Children are raised with a straight path set before them – go to school, get a job then make your own family. Unfortunately, there are never exceptions on what should happen if that straight path suddenly becomes crooked and the immense amount of pressure placed on children gets overwhelming. This and many reasons are reported to be the leading cause of depression and suicide in teens and young adults.
Born and raised in Ha Koali in the Berea district, Mathe Masupha has become an inspiration to young adults living with depression. She started off, like many children as a very bubbly child who had a mentality of moving on a straight path to success.
Unfortunately, many events occurred and she found herself crying herself to sleep because she could not pursue higher education due to the strict criteria used to admit students. In her own words, “I could not understand why I was not admitted and what made it worse is having to watch my friends go to college while I did not.”
The pain stung and she dove into a deep depression. Time seemed to stretch because the positivity that used to fill her suddenly transformed into hurt and darkness. The bubbly and optimistic person people knew in high school suddenly became anti-social and began to isolate herself.
At that time, her pain festered because she felt like God had been unfair. Seconds felt stretched and minutes felt like eternity because she began to recollect the bad memories of all that had happened in her life.
Watching her life crumble, she began to become suicidal and slowly indulged in self-harm. Sadness overwhelmed her because she just did not understand how her life had taken such a wrong turn. What do you do when you have to watch the life you had imagined with your friends in university be lived without you?
As time went, Mathe decided to heal and work towards getting herself together. This is the part where she became a miracle. A ‘miracle’ is defined as an occurrence that cannot be defined by human intelligence because it reverses an awful reality.
That means, a miracle in Mathe’s case became the strength to cope even though she was depressed. In the mist of all that pain, she explains that God met her where she was. She began to understand that the Bible was not wrong to say, “Nothing can separate us from the love of God.”
What made this miracle even more astounding is that Mathe began to allow herself that as lonely as she felt, God still loved her. In her opinion, the miracle was that in her isolation and depression, she was carried by the love of God to dare to heal.
Slowly, it began to occur to her that it was necessary for her to be isolated because she would have never understood the power of God upon her life. Accepting that God still loves you even when you are in pain – now that is a miracle!
During this time, Mathe began had a dream to change the world. The dream was to inspire girls to dare to dream in the times they are knocked down. This is why in 2018, in the midst of her brokenness, she began to invest her time in her love for advocacy for human rights.
She became the Minister of Education and Training in the Children’s Parliament of Lesotho and had collaborations with dignitaries such as Princess Senate Seeiso. In addition, she became an activist of the global campaign against child marriage.
As though that was not enough, in 2019, Mathe became the first child to take part in the Letsema Child Rights Strategic Road Map and was named the child representative in the Letsema Child Rights Network Executive Committee.
Though Mathe still has a long way to go, she is an inspiration and a walking miracle. It is commendable that she is cultivating who she is regardless of the depression. Her message to everyone is; “Depression is real. Stop saying people with depression are attention seekers. Those who suffer from depression should heal and never give up!”