Depression Her Black Dog
She watched as the days turned into weeks and then into months. Her sadness had taking control over her, like the wind in winter. The dimness of the sun didn’t take her mood lightly, but instead it invited an intruder into her world. At this moment in time, she never knew that she was in the process of adopting a dog. The breed of her new dog allowed the animal to grow as large as her apartment. His source of nutrition was a combination of her sadness and her negative thoughts about her life.
Her loneliness and her in ability to truly share the darkness growing inside her also caused her to develop a fountain flowing with her tears.While her tears flowed like a running tap, she begun reading the adoption contract. Her heart at this moment was pitch black with enough dust that could fill the walls in her apartment. She was so consumed with her dark shadows that she didnt realise that her moods were changing.
What made it worse was her inability to share with her family about the adoption of her black dog and the story behind it.Coming from an African household she was made to believe that it was evil and the devil force that had consumed someone who was experiencing her sadness. In her community her sadness is a western agenda and something that is not known in their world.
Driven by the pain, she shut everyone out slowly by slowly waiting for her demons to fly away back to the land that they came from. In her heart she was wishing for someone to see her. But coming from an African community, how does one approach a parent that is highly influenced by the level of maturity surrounding the culture around them. According to her culture and spiritual affiliation the black dog breed had not been discovered in their vocabulary.
How could depression (the black dog) be a part of her cultural or spiritual understanding? The belief that it’s a western sentiment made her adoption paper go through faster than she had anticipated. As she waited curiously in her apartment, she watched a delivery van come through her gate carrying her black dog. As the doorbell rang, she began to approached the door. She could hear and feel the connection between her and the dog. The animal heart beat was in sync with hers and his breath too. The connection grew stronger and so compelling that she moved faster towards the dog.
But for a moment she thought and wonder whether she should allow the dog in or she should turn around and face her family, religion and their cultural ideas about her darkness? So what does one do? How does she help herself handle her sadness in a world where the black dog is a foreign species in her community vocabulary?
