If you’re sensitive or triggered in any way by someone speaking (sometimes in great detail) about their poor mental health, please proceed with caution.
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I have been had ‘poor mental health’ for about a decade or so. That means that at a mere 18 years old, I have spent more than half my life ‘suffering’ from my own brain.
I’ve had an anxiety disorder which prevented me from making friends and socialising for ages – you wouldn’t think it as now, I am usually the chattiest person in the room. I used to worry that if I let myself leave the house, every negative scenario that I could possibly imagine would occur. Overthinking is still my worst enemy but I’ve learnt that it is one of the most human things you could ever possibly do. I still have the occasional panic attack – one of the most recent ones being on the shop floor at work which is not the one.
I’ve ‘suffered’ from depression since I was diagnosed at only fifteen years old. I’ve had episodes where I wouldn’t leave my room for days and sometimes weeks at a time. I’ve planned on killing myself more times than I can count – which many of my closest friends didn’t even know about until a matter of months ago. Having your own brain attempt to convince you that you’re worthless is the weirdest and hardest to describe feeling in the world. Now, in October 2018, I can comprehend and experience happiness – which at one point, I never thought I would. However that doesn’t mean I don’t still ‘get sad’ sometimes because as the wonderful Matt Haig said: You can be a depressive and happy.
I’ve had a really obscure form of OCD which is more specifically classified as a Body Focused Repetitive Behaviour disorder. I ‘suffered from’ Trichotillomania which roughly translates from Greek as ‘hair pulling madness’. I’ve pulled my hair out without realising it since being only five years old. I’d caused myself to have bald patches at the age of fifteen which had a huge impact on my anxiety and my self esteem. I’ve always put it down to being subconsciously terrified of school as it began around the same time I first started school. Its always a weird one to explain to people as there is much scientific research around it. I always get people as me how I can pull my hair out (sometimes in huge clumps) without realising it as they personally cannot comprehend it. Even after almost fourteen years of ‘suffering’ from Trich, I still don’t know how to explain it to a non-sufferer as I don’t know I’m doing it.
I’ve had psychosis which went on for so long that my therapist and psychologist at the time decided to classify it as schizophrenia. I used to be going about my day as usual, with some mild symptoms of anxiety as you’d expect, then the next minute I’d just stop functioning. I would just stop, I’d transport myself into a dream world. I’d sit/stand completely still or collapse into a pile. I used to be able to sense a psychosis episode coming on when I’d beginning to hear drums or start aggressively scratching my arms. I still suffer from these psychosis episodes to this day but they are more unpredictable than they were before which gives me a lot of anxiety.
I’ve been given – what feels like – every type of medication and treatment under the sun. I’ve been to three different types of therapy and countless different tablets from sleeping tablets to antidepressants to natural herbal remedies.
Even after finally being given a formal diagnosis about four years ago now, I am still ‘suffering’ to some extent. I am lucky enough to no longer being prescribed medication to relieve my ‘suffering’. I have been out of regular weekly therapy for about a year and a bit. My proudest achievement is probably that I haven’t been sectioned in well over a year – being sectioned was a regular occurrence for me in late 2016 up until the April of 2017.
I am far from cured but unfortunately, I am stuck with my bad and broken little brain. I’ve learnt to accept that fact which has taken a lot of both energy and time. I still have a long way to go but when I look at how far I have come since 2015, I am unbelievably proud of myself.
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Anyway, enough about me…
Give both your friends and strangers a shoulder to cry on or an ear to listen.
So many people don’t understand their own feelings so please don’t expect them to be able to share their feelings in a simple and understandable way.
Please remember that life is always worth it. Its hard to learn how to cope with a brain that wants you dead but it comes with time and patience. If you think you need help, go out and get it. Whether its from a medical professional or a friend, talking to someone helps so so much.
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Please ignore how scattered and all over the place this is.
I’m currently on a train to Brighton and my anxiety levels are through the roof.
Happy World Mental Health Day to me, lads xxx
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Side Note: If anyone is wondering why I put the word suffering in quotation marks every time, it is because I do not see myself as being a victim of my mental health. Even though it does hinder my life, I don’t see my mental illness as some horrendously horrible or troubling thing that means I can’t be ‘ordinary’.
georgiaolivia 