steps, to fight her way through, and selflessly coming out in the open with her account of fighting depression, to help others through this devastating journey. Let’s join her in this battle for mental health.

The Dangers of Depression

Depression is living in a body that fights to survive, with a mind that tries to die

Today’s world is a rapidly evolving place where change, or rather revolution, has become a way of life. In the world that we live in, competition is high. Achieving our goals or succeeding is anything but like a hot knife through butter. These circumstances or such a state of things tend to take a toll on our mental health. At times, we feel as if it were becoming exceedingly difficult to cope with life. Either we are able to snap out of it in a brief period of time, or we start overthinking and losing our joy. If the latter happens, we may fall in depression and suffer from severe repercussions.

My Experiences with Depression

Having said that, I can frankly say that I am no alien to depression, wherein everything seems dark and gloomy. For a person suffering from depression, life seems to be nothing but a death spiral having a recurring myriad of negative events and outcomes.

The First Shock

My story started in late December 2020 when I was studying in grade X. My first pre-board’s result was an enormous shock to me. I had underperformed and drastically failed to meet my expectations. Dismayed and somewhat melancholic at first, I tried moving on from it. I told myself that things would become great soon and I would pass with flying colours in the second pre-board. But little did I know that the things had just started going wrong and were not going to be right anytime soon.

The Second Shock

The result of the second pre-board (announced in April 2021) was a disaster. I scored my lowest ever marks. That snatched the peace of my mind. I was trying to fly to the highest crest but ended up falling to the deepest trough. For a while, I saw no good in studying for the upcoming boards (that had yet not been cancelled) because I knew I would fail again. Slowly and gradually, I made up my mind to get back on the right track and focus on the boards.

Destiny had to cheat me brutally. On the very next day, the Union government declared the board exams cancelled owing to the aggravating Covid-19 pandemic situation. India was badly hit, the daily new cases had started increasing exponentially and the death toll was becoming higher and higher. Conducting the board exams would have been nothing less than throwing the life of millions of students and staff into peril. I was devastated. All my hopes and all my dreams were smashed into a zillion pieces; I had lost the purpose of my life.

Related Read: Dealing with Failure

More Bad News

As if that were not enough and things had to become worse, the lethal second wave of Covid-19 struck our family. My sibling and I were the only ones to test negative for the virus, and our parents and grandmother fell quite sick. In an attempt to save the two of us from infection, we were both sent away.

Nothing was going to be right; life was going to become glutted with miseries and failure. I was not going to rise but only fall incessantly. There was surely no point in living such a wretched life where everything had to go wrong. Such depressing thoughts were the only ones my mind could think.

Even though I had never thought of ending my life, I did not feel like living it or being in this world. Hence, I would sleep for majority of the day and stay asleep for several hours at length. In my life of 15 years, I had never felt like not investing my time in anything but sleeping.

Related Read: Losing a loved one

Attempting to get out of depression

“It is not right; things are not the way they should be. I need to act swiftly to change the direction of the wind, lest it shall be too late and irreparable damage shall be caused”, my mind said to me one day. I decided to fight and win, because my soul never permitted me to die before my death.

That was easier said than done, it was no walk in the park. Yet, I had to start from somewhere if I were to make things right for myself and my loved ones. The biggest hits that I had taken were the Covid-19 crisis in my family, and the cancellation of the board exams. I had to snap out of all the associated negativity somehow.

Pouring my heart out

I started by pouring my heart out to those who had faced similar troubles. My friends who had been in the same boat proved to be a big comfort to my aching soul. They advised me not to stress, and not to judge myself. I found my family standing beside me too. Those words worked like a charm.

Related Read: A tribute to friendship

Changing Co-ordinates

But then, there was more to it. Even though I had found solace, I was still apprehensive. Despite finding my lost strength return, I was reluctant to stand up as I was afraid to fall yet again. At the same time, my sibling and I started at our new school, bidding goodbye to the old one where I had been studying for more than a decade. I faced new challenges and I was afraid of succumbing to competition and being left on my own. I had no clue how I was going to cope with the new environment.

Helping hand from an Angel

It was better to share my feelings than to keep them inside myself and suffocate constantly. So I did what I had done earlier. That was the time when I got a robust boost of morale from an angel, who is none other than the Principal of my school. I told her of the stormy turmoil raging inside my mind, and she gave me her hand.

She encouraged me to forget the past, and think of a new beginning in life. She motivated me to march confidently on the path ahead of me and advised me how I could establish myself in my new school and be accepted. That, and telephone conversations with my new classmates breathed a newfound sense of positivity inside me. The kind and healing words from my ex-teachers were of great help too.

Additionally, my new teachers too turned out to be welcoming and motivational. They became like another family, I developed the same bond with them that I had with my teachers in my previous school.

I had finally stood up.

Related Read: Lost, Found and Awakened

Positivity: The walk away from depression

Then, all I needed was a push to walk and gradually sprint as fast as I could. It is said that the best way of vanquishing negativity is filling one’s mind with as much positivity as it can take. Reading about some renowned maestros, who had made lemonade out of the lemons life had given them, played the trick.

Inspiration from Jack Ma

I was particularly inspired by Jack Ma, the founder of the multinational conglomerate Ali Baba Group. He had failed 5 times in school, he could not make it to Harvard University, and he had been re-nominated in 30 jobs. Yet this tremendously long train of failures failed to overpower him. He crowed over all of them gracefully and became one of the most successful businessmen this world has ever known. He once said –

Never give up. Today is hard, tomorrow will be worse, but the day after tomorrow will be sunshine.

Jack Ma

Related Book: Alibaba: The House that Jack Ma Built

Victory with Viktor Frankl

Then there was Viktor Frankl, an Austrian neurologist, psychiatrist, philosopher, author, and the founder of logotherapy. Life was barbaric with him, for he had lost almost all his kith and kin to the apocalyptic Nazi holocaust. His trauma, both physical and mental, was undoubtedly out of bounds. Yet he pulled himself together, rose up, and rocketed to the epitome of success.

Everything can be taken from a man but one thing; the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.

Viktor Frankl, author of ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’

This quote and his positivity arousing book ‘Man’s Search for Meaning’ made him a hero for the hopeless.

Related Read: 7 Steps to dealing with adversity

An unshakeable resolve

Next thing to learn was building an unshakeable resolve which would not break, come what may. Jean Dominique Bauby, a French journalist and the author cum editor of the French fashion magazine ‘Elle’, was the cynosure of all eyes. However, an unfortunate seizure had left him with locked-in syndrome.

When he woke up 20 days after that wretched day, all he could do was blink his left eyelid. Yet this man did not learn to give up, such was his resolve. He was paralysed, yet he was keen to fulfil his pledge of writing a book. He dictated the book’s contents to his ghost-writer by blinking at the correct letter, and impressively came up with a 130 page manuscript.

‘The Diving Bell and the Butterfly’, the resultant book was a smashing success across Europe with sales in millions. In spite of his calamitous condition, he chose to fill colours in his life.

I need to feel strongly, to love and admire,
just as desperately I need to breathe.

Jean-Dominique Bauby (author of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly)

Related Read: The PITSTOP mindset

Surfing through Life

The final ingredient I needed was the ability to sail through the ocean of uncertainties, instead of drowning in it. This is what Bethany Hamilton, an ace American surfer and ESPY award winner, brought to me.

At the tender age of 13, she was attacked by a tiger shark which swiftly bit off her left arm. The trauma was extreme, and the future uncertain. Apparently, everything was dark.

However, Bethany’s remarkable determination and courage never let her down. She was back on her surfboard within 30 days. She never looked back and went on to win several sporting championships through her mind-blowing performance.

I’ve learned life is a lot like surfing. When you get caught in the impact zone, you need to get right back up, because you never know what’s over the next wave… and if you have faith, anything is possible, anything at all.

Bethany Hamilton (author of Soul Surfer)

This famous quote of Bethany, from her autobiography, ‘Soul Surfer’ ignited a new spark inside me.

Related Read: Sticking through adversity

Winning the battle against depression

And see! The battle was won. Things had started improving for both India and us. The lethal second wave had subsided, and my sibling and I were back home as everything was fine again. Life had come back to normal. My new school life had taken off smoothly too.

Though I won’t say that was the end of all hardships and challenges. I still have to struggle, and I still feel shaky at times. Life is anything but a bed or roses, for it has challenges (like any typical life).

But then there is hope, and there is will. There is love, and there is support. Things will be the way they are meant to be. All I need to do is keep going with the flow and never stopping come what may.

Here is a perfect quote to close this account and my chapter of depression, as I wander around with positivity, surfing through the various challenges of life.

Destination will be reached, even if it is reached by wandering. For lost is the one, who does not even leave the house.

Namita Thapar (translated from Hindi)

Related Read: Inside Scoop of a Shark Tank journey, The Inspiring Wanderer

Editor’s Note: Now, it’s your turn

This is not just the journey of Devishi Aggarwal. This is the journey of millions of people, and could possibly include your friends or family members, who appear to be just ‘fine’. You can help by sharing this post copiously with your network, since you never know what is going on inside their minds.

Here are some more examples of people who have emerged victorious over challenging circumstances and mental health issues using various ways
– A septuagenarian grandmother, Sheela Bajaj turns first time entrepreneur with CaughtCrafthanded, overcoming decades of mental conditioning and taboos against women working, with support from her grand daughter
– Bisa Dobson used her training as a therapist to work for the welfare of lymphedema patients, who often suffer mental health issues, since the disease has no cure
– Alisha Sharma recovered from the lowest phase of her life by embracing the world of spirituality
– Rajiv Maheshwari helped re-calibrate mental attitude during the pandemic using the Pitstop metaphor, helping many people avoid mental health issues

Read more posts about Mental Health

About the author

Devishi Aggrwal is an Indian teenager in the final year of her schooling. She is a law aspirant and is currently preparing for law entrance. Public speaking, creative writing, and reading novels are some of her prime hobbies.

She is particularly fascinated by contemporary world politics, and history. Currently, she is serving as the MUN Ambassador in her school’s student council, and is also the research manager in her school’s International ICT Seagulls 19 team.

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