Struggling doesn't make you ungrateful

"With everything you have, how can you be like this?" Sometimes others say it to you and, much more often, you say it to yourself. You have family, work, faith, and you feel guilty for not being well, as if sadness were a lack of gratitude. But depression doesn't appear because you don't value what you have. It's an illness, and it can come into lives that, seen from outside, have everything. Adding guilt only makes it heavier. Gratitude and suffering can live side by side. You can give thanks for the people who love you and, at the same time, recognize that you need help. God doesn't ask you to be well in order to love you, or to fake a joy you don't have right now.