Everyone around Aderonke noticed when she stopped smiling.
She was always a quiet girl, but quiet was acceptable. But her silence was what made people uncomfortable. In a place like theirs where laughter survived hardships and hunger, sadness felt like an insult.
"Why is that girl always looking like this?" The neighbors asked.
"Children of nowadays don't know what life is about"
"She's just too youn to be tired."
Adronke heard everything.
She lived in a one room small apartment with her mom, the walls thin enough to pass conversations like smoke.
Every morning Adronke wakes up with heavy heart , tight chest as if sleep only deepened the weight inside her.
Some days she would just sit on the edge of the bed for long minutes, staring at the room ceiling, her body stiff and refusing to cooperate. This wasn't due to her being lazy, it was because she felt empty.
Her upbringing had taught her one thing very well: Endurance.
Her Mother was the biggest example of endurance. Long hours. Sharp words. Tears were swallowed and weakness scolded. Strength meant survival, survival in turn meant silence.
So when Adronke started to feel sad for no certain reason, she was ashamed to speak up.
She tried to maintain her routine. She went to work, she greeted people, She prayed harder hoping that God will take her sadness aways or at least make her know the reason.
But when the heaviness didn't lift, she blamed herself for failing God somehow.
"Maybe your faith is not too strong" Her aunt said one evening. " What exactly is your problem, somebody that has food, you have shelter, what else do you want, ehh this girl?"
Adronke nodded and agreed, even though she still didn't understand the problem.
She stays up all night, her thoughts racing like traffic without lights. During the day her body felt slow and disconnected. Most times she felt nothing at all. And that part scares her the most.
She finally decided to open up for the first time, so she chose someone close, her cousin, who was siting beside her in a plastic chair outside the house.
She explained everything to Chioma, her cousin, telling her how she felt sad for no reason and all that.
Her cousin laughed, not unkindly, but carelessly. "so what? Life is hard, so you think you're the only one?"
Things worsened slowly for Adronke. She stopped doing things that she loved, rejecting food, stopped attending gatherings, and spending time alone.
People noticed.
"This girl don change o, she get attitude now"
"She no dey normal"
"Is still one new year new life, abeg make she carry that attitude dey go that side joor"
The word crazy arrived one afternoon, loud enough for her to hear it.
It followed her everywhere after that.
The next morning Aderonke couldn't get out of bed.
Her mother's voice cut through the room, impatient and sharp. "This girl, do you want to lose your job?" "Get up from bed and stop all this nonsense"
Adronke tied, but her body refused.
Ten later that day her mom was speaking to a neighbor and she overheard.
"She has become very lazy" her mom said. "This new generation just love too much comfort"
Something inside Adronke quickly collapsed, not loudly, but completely.
That night she stood alone in the bathroom, staring at her own reflection and there she whispered, "Am I crazy?"
The girl in the mirror has lost so much weight, looked tired and frightened.
She looked human.
Adronke found help in an unexpected place.
There was an older woman at work who watched her quietly. So the next afternoon she said, "You look exhausted"
The words cracked something open.
Adronke spoke , hesitated at first, then at once. The heaviness, the emptiness, and the fear that she was broken.
The woman paid attention to Adronke, listening without interrupting.
When Adronke finished speaking, the woman said gently, "You're not crazy. You're just hurting, and it's normal"
It was the first time anyone had named it without being judgemental.
Healing didn't arrive like a miracle. The woman, who was once a therapist helped her a lot.
Her healing came in small steps.
Learning to rest.
Learning to speak.
Learning that pain does not require permission to exist.
Not everyone understood, some still didn't.
They still said she's changed. That she overthinks things and that she's distant.
But Adronke breather more easier now. In a world where suffering silently is praised and wellness is misunderstood, choosing to heal looks strange.
So when the word crazy flows her way again, she no longer shrinks.
Because she knows the truth, she also knows her worth. Adronke is not crazy. She's learning how to live.
Cover image generated using my prompt using Chatgpt
