Today, I’m hoping to speak about something a bit more personal.

High school sometimes feels like some kind of distant memory, but there are times when all of it feels like it was just yesterday. I had a lot of good buddies in high school, some of whom still go to school with me here at SMU. The nice thing about high school, for me at least, was that if you were one of the AP students, you generally had all the same classes with all the same people. That meant you were always taking subjects with people you knew and you were never lacking in people with whom to commiserate over school.

There was definitely an element of solidarity and brotherhood there. Now, my high school tried to promote brotherhood among all of its students, but there was definitely something special about the bonds I shared with a lot of my friends from class. Even though we didn’t always get the chance to hang out outside of school, we ended up growing particularly close by the time graduation rolled around.

We shared in each other’s joys, congratulated each other on accomplishments and gave each other a pat on the back when we all finally made decisions about which college we were going to. But there was another side to that companionship: we felt each other’s pain too.

In March of this year, one of my classmates who was attending school in Alabama ended his own life. All of my old high school friends were completely devastated and so was I. It felt like my whole world had been turned upside down. It had only been during my senior year that I really got to know this friend very well, and the most recent time that I’d seen him was at our graduation, which happened to take place right here at McFarlin Auditorium.

The idea that I would never see him again was simply astounding to me. I attended a vigil for him along with my high school brethren, some of whom came from as far away as Rhode Island to pay their respects to a man we only wished we could have known longer.

I’ll never know what was going through my friend’s mind when he did what he did. For a while, I was actually angry with him. When I was at that vigil, I saw a church filled with people who were weeping uncontrollably. My friend was loved by more people than he ever could have imagined, and that he could end his own life in that way and cause all of these people so much pain seemed selfish beyond belief.

However, I quickly realized I was looking at this situation the wrong way. My friend did not kill himself out of malice or spite to anyone. I knew him well enough to know that’s not something he ever would have done. While I certainly can’t judge the surrounding circumstances in his case, I do know that victims of suicide in this country are just that: victims. Many of them suffer from crippling depression or anxiety that follows them for months or even years before they ultimately take such fateful action.

Today, there’s a huge stigma surrounding the clinically depressed. We like to tell them to “get over it” or remind them that “there are plenty of people who have it worse than you.” What we often fail to understand is that depression is a medical condition that can’t be treated by simply telling someone to “put a smile on.” People who have been afflicted with depression often go undiagnosed, and the guilt they can incur from feeling, like burdens to loved ones, only serves to make their lives all the more difficult.

College is an especially stressful time for students like us. Between the pressures of getting high grades, staying involved in clubs and activities and planning for a career after graduation, there’s always plenty to keep a mind preoccupied, and it’s easy to fall into the trap of depression without even realizing it.

If you’re feeling overwhelmingly stressed or have been feeling depressed for an extended period of time, don’t just let it go. Say something. There are resources on campus like counseling and psychiatric services that are designed to help you. Being depressed doesn’t mean you’ve failed and it’s not something that you can always tough out. The sooner you speak up, the sooner you can get your life back on track.

I know every year there are thousands more like my friend who see it fit to end their own lives. It doesn’t need to be that way though, and I hope that by ending this huge stigma around depression and counseling services this is a problem that we can one day resolve.

Brandon Bub is a sophomore majoring in English and edits The Daily Campus opinion column. He can be reached for comment at [email protected]