On the last 3 or 4 phones I have owned I had a ‘sleeping songs’ playlist. I first created the playlist when I got my very first iPhone back when I was around 17 years old. The playlist was created mainly because I was severely depressed. It was filled with emotional, slow songs that could pass off as sleeping songs, but to me they were songs I listened to when I wanted to actually emotionally feel pain, sadness or grief.

I have always struggled to express how I am truly feeling. It’s never been an easy task for me to do. I think over time it got harder and harder to cry. I had the ‘well my dads death happened 5 years ago so I should be over it’ type of mindset and it got harder to crack through that. I remember one day in my first year of college, I was getting ready in my bedroom and I was listening to Rihanna Diamonds and my eyes just started to water. Part of me was amazed that I could just so easily get emotional about a song that has absolutely nothing to do with me and the other part of me was confused as fuck. It wasn’t long till I created a ‘sleeping songs’ playlist which really I knew was my ‘crying songs’ playlist but obviously I couldn’t name it that as it would raise a lot of questions I didn’t want to answer. The playlist became a way for me to release how I was truly feeling. There was just something about the songs that made me just cry and cry, but I knew I wasn’t actually crying about the song, I was crying because I was genuinely sad, lost and lonely but I couldn’t cry about that without listening to some sad songs.

Over time the playlist got played all the way through college, break ups and life in general till about February last year. By this point I was still going through CBT but I was so broken it was easy to let my emotions out. If someone asked me to cry I probably could’ve cried real tears right there and then. I had no persona or wall to break through. I could just cry when I wanted, where I wanted and for how long I wanted so I stopped listening to the playlist. There was no need for it anymore. The playlist then became something I always avoided. It took me up until November to delete the it. It was a big step for me as I became somewhat scared of it. To me the playlist was created for one sole purpose and it held a lot of difficult memories. I think that’s what made it hard for me to delete it (sounds stupid, I know) but it was a pretty big part in my journey and wiping it away completely was something that I needed to let go of. Eventually I did it.

I began to create other playlists which are full of more upbeat type of music which was great but I wanted to create a playlist filled with just some nice songs to chill out to but I was so scared to do so. I was scared of relapsing. I was scared in case I created this playlist, I would listen to it and fall into a depressive hole again so I put it off for about 2 months till one day I thought fuck this and it’s now a playlist I listen to almost everyday. I realised that I have no emotions to hide anymore. I have no reason to hide emotions, I can just be open and honest with myself and others. That tough exterior that used to be made of steel has gone. Absolutely crashed through it and demolished it. Job well done for me, big step.

Depression takes over a lot of different aspects in peoples lives. It can be anything from emotions to music or our social lives. It takes time and a lot of bravery to over come depression but it is possible. It’s just one of those things that takes understanding and time.

If you want to check out my Chill Songs playlist click the link below:

Sending love, light and positive thoughts to you all,

Emma xo