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safelittlecorner · 2 years

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When I first started struggling with my mental health, I went from someone who would talk to a room full of people with ease, to someone who broke down at the idea of ordering my own food in a restaurant. Some days I couldn’t even hold a conversation. Someone could ask me something, and I’d get so lost in my head desperately searching for the words to form the right answer; that I’d forget the question. I spent my life just waiting for each day to end, hoping that the next would never start and It absolutely broke my heart.

As children we are taught that when we’re hurt, to look after ourselves until we feel better. People try to make us feel better and tell us it’s ok. When we’re sad... we’re told to cheer up. We don’t get taught to manage our feelings, we get taught to ignore them. As a society we have formed this belief that mental health doesn’t exist until it’s mental illness. We ignore and ignore and ignore until a tragedy occurs and we “wish we could’ve seen the signs”.

As a 12 year old. I started having panic attacks. I had started secondary school. And it came as quite a shock. I had no idea what was happening to me. It felt like there was this bar across my chest, stopping me from breathing and my throat would get all dry and I could never clear my through to get my words out. I’d feel shaky and sick and sometime my hands would go numb. But mostly I was terrified of people seeing. I still am. When it happens I look around like a mad woman. As if there’s a threat in a completely safe environment. My own mind convinced me I was unsafe, and unloved. I’d never heard of this before. Everyone around me seemed so put together and happy. The harder I tried to “cheer up” the further I felt from myself, and who I once was. I convinced myself if I looked the right way, my problems would be solved. If I dressed the right, if I spoke the right way. I worked so hard in school, every day I’d tell myself that if I just became like the people around me. I’d be happy like they were. After a year I moved schools, I changed so many things about myself. And things seemed better for a while. But I never seemed to understand that it didn’t matter where I was, or who I pretended to be, I was still me. I couldn’t outrun or ignore the problems in my head, and so my mental health declined once again. I began to hate everything about myself. Trying to distance myself as much as I could from that girl. Because that girl was broken. Something was wrong with her. She needed to be hidden. And after years of it I started to believe that she didn’t deserve to live. That I didn’t deserve to live. And so I tried to take my life. Thankfully I told someone, and my attempt was unsuccessful. I received support from mental health services and as much as I wish I could say it was happy ever after, I’m afraid I’d be lying.

There is no instant fix. And even over a year later things were still pretty messy. But during this difficult period, I received some amazing support from some amazing people. One of these people happened to be my biology teacher. I remember being in his office one day, I was probably crying (I spent a lot of my time crying over these years). And he asked me a question. I’m not too sure what this question was but I remember my response was something along the lines of “I just don’t believe that anything can be worth this much work. I am so tired and this is clearly never ending” and without hesitation this man looked at me and said “I disagree. I believe that only the best things in life are the things that you work so hard for, the things that take everything out of you”. I don’t remember the rest of this conversation, I probably walked away from it without taking in anything else he said. Being stubborn as hell I probably stopped paying too much attention after he said the words “I disagree”

A few months later we found ourselves in a global pandemic. I’d recently been put on medication and as some may know, often with antidepressants things get worse before they get better. And in a whirlwind of depression, anxiety and exam stress. We got put into a national lockdown. And I think everyone close to me was absolutely terrified at how badly it would effect me. And the reality is- it probably could have absolutely ruined me even more than I already felt I was. Exams were cancelled, schools shut it felt like my stability and support was just ripped away. But one day I was on the YoungMinds website, and my mouse hovered over the “Get Involved” link. When I clicked on this link, instead of being met with people who had their perfect lives explaining how I could “be like them”, I saw people like me. Using their own, real life experiences to help others. I also saw an application to write for their blog.

This time, instead of seeing myself as someone who needed to be fixed, and searching desperately for someone or something to solve my problems. I started seeing myself as an opportunity to use my bad experiences for good. And I wholeheartedly believe that this is what changed everything.

When I had that conversation with my biology teacher I was missing the most vital part. I always saw the “work” side of the statement, I never even thought about what I was “working for”. I’d spent so long desperately trying to keep my head above water that I didn’t even see that I could swim towards shore.

I wrote a blog for YoungMinds, and they published it. A small victory, but my story was alongside hundreds of other kids just like me, and maybe my story could help someone. I shared it on my Facebook and the response was overwhelmingly loving. People who you’d never expect, told me about their own struggles, and how hearing what I had to say helped them, and other people they knew. It was the first time I’d ever properly felt like i was allowed to feel the way I did. It felt like I didn’t need to change who I was and pretend to be someone who was happy all of the time. This one blog opened up a door to a world of ideas of what I could work towards next and before I knew it I had a whole future mapped out in my head. For the first time it what literally felt like a lifetime, I knew exactly what I wanted and was excited to work for it. It’s insanely difficult to keep going when you don’t know what you’re even doing it for. Finding hope in the smallest things in life can actually change your whole perception of everything. If you currently feel like you’re working every day of your life, without knowing why you’re doing it, it’s easy to lose sight of how far you’ve come. Of course I have bad days, but I’ve learned that everyone does. And I’m learning that when these bad days happen, it doesn’t mean I’m back to square one. It just means I need to give myself a break and I can try again tomorrow.

If you or someone you know is struggling, be gentle. Acknowledging the feelings is often one of the hardest things you can do. Find someone and talk things through. Even if it’s just over a cup of tea. We need to learn to include mental wellness into our daily life. Be kind to yourself and others, always. And remember that you aren’t alone. Even if your brain is telling you that you are.

#mental heath support #school #positivity #wellness #lockdown #anxiété #happy #sad thoughts

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