Allie Brosh is a writer whose skillful storytelling and wonderful comic art have earned her blog, Hyperbole and a Half, an enormous following.  In a moving interview on NPR’s Fresh Air, she provides a revealing portrait of depression by sharing her own experience with this condition.  When asked to describe her depression, she says:

The first part was all sorts of feelings and a lot of self-loathing. … And then slowly it transitioned to feeling nothing and feeling very detached and bored with everything because I couldn’t connect in a meaningful way to the things I enjoyed or the things around me. …

 

I’ve always sort of secretly thought of feelings as a weakness. I think growing up I always wanted to be someone tougher than I am, and so when I first started not having feelings anymore I thought, “I’m finally this person who doesn’t react. I’m not sensitive anymore.” I enjoyed that for a short time, especially when I hadn’t lost my feelings completely, where I just felt like I was emotionally very strong. And then once all of my emotions disappeared, I very quickly realized that emotions are the only thing that provide variation in your life.

 

I think there’s a common misconception that depression is about something or depression is sadness or some form of negativity. It can represent a sadness or a self-loathing, as the first half of my depression did. It sort of circled back on itself and made me dislike myself more because I was so sad, and I didn’t know why, and I felt like I needed a reason. … It took me a long time to figure out that something was broken on a fundamental level. There was no reason behind it; it was just the way things were.

 

One of Brosh’s most beloved blog posts is one she wrote about her experience with depression and Here is a link to it.