So easy to miss plea for help from someone whose soul is crying out

I look good on paper, by any standard. If you are reading my papers, you will get a picture of academic excellence and an enviable career.

You can tell I am the rare creature who multi-tasks and delivers on the objective, even under pressure.

It is easy to imagine me in a suit in the morning, carrying heavy bags and still prancing effortlessly in high heels.

I look good in photos, too. I have cute eyes and that look of permanent innocence.

So all the photos I publish speak of health and youth and an exciting life.

If you were to meet me in person as well, in all my cuteness, and with that quirky laugh - you might just envy me for being so calm and collected and full of humour at a time when everyone is so fearful of the pandemic. But all this is not a true reflection of what is really grinding inside me.

These are all external deflectors, and if everyone were to go by them, I would not be lying curled up in hospital bed - a nervous wreck.

Funny enough, a day ago a friend had texted that we must thank God we don't look like the things we are going through. Maybe that is good. But sometimes maybe the only way we can get the intervention we need, immediately, is if someone looks at us and realises that everything is not OK.

These are extraordinary times, moreso for those who live with depression like myself, or live through other challenges that are amplified by the limited movement and restrictions on interaction with loved ones.

Check on your friends. Check on your loved ones. Don't leave it at the standard, shallow "how are you?"

Find out how they are. Pry. Be invasive with your inquiry and ensure that their responses are not a facade - like the big sunglasses worn by our mothers back in the days to hide a "blue-eye" while they took compliments on how beautiful and stylish they looked.

It is so easy to miss the actual plea for help when speaking with someone whose soul is crying. Listen attentively to what people want to say to you these days. It is so much harder to reach out to people when one is already fatigued by the national lockdown.

I watched myself gradually sinking into a depression. I kept brushing things off, of course. Because we all get frustrated by kids and family, especially teenagers, right?

And I read somewhere that crying cleanses the eyes, so this was like my eyes taking a daily shower. Nothing to worry about. And the body aches and lack of sleep... that was because Ramaphosa shut down the wine!

I had an explanation for everything that I was going through: eating at 11 and three, not having an appetite during the day, then custard before supper.

I guess it was really not as simple for my family to pick up either. Because I am a recluse. To them I was still the same Kwanele who sat by herself and worked in silence. But I was not always sitting in silence. Often times I was crying my lungs out.

And eventually I started having fits.