Down but Not Out

                                                                                                                        Jesell Perez

                                                                                                                        English 110

                                                                                                                        Jay Lewenstein

 People who often suffer from depression always feel that they are alone. They may not be alone necessarily, but they are alone in their minds. Depression is a mood disorder that makes you have a sense of sadness and loneliness. People with it are most often the ones at risk for self-harm. They deal with a daily struggle that to me in unimaginable. I have witnessed many older people go through depression in my family, and it’s hard to believe that there are kids out there being diagnosed with it.

            The image that I have chosen is overall black and white. There is person sitting on the floor with their arms hugging their knees, and there head bowed down to them. The gender of this person is unspecified, I think it saying that this person can be anyone. There are captions in this photo. At the top in bold black letters it reads, “DON’T ASK WHY.” On the bottom there is a mix of capped words and lowercased in white. The caption says this, “Just try to understand the BLACKNESS, LETHARGY, HOPELESSNESS, and LONELINESS they are going through.” I feel that the capitalized words are the ones that are most important. The ones that stand out amongst the rest. These are the words that describe how people with depression feel.

            The message to me is that they are trying to say people with depression don’t want to be asked question about it or how they got it. They want people to understand them, to be able to listen to what they have to say. People with depression are going through enough, why add onto it. The intended audience would be mothers or family members with kids that are suffering with depression. They might want to get a sense of what they are going through or maybe try to understand it. Most people go through there day not realizing that there are serious illnesses out there until they get it or a loved one. This ad makes you feel compassion for people with depression because they are going through so much already with their everyday life, and then they have to live with those feelings. Feelings that you are not cared about, not loved, not useful.

            The element that grabs my attention first are the four bright white arms reaching out to this person. There are a few hands that are placed on him/her, and some that are reaching towards it, as a sense of that this person is not alone.