I'm sorry, I can't.
I'm sorry, I can't because I have to study. I'm sorry, I can't because I already have something else going on. I'm sorry, I can't go anymore, something came up. I'm sorry, I can't.
I could not even begin to count the number of times these words have left my mouth or been typed by my fingers. It's not that I didn't want to go, either. It was that I genuinely, 100% felt like I couldn't go. I felt like I couldn't muster up the energy to get out of my bed and get ready to leave the house. I felt like I couldn't pretend like I was enjoying myself for hours. I felt like I couldn't go make conversations with people I didn't really know. Sometimes I even felt like I couldn't hang out with my best friends.
Before I was diagnosed with depression, and even after, I was never the type of person that people would think is depressed. Not to say that there is a specific type of person that you look at think, "that person is depressed." I was just always goofing off and making people laugh, whether it was with me or at me. I was always the outgoing girl that had a smile on her face. I was always a mess too, but I think that was part of my charm. People loved the stories about all the ridiculous things that happened to me on a daily basis.
I have lost a lot of friends over the past two years because of depression, too. It's not their fault of course. For most of them, they probably had no idea I was even struggling in the first place. After they invited me out a bunch of times and I never said yes, they stopped asking. Which again, it's not their fault. I wouldn't ask someone to hangout over and over if they always said no either.
At first I was pretty bitter about it, though. I got frustrated that whenever I did see my friends they would tell me how much they missed me being around. I would think to myself, "why do they always say they miss me but never try to hang out with me?" But they did try to hang out with me, I wasn't hanging out with them. I missed them, too. Just never enough to convince myself to go to that study session or to go to that party.
As time passed though, I realized it was my fault. Even if I was losing my friends because of something I didn't necessarily have control over, it was my fault that I wasn't there. Things have gotten better over time. It's easier for me to push myself past the "I can't" because I know that I will have fun even if I am exhausted after. But it doesn't change the relationships I lost when I couldn't.
It's hard to understand something when you've never experienced it. Someone I was close to in high school struggled with depression and I never understood it. They wouldn't want to hang out with my friends or go out and do stuff with me. In my mind that equaled them not caring about me. I didn't understand what it was like to feel like you just can't because I wasn't depressed and I never had been depressed. But now I get it. I get why sometimes all they had the energy for was laying in bed and talking. I get why it was hard to go out into a group of ten or more people and hangout for hours.
I guess the point of me writing this is to tell you guys that sometimes, people don't hang out with you because they really just can't. It's not that they don't want to or don't like you or any other reason you can make up in your head. It's that after all the other responsibilities they have on a daily basis there's no energy left to hang out. There's no energy to do anything most of the time, even the things they enjoy.
So please reach out to that friend that always says no, because maybe this time they'll say yes. Or just reach out to ask them how they're doing. Even if they lie and say they're fine, it still means a lot when people take the time to ask. Take care of each other!
Honestly,
H
I could not even begin to count the number of times these words have left my mouth or been typed by my fingers. It's not that I didn't want to go, either. It was that I genuinely, 100% felt like I couldn't go. I felt like I couldn't muster up the energy to get out of my bed and get ready to leave the house. I felt like I couldn't pretend like I was enjoying myself for hours. I felt like I couldn't go make conversations with people I didn't really know. Sometimes I even felt like I couldn't hang out with my best friends.
Before I was diagnosed with depression, and even after, I was never the type of person that people would think is depressed. Not to say that there is a specific type of person that you look at think, "that person is depressed." I was just always goofing off and making people laugh, whether it was with me or at me. I was always the outgoing girl that had a smile on her face. I was always a mess too, but I think that was part of my charm. People loved the stories about all the ridiculous things that happened to me on a daily basis.
I have lost a lot of friends over the past two years because of depression, too. It's not their fault of course. For most of them, they probably had no idea I was even struggling in the first place. After they invited me out a bunch of times and I never said yes, they stopped asking. Which again, it's not their fault. I wouldn't ask someone to hangout over and over if they always said no either.
At first I was pretty bitter about it, though. I got frustrated that whenever I did see my friends they would tell me how much they missed me being around. I would think to myself, "why do they always say they miss me but never try to hang out with me?" But they did try to hang out with me, I wasn't hanging out with them. I missed them, too. Just never enough to convince myself to go to that study session or to go to that party.
As time passed though, I realized it was my fault. Even if I was losing my friends because of something I didn't necessarily have control over, it was my fault that I wasn't there. Things have gotten better over time. It's easier for me to push myself past the "I can't" because I know that I will have fun even if I am exhausted after. But it doesn't change the relationships I lost when I couldn't.
It's hard to understand something when you've never experienced it. Someone I was close to in high school struggled with depression and I never understood it. They wouldn't want to hang out with my friends or go out and do stuff with me. In my mind that equaled them not caring about me. I didn't understand what it was like to feel like you just can't because I wasn't depressed and I never had been depressed. But now I get it. I get why sometimes all they had the energy for was laying in bed and talking. I get why it was hard to go out into a group of ten or more people and hangout for hours.
I guess the point of me writing this is to tell you guys that sometimes, people don't hang out with you because they really just can't. It's not that they don't want to or don't like you or any other reason you can make up in your head. It's that after all the other responsibilities they have on a daily basis there's no energy left to hang out. There's no energy to do anything most of the time, even the things they enjoy.
So please reach out to that friend that always says no, because maybe this time they'll say yes. Or just reach out to ask them how they're doing. Even if they lie and say they're fine, it still means a lot when people take the time to ask. Take care of each other!
Honestly,
H
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