There’s this weird phenomena that comes with being diagnosed. 634Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUAONHYpn4p
It’s like waking up one day and looking in the mirror to find that this aching headache you’ve had forever has actually split your head open. There’s no hiding from it any longer. You can put a hat on, sure, so other people can’t see it. But you’ll always see it, though, no matter how hard you try to convince yourself that it might not actually be there.
I’m not talking about cancer. Not kidney failure. Not even ebola.
It’s never that simple, is it?
This one kid, Peter Pescidola, had leukemia when we were in fourth grade. A whole bunch of his friends shaved their heads. He got to lay down when he got tired. Mrs. Larsen never made him help tidy up the classroom every Friday before the bell rang. He died during the summer between fourth and fifth grade. Gone, just like he had moved away or something. Like, I get it: cancer blows. But at least people know you have it, right?
I don’t know, maybe I’m just bitter. Mom’s always telling me I’m bitter. I think I’m just a realist. Realistically, people don’t care if you’re sick in the head, ‘cause you can’t see into someone’s brain.
I turned seventeen on August fourth, which meant I was the youngest kid in the senior class because I had missed the cut off by a couple weeks. My diagnosis came two days after my birthday. Mom was worried because I didn’t want to have a birthday party and I didn’t even want to go to the movies or anything with my best friend Sean. I told her that you don’t have birthday parties when you’re seventeen, and that there was nothing good playing at the AMC by the interstate, but she took it as some red alert on her “mom-dar” as she called it, and we were sitting in a counselor’s office not forty-eight hours later.
“Now, I need you to be honest with me, Samuel. We need to build trust here, okay? Can you do that for me?” The counselor, Dr. Frolland, wasn’t a bad guy, he just had a habit of speaking to me like I was four, which really irritated me. I hadn’t plannned on him diagnosing me (ugh), but I probably should have seen it coming.
“Do you get sad, Samuel?”
“Yeah. Doesn’t everyone?”
“Of course. What kind of things do you get sad about?”
“Um. I don’t know… life? Life can suck sometimes,” I had said, which was probably pretty damning.
“How do you feel about the other kids your age?”
“Uh… they’re fine, I guess.”
“Do you have a lot of friends? Do you spend time with them often?”
“Just one. And… sometimes?” I saw Sean every day at school and we hung out at his house a couple times a week, but I hadn’t stayed the night there since we were about twelve years old.
“Do you find yourself easily tired of directionless conversation?”
“What, like this? Yeah, I guess.”
Frolland ignored my smartass comment and questioned me like this for easily almost two hours. After he was done, he and my mom retreated to his office while I sat in the lobby and watched two goldfish swimming around in a small, dirty fishtank in the corner. Both fish looked like they could go belly up any second, which made me worry a little bit about Frolland’s credentials a little. Who had a PhD but can’t take care of fish?
When Dr. Frolland and my mom came out of his office twenty minutes later, she was looking all teary-eyed and kept pursing her lips together and readjusting her purse, which wasn’t a good sign. He sat down in the seat next to mine and, with this serious expression on his face, told me that I had a “considerable” case of chronic depression, and that it was tough, but would be manageable with regular counseling sessions and medication.
Three thoughts rolled through my head:
What?
No.
Hell no.
Mom cried a little on the car ride home wondering out loud how could she have never known that her baby was hurting so much on the inside. I wanted to fake vomit or something to show her it really wasn’t a big deal and that I was fine, nothing had changed, but it didn’t seem like a good time so I just kept my mouth shut and stared out the window, contemplating Frolland’s word’s as if they were a prison sentence. In a way, they were; up until now, I had just been “bitter” and “realistic” and “noncommittal” about everything. Now, suddenly, I was “depressed,” and I would be shuttled into that social purgatory where people didn’t quite know how to treat you ‘cause you didn’t exactly have cancer but you sure as hell weren’t normal.
We were given a prescription for antidepressants, which I didn’t tell her I wasn’t planning on ever taking. Perpetual bitterness, in my mind, was a much better alternative to being a human vegetable.
Mom made my dad and I sit down at the kitchen table as she tensely tried to coax some feelings out of me, referencing a thick packet of information the counselor had given her. Dad looked even more lost than normal; it was already strange to him that his son didn’t play football and stay out until three AM on Friday nights like he did when he was seventeen, now I was probably even more of a freak to him. He somewhat awkwardly patted me on the back and said that yes, he would come with us to the first support group meeting, which was supposed to be the next day at six PM. 634Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGI3XBybD0O
When I finally pulled away from them I went up to my room and drowned myself in my two guilty pleasures, computer games and my favorite band, The Script. In some ways, it felt like nothing had changed. I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that something might actually be wrong with me, that I would never be normal, and I had just received my proverbial scarlet letter.
As I powered off my computer and flopped into my bed I stared up at the three glow in the dark stars that had never fallen off despite being stuck up there almost a decade ago and tried to convince myself that everyone goes through a phase like this.
“I’m not depressed,” I said to no one in particular. “I’m just bitter.”634Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡmenFxuhbuE
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Author's Note:
Hey guys! If you enjoyed this story don't forget to like it or leave me a comment, reader input is how I continue to bring you more of what you like! Thanks a ton!
-AK
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