I screamed at my dad in tears and frustration, trying to get him to understand why.

Six months and he still doesn’t understand.

Six months and he still doesn’t understand how or why

I was diagnosed with depression and anxiety at the age of fifteen.

He doesn’t understand why I cry,

why I don’t feel like eating,

why I get filled with so much anxiety.

I wish my dad knew that depression is complex,

that it has spiritual and psychological parts to it.

It’s about the chemicals in your brain and the guts in your stomach.

I have all of these people around me all the time,

yet I feel so alone.

I feel guilty I have depression

when other people have it worse than me.

the only thing that gets me through the day

is when I mentally remind myself that

if they can get through it, so can I.

But I live with depression,

I have no control of that.

He thinks I can control it.

He thinks I can wake up in the morning

and decide that I am going to be happy.

If that was the case,

I would be happier every day.

But I stay sad

and hurt,

haunted by bad memories

and bad feelings

and nightmares and sadness.

He’s a good father,

no doubt about it.

But he does not understand

and tells me I am disappointing

and that he didn’t raise me to be “weak.”

We scream back and forth.

Exchanging our ways of thinking.

I sit in the back seat

wishing the day was over

Hoping and praying that

God would be on my side for this one.

As I sit in the backseat I realize something:

He will never understand. He will never come around.

He will never think of me as the daughter who has made him proud.

All because I have emotions.

I have feelings.