Towards the end of 5th grade my class went to the auditorium for gym class. The way I remember it, there were a handful of stations, although what the first of those were I can’t remember at all. What I do remember is that I had gone through all of them except the last which was a dance station. The instructions were to dance, however you wanted, just dance.
My buddy P and I got after it, smiling, laughing, having a great time copying all the dances we could think of. Primarily we did every variation of the running man we could think of. We did our version of the Kid N Play.
The dance station was in the very back of the auditorium, and the teacher was up on a stage at the front of the auditorium. As P and I half jokingly, half seriously danced our asses off, I could see the teacher watching us, watching me it felt like. I can’t remember if I was self-conscious about it, but knowing me I must have been.
At the end of the last station, we waited for the teacher to tell us what we were doing next. Before she told us, however, she said she would be announcing the winner of the dance competition. I must have missed the part at the beginning where she explained she would be judging a competition.
She said, “and the winner is…” and then pointed to me and somehow explained that I was the winner (she was not our regular teacher, just a gym teacher for that day as best I can remember).
During the walk back to the classroom I was the focus of everybody’s attention, with the boys laughing and making fun of me and the girls asking me to show them what dances I did. And just like that, like a switch had been thrown, all the endorphins and feel-good that had been coursing through my body while dancing were gone, replaced with a deep, profound sadness.
It felt as though I shouldn’t be that happy, I shouldn’t be energetic and bubby. It felt like what I deserved was much more severe. A dark weight fell over me. I had been walking with two friends, N and N, and it was almost like they could sense it. But instead of giving me a hard time, they just stuck with me, deflected the attention from all the girls, told me stories, told me jokes, kept me company the rest of the school day (this really must have been towards the very end of elementary school, because I remember the rest of that day being a big party. Perhaps it was our last day before graduation.)
I can’t say for sure, but I think this was the very first time I felt a full-on crush of depression. It was definitely the first with such a sudden onset. Since then, I’ve experienced this plenty. I’ll be at the dinner table at work holding court, telling stories, making people laugh, all eyes on me, and I’ll be buzzing with adrenaline, feeding off the attention, off the laughs, when suddenly it’ll get quiet and I’ll just crash, absolutely crumble to the ground with a profound sadness.
Guilt even. Like I just don’t deserve to feel such giddiness.
I remember being beyond ready to get out of elementary school. But middle school, despite good friends, athletic success, good grades, was worse. It was the solidification of my isolated depression, my insecurity at the certainty that all the other cool kids I was friends with were in fact far more worthy of attention and were much more confident as well as competent.
My best guess is that it has to do with the struggle between both wanting attention and fearing exposure. This dilemma plays out in my introverted nature but my desire to be successful, skilled, and accomplished. It plays out in my desire to be alone and private, but my strong conflicting desire to be fully exposed sexually. And it plays out in this blog, where I lay myself out there, but have to hide my identity and identifying details.
Sex And Depression 