Wednesday 30 May 2018

The Box Of Pineapple and Something Slugs Do

"The box of pineapple arrived on Christmas Eve"

I find myself not being able to deal with anxiety. Everything is completely overwhelming, just laying in bed with the lights off is currently too much to deal with. I find myself not knowing what to do, there is only so much of letting something consume you that you can mentally manage. I find myself crying, not being able to stop the tears and not even knowing why they are happening.  The last 48 hours have been me, on hyperanxious all the time. I've had some of the worst panic attacks I've had in a long time and I just feel like I want to scream.

I just want to get things out. I just want to type. I just want to do anything I physically can to distract myself from the growing feeling in my chest that feels like it is about ready to explode. 


"We need more words like toothbrush"

I find myself pulling all the books I own off the shelf, opening them onto random pages to try and find the weirdest sentences I physically can. I write them up, I laugh abit then throw them in the pile. I spent half an hour at least doing this, and get a lovely little book pile. 

"You know what they say about playing with your sausage too much"

I find it strange that such random quotes can be embedded in books. I find it sort of comforting that a book about suicide and a psychiatric hosptial contains multiple innuendos about dicks. I find it comforting that a book about a girls probably drunk driving suicide can so happily talk about strippers. I find it comforting that books around such upsetting topics can also bring so much laughter too, just as the way that even though life can be painful and sad, that it can bring joy too. 

I find it interesting that these books, by different authors about different things can all contain such interesting sentences. How does someone even think about the collaboration of boxes of pineapples and Christmas Eve? How do you type your way to the need of words?

"It's not a question of poetry, but of facts!"

This activity was almost fitting to how I was feeling. When I get anxious, I'll say the most random shit that I can think of, and it will be amongst all the serious, the sad and the drama. I am the book, my expression of anxiety is often these quotes, and yes, this is the worst metaphor you may ever read.  


"There is not technically a rule against paying a stripper to dance in front of the school"

My days are often fuelled by anxiety. Anxiety will tell me what I can and can't do. I am almost living in fear that the idea of doing something is too scary that I won't bother to even leave the house. I am constantly telling myself I can't do something, so when it comes to doing it I have to cancel because the idea of it is too overwhelming.

I am a relatively extraverted person. I always have been more outgoing, louder, more over-the-top than alot of people I know. Where I can be shy, when I'm in my comfort zone there is almost no stopping me, I'll be happy, speaking with my body movements, absolutely in my element talking to people and doing things. In many ways, socialising and being loud are the things that energise me, whilst also being the things that cause panic and fear. It is becoming progressively harder to cope with the need to be social but the panic at doing so. 

I'm kinda just sat here letting everything I physically can out. I feel like I'm writing this more to tell myself these things and to help myself than I am, instead of trying to write a coherent piece of writing that might help someone else. But I need this, I need to get everything out and this is the place I love to do it. I can usually divert all that energy into something to find myself helpful, but right now I'm typing with very little clue as to what I'm doing. 

Sometimes anxiety just wins, today is another one of those days. 


"How can our sentient fucking lives revolve around something slugs can do?"


Monday 14 May 2018

A Story || MHAW 2018.

The first step towards recovery for me was the first time I spoke about it.

I had spent my secondary school feeling so many emotions that I didn't understand. I was young, unknowing about emotions and I was hurting. But I was hurting in silence, hurting behind a perfectly constructed mask I had spent a few years building myself. Time went on and these feelings became worse. I started to realise these emotions were getting the better of me and I found myself in a repeated cycle of unhappiness and feeling lost.

My secondary school years just consisted of days where one moment I was okay, next moment I was at rock bottom. After feeling isolated from years of bullying, I eventually settled into a good friendship group, and then shitty people left me alone. I felt like I gained abit of control back in my life in that respect, it meant that I had something good in my life, which is what I really needed. But I kept feeling down, I kept worrying at every little thing. I'd tend to eat nothing or eat 6 meals a day, I'd constantly feel tired and sometimes everything felt too much.

I wanted to talk, but I didn't know where to go. I opened up to a few of my online friends, but they discounted anything I said to them, and I found myself in a situation where I felt surrounded by people who didn't believe what I was saying, and instead were making fun of me. There are only so many times you can hear someone tell you that you're just seeking attention when you were crying out for help. I wanted to talk to someone at school, but I couldn't bare to do so, after a separate story that changed me for the worst. I didn't feel comfortable opening up to them, because I knew how awfully and terrifyingly they dealt with similar situations. I was alone, and I had to accept that.

The next few years were very much the same. In my time at sixth form, I tried to talk to anyone about how I was feeling, but I was often too scared to or if I did, I just said I was feeling rough. At the end, I gave up completely. I put back on the mask and continued my studies, whilst continuing down into a spiral of unhappiness. At one point, I nearly went to my tutor to talk because I wanted to get these emotions out and I didn't know where else to turn. But instead of opening up, I carried on with unbearable emotions and hoped I would start a new chapter at university.

I struggled through my A2 levels, my mental health completely blocked me from doing anything, but I managed to scrape the results I needed to get me ABB and get me into my firm university choice.

I went to university, and this is where everything started to look up. I went to university off a really bad month, losing the two closest people in my life and I spent the few weeks before I went feeling really low and relatively suicidal. And I meant it then, I was struggling with everything and it felt like one thing after another was against me, and I felt like the only way of anything improving was simply to cease to exist. The week or two before I went to uni were the two weeks of my life where I was at my lowest, but thankfully I stayed alive and went to university.

I wanted a new start, and I found one. I really did. I stay in contact with my best friends from school, naturally, but I was lucky enough to find myself settled into a good bunch of friends. My mental health still fluctuated, I really struggled at points to get out of bed, to talk to anyone and to do anything. In some ways, the stresses of all the change at university and the whole meeting a brand new set of people made any feelings I had worse, but the awfulness of it was made easier through the people I was with and the fun I was having. I quit my part time job in December of my first year, which further alleviated any anxiety I was having (yes, work gave me alot of it) and I, for the first time in my life, felt happy, comfortable and accepted somewhere. I wasn't being picked on, I didn't feel alone or left out, I felt comfortable with the people around me and I enjoyed what I was doing.

For the first time, I opened up to someone and didn't get pushed away. Someone asked me if I was okay and for the first time in a few years, I said no. I finally had someone who believed me, someone who understood what I was saying and actually cared about it. It was almost like the entire weight of the world was lifted off my shoulders and instead was replaced with an infinite hug. When I finally had someone to talk to, someone who cared, my mental health started to slowly improve.

I had bad nights, I had some really bad nights but slowly and surely I had less bad nights, less bad days. Things that were thrown at me were easier to deal with, for the first time since everything had started, I saw a light at the end. It was a small, faint light, but I saw it.

This continued through my second year, to where I am now. I have had days where I felt like everything was too much, I still do. I had absolute rock bottom periods this year, where I nearly left everything behind and moments where I genuinely didn't wake up. But I have so many days where I am so happy that the bad days feel so little and unimportant. I look forward to waking up, I look forward to seeing what is in store. I am excited for my future, I am excited to see what each day brings. I know what to do if I'm not feeling as great as I can be, I understand my limits and I know that I have support and love from so many people.

I have so many amazing people in my life who care about me, and care about how I am instead of how I say I am.

I say all of this for a reason. I didn't think even 2 years ago that I would be alive, I genuinely didn't. Now I'm here, finishing my second year of university, with the best friends I could ask for, and my life genuinely looking to be on the up. None of this would have arguably happened, if I didn't make that first initial conversation.

If there is one thing mental health awareness week should be shouting, is that talking about mental health is the most important part in breaking any and all stigma. Talking it about it normalises it, and the more we normalise it the more people will feel okay about talking about how they're feeling. Talking about it makes other people comfortable about it. Talking it breaks down barriers, breaks down the idea that mental illness is just attention seeking and that mental health isn't real.

I've spent nearly 9 years of my life with mental health fluctuations in some ways, and only in the last 2 years have I felt like I can talk about it. The stigma is being broken slowly around mental health, but it still isn't enough.

Approximately 1/4 people will experience a mental health difficulty, with 1/6 experiencing a common mental health problem each week. This figure is nearly 1/3 for students.

Female suicide rates are at their highest and the highest rates for suicide in 2017 were males between 40-44, and in general terms, males are 3 times more likely to commit suicide.

Mental health awareness week is here to lower these. Whilst so much work is being done to emphasise that it is okay to talk about mental health, there is so much left to be done.

And awareness starts with you. It starts by opening a conversation, making sure you're friends, family, peers, colleagues etc are okay, and are genuinely okay. It's putting your arm round a friend and it's starting the conversation that could lead a person to be able to carry on. I can say that these types of conversation are a huge part of how I am typing this, how I had the strength in me to continue going. It's the message that reminds me in my worst moments that yes, people do care about me and would care if I wasn't here.

A conversation is why I am here. A conversation is why so many others are here. A conversation is all it takes to help someone in their road of recovery.

Because if anything is important this week, it is talking. Making sure people are aware that it is okay to not be okay, as long as they aren't giving up.

Friday 11 May 2018

A Voice

It was almost like it had already been decided, somewhere in my mind, that I would not be able to deal with today. Like I had a predisposition to lack the ability to function today.

But I don't have the choice, I have to do something. I have to get up. I have to push this all away and hope that it doesn't impair my ability to exist like a normal human being.

Sometimes it is all too much. It's overwhelming sometimes to get out of bed, to even think about doing so. Breathing is hard, thinking is hard, crying is hard. It's so hard when things are hard because you start wondering if things will ever get easier again. You wonder when you can focus again, when you can sleep again, when you can get up again and it not take four hours.

Sometimes I don't have a voice. Sometimes I cannot do or say anything because everything is too much. Sometimes I just lay here, my mind in a whirlwind and my heart in overdrive. Sometimes breathing can panic me. Sometimes I don't know what to do or say when anxiety is at it's worst, but today isn't one of those days.

Today I can speak. Today I can type. Today I can say something to get the panic out there. Today I have a voice.

Today my anxiety has consumed me. Today it is too much. But it's okay, tomorrow will be a new day.

Friday 4 May 2018

Burst

Sometimes it feels like everything is against me. It feels like I'm battling the world, but when I overcome a challenge, another bigger one puts itself at my feet.

My life right now is pretty great. Minus all the exam stress, I am surrounded by amazing people, I'm doing things I never thought I'd do, I'm doing my exams, I'm eating properly again, I'm doing so many things I love with people I love. But my anxiety is getting worse. Sometimes my feelings are getting worse.

There is absolutely no reason that I should feel like this. But I do. I wake up and it is so hard to get out of bed, because I feel too scared to face a world, but a world that I am feeling great in. It is absolutely emotionally draining to feel like this, to feel so lost and broken in a world where everything is great.

What will stop this feeling? If I'm struggling to get up in a world where I want to get out of bed and exist, then how will everything be if something turns everything around? Is it even possible to get to a stage where I am a person who's anxiety isn't taking away from their life?

It isn't even the big things. I'm fine public speaking, relatively okay with talking to strangers, I can go to parties, I can do things that I shouldn't be able to do. It's the small things, it's the constant worry about nothing for absolutely no reason. It feels like my body is in the fight-flight response 24/7, because I can even just be sat in the library and feel like everything is too much.

Right now I have alot of emotions and I don't know what to do with them. Alot of the time, I am good with managing them, but today isn't that day. Today is me leaving the library 2 hours before I have a meeting to have a lie down, today is me leaving a social event early because being there felt too much, today is me just wanting to constantly scream and cry and find someone that can tell me whats wrong with me.

Today isn't a good one, but tomorrow will come and tomorrow I will start again.