When I was a young mare, in late middle school and early high school, I spent a lot of my time feeling sad.  Around my friends and family I was normal and happy, but I spent most of my time alone feeling melancholy.  It went on for about four years in total, and it felt like I was in a really really deep hole, so deep I couldn’t even see the opening anymore, and I felt like there was no way out.  It wasn’t fair, and it felt like I was upset for no reason!!  I had a great life, and I had friends, and I had a good family that loved me a lot, but I just couldn’t bring myself to be as happy as I thought I should have been.  It was a hard time.

I couldn’t say any one thing that brought me out of that slump; it was a lot of things that worked together to make me feel better.  The most important thing, though, was that I started talking to people about my feelings!  I talked to friends about how I was feeling down and lonely, and it helped having people to confide in.  I thought they wouldn’t really care, or they would only make me feel worse, or they’d act like it wasn’t a big deal, but I was wrong!!  My friends were such a huge support, and they wanted me to tell them when I was sad so that they could make me feel better and feel loved.

Another thing that helped was that I took a lot of time for myself.  I did things that made me happy, like reading and painting and taking long walks in pretty places.  I thought about what I wanted, I took time to fulfill my own needs before thinking about other people.  I did the things that made me most happy.  It took a while, but with the help of my friends and by doing things for myself, I started feeling so much better.  Just remember that this sad spell will pass.  It may feel like there’s no end in sight, but I promise you it will end.  And know that there are people who love you and care about how you feel, maybe people you wouldn’t expect, maybe even people who barely know you.  Good luck friend, I hope this helped <3