How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
me: it's a depression thing.
tiny: oh, i feel depressed, too. sometimes.we're coming dangerously close to the conversations i'd have with maura, when she'd say she knew exactly what i was going through, and i'd have to explain that, no, she didn't, because her sadness never went as deep as mine. i had no doubt that tiny thought he got depressed, but that was probably because he had nothing to compare it to. still, what could i say? that i didn't just feel depressed—instead, it was like the depression was the core of me, of every part of me, from my mind to my bones? that if he got blue, i got black? that i hated those pills so much, because i knew how much i relied on them to live?
no, i couldn't say any of this. because, when it all comes down to it, nobody wants to hear it. no matter how much they like you or love you, they don't want to hear it. (14.91-93)
This is a pretty awesome statement. People do write off mental illness as not that big of a deal. But while everyone feels sad, not everyone needs medication and doctors to help them find their way out of the dumps. No one would ever think of saying, "sometimes I feel like I have cancer, too," to someone who was going through chemotherapy. So why do it to someone suffering from depression?
Quote #8
i think the idea of a "mental health day" is something completely invented by people who have no clue what it's like to have bad mental health. the idea that your mind can be aired out in twenty-four hours is kind of like saying heart disease can be cured if you eat the right breakfast cereal. mental health days only exist for people who have the luxury of saying "i don't want to deal with things today" and then can take the whole day off, while the rest of us are stuck fighting the fights we always fight, with no one really caring one way or another, unless we choose to bring a gun to school or ruin the morning announcements with a suicide. (16.3)
Another statement about how people misunderstand mental health. Tiny doesn't mean to be insensitive, but will knows that a person just can't get better in a day. Tiny has his issues, too, but he just doesn't get what it's like to have a mental illness.
Quote #9
i get it. i understand it.
and then he loses me.
tiny: but there is the word, this word phil wrayson taught me once: weltschmerz. it's the depression you feel when the world as it is does not line up with the world as you think it should be. i live in a big goddamned weltzschermz ocean, you know? and so do you. and so does everyone. because everyone thinks it should be possible just to keep falling and falling forever, to feel the rush of the air on your face as you fall, that air pulling your face into a brilliant goddamned smile. and that should be possible. you should be able to fall forever.
and i think: no.
seriously. no.
because i have spent my life falling. not the kind that tiny's talking about. he's talking about love. i'm talking about life. in my kind of falling, there's no landing. there's only hitting the ground. hard. dead, or wanting to be dead. so the whole time you're falling, it's the worst feeling in the world. because you feel you have no control over it. because you know how it ends. (20.52-57)
People just don't understand. will doesn't just feel sad sometimes, he feels like he's fighting to keep his head above water, to keep himself alive. will isn't mad at the world, he's just wired a little differently. So is it so wrong that he tries to minimize his pain in other areas—like, say, when it comes to who he loves?