For those who are silently sinking… By Rhema
Sometimes pain doesn’t scream.
It whispers through empty eyes, half-smiles, and forced laughter.
Depression isn’t always chaos — sometimes it’s the quiet slipping away of someone you love, inch by inch, breath by breath.
This is for the ones who are trying to stay afloat in waters no one else can see.
And for the ones watching them, helpless,
wondering how to save a soul that no longer believes it can be saved.
And her last real words were,
“I don’t want to drown.”
Let’s talk about Sonia.
The first month,
I caught her staring into space.
“What do you feel?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said,
“just numb.”
But I saw it,
the light quietly leaving her eyes,
a dimming so slow,
you’d almost miss it.
The second month,
she laughed.
A lot.
Too loudly sometimes.
“I need the noise,” she said,
“I need to feel alive,
even if I’m only existing.”
So she stayed out longer,
chased laughter like medicine,
afraid of what waited in silence.
The third month,
she was running on empty.
Every step was a whisper of will.
She talked, but wasn’t speaking.
She heard, but wasn’t listening.
She felt — but to what end?
“I’m alright,” she’d say,
but her voice carried distance,
and her smile came cracked at the edges.
“I need to eat, but I don’t want to.”
“I have work, but what’s the use?”
“I want to disappear, or sleep forever,
but what would change?
Wouldn’t that mean
putting the people I love
through this same cold I lay on?”
Sonia was suffocating,
but the words wouldn’t come.
The feelings were too much,
or too little,
or not there at all.
All she could say,
with trembling breath and tired eyes, was —
“I don’t want to drown.”
Closing note:
Depression doesn’t always look like sadness.
Sometimes it looks like laughter.
Sometimes it looks like survival on autopilot.
Sometimes it looks like Sonia.
If you’re reading this and you see yourself here, please, hold on.
You are not a burden.
You are not invisible.
You are not alone in the water.
Someone still sees your light, even if it’s flickering.
Even if you don’t. And, someone wants to hold you regardless.
Someone wants to help, even if they don’t understand it…
If you or someone you know is struggling with their mental health, speak up. Ask questions. Seek help.
