What experiences in life helped you grow the most?
I am not a masochist but I have to admit that pain has caused me to grow more than anything else in life. I have felt pain. I have not been one of those people who lost half their leg and still walked 5 miles to safety. The pain that caused me the greatest growth happened in my bed.
Did I give birth? No. Did I have a heart attack? No. Kidney stones? No. Still trying to guess? It’s been the pain that threatens to paralyze you and yet, you don’t care. It’s the pain that makes horrible suggestions as to how to end it, but you don’t act.
To call it “depression” makes people think that you’re merely having a bad day, or even a bad month, it is something we all have, and I should move on. But it’s not “having the blues” or “feeling down”. It is the “pitiful incomprehensible demoralization” – I think that’s the term. It is despair dipped in loneliness, covered in grief, surrounded by shame and with a side of fear.
That’s the pain that makes me question the rotation of the planet and why I haven’t fallen off. The pain can move up and back, twisting your hope so tightly that you’re already emotionally spent but this is a relentless force whose primary mission is to trip you up. So you hang on for deal life because what bubbles below is the tar of anxiety. The tremor of your fingers is nothing compared to the tremor of your gut. You shake, gulp air, try to speak but can’t speak because the gulps of air hurts your sternum, pressing on it as if you were actually having a heart attack. Then the bottom of the tar pit tries to drag you further down until you are up to your neck in muck and dung.
And then, you receive a breath that breathes in you, infusing your body with a new focus. Energy begins to return. And with each cleansing breath, wisdom.
You turn and head the other direction, because now you know. And you know that you were defeated and absolutely unable to save yourself but that something; some power stronger than the gravitational pull sucking you into the abyss, delivered you straight out of the pit of hell.
Revvin' it Up 
Thanks for your transparency. Many have been there, as have I, but not many talk or write about it. Blogging has helped me with that.
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Your writing is powerful because it’s honest. You didn’t just talk about pain—you made it something the reader can actually feel. That takes courage.
What stood out to me is that even in the darkest parts of what you describe, there’s still movement… that moment where the breath returns and you turn the other direction. That’s strength.
Keep writing. There are people who feel this but don’t know how to put it into words, and your voice could help them feel less alone.
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