[The Quiet Hours Chronicle](/blog/series-the-quiet-hours-chronicle.html) · Part III of VI
Category: Human Connection · Personal Essay
By Morgan Rivers, Staff Essayist
In the third week of trying to be less alone, a confusing thought arrived:
I am speaking to people again. Why do I still feel sad?
I had mistaken loneliness and sadness for a single creature. They are kin, not twins. This is what I learned when the room was less empty but my chest remained heavy.
I. The good day that collapsed
Saturday began well. Coffee, laundry, a call with my sister. I even laughed.
By evening, for no reason I could name, I sat on the bathroom floor — not weeping, only tired in a way sleep does not repair.
No one had wounded me that day. That frightened me. If sadness required a villain, one could prevent it. This felt like weather.
II. Toxic positivity I nearly believed
A friend wrote: "Just go out more! You'll be fine!"
They meant kindness. It still made me feel defective — as though cheerfulness were wages I had not earned.
I made the opposite error too: romanticising the sadness — playlists, old messages, pain worn as identity. Company, yes; progress, no.
III. Two kinds of sadness
I began sorting low moods into two buckets — not clinically, honestly.
Bucket A — grief with a cause. Rejection, loss, failure, loneliness itself. Response: feel, speak, time.
Bucket B — no clear cause. Exhaustion, chemistry, season, brain weather. Response: do not hunt a villain; stabilise.
Most of my eleven-o'clock episodes were Bucket B dressed as Bucket A.
IV. What "less sad" resembled
Less sad was not happiness. It was shorter crashes, fewer spirals at two in the morning, sadness still — but the ability to shower and answer a message.
Small. Un cinematic. True.
Three insights that moved the needle.
One: Sadness wants witnesses, not always fixers. The finest message I received: "That sounds heavy. I'm here."
Two: Inputs matter on ordinary days — sleep, food, alcohol, scrolling. I could not think my way out of an empty body.
Three: Connection helps sadness when it is safe and harms when it is not. Choosing how I reached out became part of healing.
Two practices I still keep.
The ten-minute witness: Message one person: "Rough night. No solutions needed — only saying it aloud."
The comfort menu: Written in a clear hour: shower, walk, tea, one episode, text-only chat if people feel too large. In sadness, pick one item.
Part IV answers the question readers ask next — how do you get a girlfriend? — not as pickup art, but as presence.
Continues in Part IV — This Is Not How I Got a Girlfriend · Previous: Part II
On nights when friends felt like too much exposure, I used text-first chat and kept my camera off — the same discipline as in this safety guide for strangers online. Connection helped when I could leave at will.
If sadness persists or you consider self-harm, contact a crisis line or professional in your country.
— Morgan Rivers
