Happy HAPPY looking, LOOKING,yet sad… my YET friend SAD…MYwas one FRIEND WAS ONE
Kemi Ajumobi
Associate Editor, Businessday kemi@businessdayonline.com
All she said was that she was going out for a walk, that she needed air. She left with her drawstring bag, and the only thing I saw her put inside was her journal and pen. She was on her best trainers, sweatpants and hooded sweatshirt, with her headphone hung on her neck. She looked quite sprightly and full of life; little did I know that she had other plans. I didn’t know that she dressed her best just to go and kill herself. How was I supposed to know that someone with so much life in her (physically speaking) was dying inside? How was I supposed to know that even though she was quick to laugh hard at the slightest provocation, she carried a deep sense of pain inside? Why didn’t I decipher that all those signs that she displayed and laughed off whenever I confronted her was depression flaunting itself at me? And ignorant me, I couldn’t even help because I didn’t even know that that was what depression looked like. Only for me to get that heart wrenching call that they found her body lifeless. What? How? Why? I was shaken to my very core.
Kim was a sweet soul. She left everyone that encountered her in awe because of how much love she had to give. She was a very brilliant student and a highly industrious person. She was just 19 at the time but was so mature, you’ll think she was already in her twenties. She had a very sound sense of judgement and this earned her lots of leadership roles even at such a young age. We were first roommates, then friends, then besties. We became so close that our colleagues in school started teasing us and calling us Tom and Jerry. We were quite a pair because Kim was on the quiet side and I was something else. She’ll wave off stuff and make excuses to cover up people’s excesses but I on the other hand wouldn’t. She truly complemented my personality and it really made our bond stronger. Kim had been battling depression for over 8 months and I didn’t even know. She once said “sometimes,it’s just easier to slip into your own dark abyss and forget the world exists” and I was like “ehh?!” She then laughed it off and said “never mind, I was just ruminating over something I heard in a movie” then I went “ohhh, I remember, we watched that movie together”, then we went on chatting about the movie. But, my Kim took the movie to heart because she could relate with the depressed character and I didn’t even notice. She was gradually losing her jovial spirit but I felt it was just stress. I was concerned and tried to make her talk but she only said “I’m fine, just stressed out because of this whole school wahala.” I didn’t bother her much because I knew she had issues at home. She lived with a relative and was facing a lot. She doesn’t talk much about it but the only time I visited (uninvited, I must add), I saw enough. She was more of a slave at home and was treated with so much disdain. The children of this relative were so rude and lousy. I couldn’t find my jovial, lively and sweet friend in that hurt, broken girl I saw there. Now I know why she didn’t ever allow me to come visit. Now I know why she was always unhappy whenever we were approaching the end of a semester. Now I know why she never wanted to go home. So to escape the pains of her world, she wore a mask of smiles, but still carried the pain within. How I wished I pushed more, maybe I would have been able to help her, maybe she might have still been here with me. Oh my Kim!
There are a lot of Kims in our world today. Looking okay on social media, in church, at the mosque, at school or even in same house, but dying inside because of the pain they carry. Like Kim, these people wear plastic smiles as an act of camouflage so as not to “wash their dirty leanings outside”. They sometimes make everyone smile but go back and cry in their closet. They even go out of their way sometimes to help make others happy but seem to be so locked up in their world of pain that they become unreachable and unable to be helped. Depression is real and it’s fast eating deep into our society. There are a lot of depressed millenials out there who look alright, until you stop and prob. A lot of happy looking sad fellows. Lots of people that are only happy on the pictures on their social media pages. I know we live in a busy world, but if we pause and listen, we’ll see that there are a lot of people that need us to help them regain their mental stability. Depression is only possible when one is carrying their pains alone. If we work as a community and help as many as we can, we can kick this thing out and restore the healthy mental health we were made to enjoy.