0 
0 By Patrick Bailey
It was two years ago, but I can still clearly remember that the rain was falling very hard when I confronted Eric. I was asking him why he and my best friend Maria were kissing in that photo on my messaging app. I couldn’t get an answer.
It was afternoon when I quietly left the room so as not to disturb Eric while he took his afternoon nap. I headed straight to the kitchen pantry where Eric charged his mobile phone. He had a new message—
*Beep* *Beep* —from somebody going by the name “Lorde”.
I tried to key in his pass-code to see if I should wake him. “Failed,” his phone said.
Then one of our friends sent me the message
“Have you seen this?!” Bethany’s text accompanied a picture of Eric and Maria locked in a romantic smooch at some party. It turned out to be a picture taken at my graduation party last week.
I stood stunned for about 30 seconds before I rushed to our room to confront Eric. After his non-answer, I threw his phone, the laptop, the lamp, and everything I could get my hands on.
I was shouting and crying at the same time. I told him to take all his things out of the house and pushed him to leave.
I’d had a nagging feeling that something was amiss five months earlier, but it was only in the last week or so that I noticed Maria—my best friend since middle school—was avoiding me.
I had to beg her to come to my graduation party. She said she wasn’t planning on going, but I wanted her there.
“You have to be there, that was our plan,” I said, reminding her that we had promised not to miss one another’s high school graduations when we finished middle school.
Maria ended up attending my graduate school party after all and was caught kissing my boyfriend, and apparently not for the first time.
The Big Vacuum
I sank into a deep depression. It was the worst feeling. It was like a giant vacuum on top of my head was trying to suck me in and I only had a shrub to cling on to. I felt hopeless, numb.
I remembered staring at myself in the mirror and comparing myself to Maria. She was prettier than me, I thought. My hair was limp while Maria had dark brown, curly locks. She also was taller, leaner, and a go-getter. She seemed kinder to everyone she meets. While people see me more like a snob who was only interesting because I could help them out with physics. Even my thick glasses were ugly, foggy, and branded me a “brain”. “What good are my cold, gold medals for academic achievements anyway? Boys are scared of intelligent women!”.
I blamed myself for trusting Maria and Eric. I began hating all the events that ever happened between us, a significant part of my life and once-happy memories. I’d started to lose myself.
The first effect of my depression was I started skipping meals. I thought my body was ugly. I needed to be leaner so I could appear taller.
As well as all this, I decided to take decisive actions so that I would never be cheated on again. It mostly involved getting out of bed as seldom as possible and not talking to anybody. Not that I had much energy to do anything else. I was sick.
Making choices to be better
I didn’t want to talk to anybody, but my mom got a nod from me. She and my father were worried that given the severity of my depression and my access to my grandmother’s pain medicine, I might already be self-medicating and need help with a dual diagnosis: a mental health issue and substance abuse.
First, they hid the pain medications inside their room and locked it. Then my Mom did something that hit me hard: She cried in front of me.
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“I can’t find my little Abbie, anymore,” she said.
She went on telling me how much she missed my laughs and my painting. She asked me to travel with her again.
Getting hurt is normal
One day soon after, I woke up realizing that protecting myself from getting hurt was futile. Mom was right. Getting hurt is a normal part of life.
We run, we fail, we laugh, we cry, we love, and we get hurt. I told myself that while I will never be sure if I will be cheated on again, I can be the best lover and friend I can be.
Sometimes, when we feel the world has turned its back on us, we want to turn our back, too. We think that if we choose to armor ourselves with hate, we are protecting ourselves from getting hurt. But we only end up hurting ourselves even deeper.
If we choose not to love, we don’t get to feel and enjoy the love of the people around us. We put ourselves underneath a giant vacuum and we switch it on. It makes a great difference if we choose to get better, to get or accept help, rather than wallow in our depression or numb ourselves with drugs or alcohol.
Choosing the good can make us feel better, if not actually happy. I tried and now I am much happier.
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