Since it's out, I just want to share a story.
Four years ago, when Ate was diagnosed with CKD, we're all pressured to come up with all the money we can get for her medication, hospitalization and dialysis. We sought help from friends and family. Ate's hospital expenses then was sky high. We need to come up with a certain amount every freaking week. And the amount was not even equal to how much I am paid for at work. Imagine the stress it brought me then. I always cry at work but co-workers only saw me cry once. My siblings never saw me shed a tear. Tita Sette saw me cry once.
I almost quit life then. Everything was too heavy for me to carry.
What I did? Instead of my usual bus ride to Biñan (Jac Liner), I rode a bus to Lucena. Just a random bus ride. Just to think and breathe and cry. I once found myself in San Pablo too. And in Batangas, Novaliches, Bulacan, Dau, Pampanga, and in Fairview. Remember my story about talking to strangers? If I can't talk it out, I would find a seat at the end of the bus, earphones in and cry.
I can't burden people around me of how I feel because Ate's case is much more difficult than mine and people around me has their own problems to deal with too. But in cases as such, I don't think I'd still be here if I didn't do anything then and just allowed the situation to swallow me whole.
I have lost tons of hankies and face towels all soaked up in tears, and that's all I can do then. Ate never knew of how it was for me. Up until her last days, she never knew about my illness. My other sister thinks of my illness differently. She never took it seriously, but I am okay with that. My brother, well, he is still my brother regardless if he knew it or not. Mama? Never had any idea about it. No one knew until recently. Well, except the strangers I've shared it with.
My point is, mentall illness doesn't have to look like you are crazy, messy, recluse, disheveled, sad and mad. You could be the happiest person on Earth but is dealing with it silently. And it doesn't have to be that way. Whenever I see someone share stories that I felt I went through, I urge them to seek professional help or talk it out with anyone.
And for you people, not everyone who is sad or is showing signs and symptoms of depression and anxiety wants to get you attention. Most of the time, we don't. We prefer to say we're fine than be told that we're attention-seeker, that we lack faith, that we're just tired and all other lame words you can call us. We want to be heard. The silence itself is a message that we want to scream all out. That all we want someone to go beyond the "how are you - I'm fine" convo. That we want our conversations to be longer than that. That we want to talk. If we refuse to talk about how we are feeling, our REAL feelings, please do respect it. It is very difficult for us to come out in the open letting people know that we are ill, much more to discuss it with you. Talk to us about any other things. Let us open up and discuss it with you in our own time. We need to warm up too, you know.
Please do not give up on us the same way that we don't want to give up on ourselves. Suicide is the very last thing on our mind, believe me.
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