I would want to share a story of how lucky/courageous 3 hours made me come out of depression.

Disclaimer: I am not sure if I was in depression. Maybe you can help me understand what it was.
And this is not a marketing for Red bull

I'm Indian. Few years back, my life was going perfectly. I got into a good college to pursue my undergraduate degree. I wanted to continue studying after college and had up my decision to give a test called CAT after my under-graduation. It was not an easy exam. After giving the exam, we could accept admission into a b-school and complete our MBA.

So during my first attempt, I started prepping 1.5 years before the exam date. Since practically all my friends were giving the same exam, I always felt relaxed. The preparation didn't go as anticipated and I scored the worst among all my friends  (though I was expected to score the best).

Few of my friends obtained admission into decent colleges(not the best ones), and few gave CAT again.
I also started preparing for the exam again.
After the results, I scored well, the best among my friends, but not enough to get into the top 10 or 20 b-schools in the country. By this time, all my buddies, every single one of them decided to settle for a decent b-school. I decided to take the chance and give the exam one last time as I knew I was capable of much more.

This exact moment is where I think I started loosing the plot. It was the start of COVID too.

I started preparing 6-7 months before the exam but never could actually sit and prepare properly. I would find myself finding excuses to get out of preparation. I would do random shit which I didn't even like. I would simply sit around all day thinking about random shit. I started eating more. I would make a commitment everyday and break it every single day.
I would lie to my friends that I had to study and hence I cannot meet them.
I would see motivating videos just to assume that they had it all easy and they were lucky.
I started sleeping late and waking up late.
I started feeling terribly jealous of all my friends.
I started feeling envy of practically everyone, and their life's.
I started feeling a tingling anxiety sensation under my stomach 24*7. I even consulted a doctor online for this.
When I gave practice exams, my results dipped.
I gave 10-15 practice exams before the real one and my scores kept on dipping.
I realised that I have made a massive mess and this time my scores will be even worse than previous years. I thought I might have destroyed 3 years of my work and had disappointed my parents.
But still 2 months were left for the exam and I figured that I'll try one final time. This was the period when COVID struck my family. Starting few weeks were a chaos and I had little time to prepare. But after that I was free. Still I tricked my mind into thinking that because COVID has struck my family, I won't be able to prepare. Every every day I knew it was an excuse, and I was literally frightened to waste the day again and I would do precisely that. Every every day!
It was never like I didn't like what I was studying. It's just I had experienced what zero concentration felt like.

After 1 month, when everyone in my family got well, I told myself that since just 1 month is remaining, I have no time to prepare now.

I started doing random crap again. Just alone and not really attempting to engage in things.

All this while I experienced the tingling sensation under my belly(for 6 months now) and it never truly quit.

Exam day was nearing and I knew I won't be able to sleep because of Anxiety. I purchased myself a Red Bull the night before.
As usual, I couldn't sleep the entire night and chugged a Red Bull 30 mins before the exam when I was in the cab nearing the exam centre.
I don't know what the Red bull had, but I recall hoping it would activate all sections of brain to 100% capacity. I knew it was a wishful thinking but somehow I was able to convince my mind that Red bull has started functioning. I just convinced myself that I'm one of the smartest person I know, and I can crack this exam if I had 2 good hours.

Suddenly all the worry went (even the tingling sensation) and I felt like I owned the place. I felt like I'm one of the smartest in the room.
I gave the exam calmly.

The tingling sensation again started after 5-6 hours.

I headed back home. Expecting a solid enough score but nothing too amazing.
After few weeks I got to know that I had done extremely well and was among the top 1%.
In approaching few months I applied to several B-schools and got into one of the top b-school in the country.
That was the point when the tingling sensation finally ended.

During all this time I never felt I was depressed. But then when I finally felt okay, I have always questioned if it was depression.