2020

 December 31st, 2019. It was getting onto the time I had to leave to go out for new years. I was fucking exhausted from working, woken up an hour late and on the verge of having an anxiety attack. I didn't want to leave my bed let alone go and get drunk. My mum persuaded me to go. I got up, drove round to my friends, had to quickly get changed and apologise profusely for being so late, trying to ignore how absolutely dreadful I felt. In the car ride, I thought about 2019. 2019 was one of my better years. It started off completely terribly, but eventually I became more stable and found my feet. I graduated, started my masters degree, gone on various holidays, many music events, settled into some new friend groups and most importantly was optimistic for 2020 to continue this trend I had started of what I called my true recovery. 2019 was the year I worked on myself, I became more comfortable in my own body, I was relapsing from self harm less often and I was ending the decade happy. 

The first 6 weeks of the year where amazing for me. I went to Sweden, I celebrated turning 22, I was doing well in my masters degree and I just felt happy. I thought that 2020 was going to be my year. I have been waiting for my year and truly it felt like it was going to be. A few weeks into February I got sick. Sick as in, I couldn't get out of bed for 2 weeks or I passed out, sleeping 18 hours a day, crying because it felt like sitting at my computer was pushing myself sick. The first few days, I couldn't even sit up. That was when the year went downhill. I missed a concert I had been waiting for for so long, I missed weeks of uni and was so behind with my work, I barely spoke to anyone because I was too tired. At once point I thought I would never recover. 

By the middle of March I was around 80% better from mystery illness. In March I was back at uni all of us talking about covid19 like it was a joke, I also went to two concerts and then we went into lockdown. Suddenly I felt like I had lost everything and I don't know why. I walked into work the first night of lockdown, bare bare empty shelves, everyone joking about panic buying. It carried on like this for a few weeks, and then everything for me started to set in. Lockdowns extended, struggling to keep up with my uni work because I was too tired and completely deprived from normal life. I couldn't fix my sleep schedule because it was too hard to when I couldn't get up and go do something to combat the tiredness. I was still working, having to do overtime and still juggling my degree whilst I saw so many people genuinely having a great time, doing things, doing nothing, doing whatever they wanted whilst on furlough. It was hard. I thought I was struggling and struggling alone, because everyone seemed to be coping well with lockdown. 

Eventually it became apparent that it wasn't, and as we started to ease out of lockdown I felt better. I could see my friends again, I could go outside again and not get scared I was going to get in trouble. It took a while to be comfortable with it, the fear of corona was raging in my mind and I was worried everytime I left the house that I would get it. But I had to see people. My mental health depended on it, I was at the point where I was struggling and I needed to see my friends again. But I started to feel better. Whilst lockdown seems like a blur now, whilst I know my anxiety was struggling for the most part everything else was okay. I was fine eating, I was staying clean, I wasn't suicidal and for the most part I wasn't lonely. This all seems like a huge oxymoron, but compared to the places I have been, I was genuinely doing okay. I made more new friends, I started to be less alone at 3am when no one else I knew was awake and it got easier.

In September I completed my masters degree. I never ever thought I would ever make it, but I finished my presentation, sat down and had a huge wave of relief. I had done it. I had done the dream I had had for 6+ years at that point, through a pandemic. I had completed a MSc dissertion basically by myself and I had done it. But afterwards I just felt empty. I had been so stressed about finishing that when I did I felt lost, I had no direction, I was stressed about the idea of finding a new job and everything felt heavy. 

At the end of October it all caught up to me, and I fell into one of the worst depression slumps I had ever experienced for a 3 week period. Everything was impossible, most days I couldn't even get out of bed to turn the light on. I was convinced everyone I loved hated me, I was having bad panic attacks every few days, having intrusive and suicidal thoughts, I was just so unbelieably low that I didn't think it would get better. I eventually started getting better. I invested myself into headspace, into breathing practices, into music, into everything I needed and it slowly by day got easier. And it did, eventually, get back to normal.

I bounced back. I started twitch streaming again, really loved it and hit twitch affiliate within 2 weeks of restarting. I had gone from a high, to rock bottom and was back to a high. Things fell in place, and they stayed in place.

And here I am now. January 1st 2021. 

I know how lucky I have been to had an okay 2020. I focused alot on the negatives of the year but when I reflect, the worst times were far and few between. I had so many okay days, unmemorable days but even more so, days that I was just fine. I was fine. I used to just be up or down, I rarely had in between days but this year they happened. It truly this year felt like my mental health was improving and I was doing better. I don't say this to brag. I don't say any of this to do anything but reflect on my journey, how far I've come.

If this pandemic had happened at a different time I don't know if I would have made it through, made it this far. I count my blessings everyday that this didn't happen at a worse time in my life because who knows what would have happened then. I have had to work hard the last few years for this. This year I decided to just simply cut out people who do not make me happy or who I was holding onto for the wrong reasons. It was the year I was more important than anyone. I put myself first. I had to. I could not keep moving forward by holding onto the belief that I have to appease others and then myself. To me this meant just simply letting go of worry about cutting people out whether this was in the past or present to help myself. This was easier said than done, I am not denying that but I did it. I put myself first, even if that had consequences that maybe I did not want. 

I am proud of myself. You should be too. No matter what you did or didn't do this year, you made it through. We survived an awful awful year and hopefully this one will be better. 

For me? 2021 means recovery. It means going to get help. It means getting those piercings/tattooes I want. It means keeping on top of what I need to do. It means therapy. It means trying to start to love the body I am in. It means taking care of myself. It means continueing to put myself first. 

For everyone who is still here. Whether your year was amazing, awful or anything in between. 2021 is your year. And I hope, I pray with all my heart that it is a better year.

And finally. To all those we lost this year, whether due to covid, due to other things, due to old age, due to mental health, due to other illnesses. To every single person who we lost. We will remember you all. 

it's 11am, i haven't slept, and i need to comprehend my thoughts

things often feel like too much almost constantly.

no one told me that as i got older and i got better that the anxiety would just get worse.

when i was 14 and suicidal, struggling with eating and extremely depressed, the anxiety was the easiest part. i just thought it was normal, that everyone felt that way. i didn't learn that the didn't until i was 18, when my relationship with myself started to improve. the better the other aspects of my mental health got, the more my anxiety was able to completely disrupt my life. it was almost like the other things were just the opening acts to a main show that got significantly louder and more prominent as it went on.

grounding techniques have stopped working. music doesn't have as powerful of an affect. all the anxiety helping phone applications if anything just make it worse.

how does any of this get better when the things that make it better stop making it better?

when the idea of going to get help itself brings you so much anxiety that last time you tried you were too anxious to get out of bed for 2 weeks.

how does any of this get better when the things that make it better stop making it better?

when you play down everything your feeling when you do try to reach out because the idea of being a burden or worried about is somehow worse than existing everyday with constant worry about doing absolutely anything?

i have gotten so good at anxiety that i am able to pinpoint when i'm going to have a panic attack, sometimes hours before i do. i have gotten so used to panic attacks that i don't even panic about getting them anymore. 

but when will it get too much? when it becomes not being able to leave the house? where every panic attack feels like a heart attack? when it all just becomes too much?

even now i am too anxious to do the things i love and the things i do everyday and have done for a while. it just feels like soon, anxiety will take my voice away. and i will be unable to fight it back.

amen

"is there a moment when it all makes sense, when saying goodbye doesn't feel like the end?" [amber run - amen]

it is absolutely impossible to sum up emotions that you don't physically know how they feel. 

the first time i truly felt grief, someone asked me how i was doing. they didn't know what was wrong, they had no idea that i was feeling whatever the sadness was that i was feeling, but they knew something just wasn't right. i didn't know what to say, so i just didn't. i just said nothing and moved on with my day, my day being me just trying to hide from the world and feeling nothing. and that's how i lived everyday for a while, because i was feeling this thing i was unable to truly feel because i did not know how else to feel it. i knew it was something sad so thats what i did, let myself be sad. but by letting myself just be sad, what i was really doing was just delaying feeling everything else and not letting myself accept what had happened. so at the funeral, months later, i broke down. i cried, and i couldn't stop crying. and i didn't stop crying for a few weeks. i had panic attacks constantly, if i was awake i was probably drunk and if i wasn't i was overthinking and probably at work. if i was doing either of those i was asleep, because at least then i didn't have to feel anything at all.

nothing really prepares you for that first time. no amount of childhood pets or conversations about grief can really prepare you for all the emotions and things you have to go through. being given gifts you gave them to remember them by, anyone saying their name whether referencing them or not making you sad, clearing out their room, going round to see them for them to just not be there, waiting for them to walk down the stairs to see you but that never happening, everything just reminding you of them. the worst part is, it doesn't get easier. you just get better at living your life without thinking about it. 

i thought the second time would be easier. in some ways it was. i knew what i was going to feel but this time i was worse at dealing with it. i was going through one of my worst mental health patches of my life, and then suddenly i had to deal with grief again. emptying your house was one of the hardest things i had to do, then seeing my childhood home where you lived become boarded up, living knowing one day soon that it will not be there anymore. 

why does grief not get easier? how each time does it feel so different but yet so much the same? how after four and nearly 3 years do i still expect to see you when i walk through your door, or expect the phonecall on my birthday? how can i not see a picture of you without feeling sadness? when does that turn partly into happiness, fondness of the memories and the love that we had? where do i find peace with the idea of never seeing either of you again?

and i have been so lucky. i am nealrly 23 and have only had to deal with grief twice in my life. i know it will come again and probably come again soon, but how will i deal with it then? when does grief ever make sense? how does it ever make sense?

there is a reason that amen by amber run is consistently my top or second most listened to song on spotify. music is always the way i feel everything and there is no other way i can process grief but hear it, feel it and in some ways cope with it. everyone goes through grief. everyone. when i listen to something so raw and open in its vulnerability surrounding grief, i allow myself to feel everything i need to feel to process it.  and that is how i am able to move forward. maybe slowly. but i move forward. the days where i feel grief are hard, but the days i do not are normal. i have more days than not now where i don't feel grief. with time, with understanding and with acceptance, it slowly started to go away even though part of me will never truly be the same again.

"i don't wanna be here, i don't know what to do sometimes i'd rather be dead, at least then i'm with you" [amber run - amen]

things on my mind

 there are so many things i cannot stop worrying about that sometimes i lose track of them.

i think especially now, sometimes the weight of the world is so much to deal with that my head will constantly think of how i used to be and i do not know whether this is a warning or an open door.

everything seems to either be absolutely everything or nothing. i feel everything or nothing. when i do something, i am either putting in 300% and it's all i can do, or i can't even spend 10 seconds even thinking about it. my days seem to be the best or the worst days and anything news is either the end of the world or the best thing i've ever heard.

it's tiring, not knowing how i am going to feel when i wake up. not knowing whether i'm going to feel like i don't want to be alive or whether i feel the best i've ever felt. sometimes it's especially hard because i celebrate how far i've come one day then two days later i feel so mentally awful i doubt everything i just thought. 

when i think about it, it makes me think about uni. how i used to cope with the constant change of emotions: alcohol. when i felt anything, alcohol was always the go to. it at one point got to the point i was worrying myself with the amount i was drinking, to the point where i started getting anxious at the idea of going to a social event with alcohol because i was scared i would overdo it and do something i would regret like i had many times. when i did my masters and essentially stopped drinking for a year, i told people i rarely did because my work schedule meant i never had the opportunity. and whilst this is true, the fear of having a social drink was really pushing it, the fear that it would get out of control was pulling it along. 

it's scary to look back and see how bad things truly were and i had no idea. i thought my worst times were during school, but there were periods at uni where i never slept, i missed most lectures once for an entire month, i was too scared to even go and play football sometimes and i missed all the signs it was getting bad because the uni year before had been bad and nothing i was doing then even closely resembled then. 

i miss my friends. i miss my family. i miss the ability to do things. i miss feeling safe. i miss not going out and being scared when someone came close to me. i miss the life i was comfortable with. i miss the day. i miss having a concept of time. i miss being awake at the same time as my friends. i miss myself. i miss sleeping. i miss feeling awake. i miss feeling. i miss not feeling. i miss knowing what to say.

i don't know when i will ever get a restful and long night sleep again. i am so tired. 

i feel like i'm being rushed. everyone around me is in long term relationships, having children, in jobs they love. i feel alone. i am constantly asked when i am going to get a job that 'uses my degree', but it's hard to even want to apply when my brain is fucked up, the world is fucked up and i don't even know what i want to do tomorrow let alone in the future. 

everything is scary. i'm so fucking anxious. and i get anxious because i'm anxious. i get anxious because i don't know what's going on in my head sometimes. i get anxious because everything in my life is fine so if i feel like if i'm like this now, what will happen if something goes really wrong? 

with each day i feel like i'm losing the few ounces of body confidence i have. it scares me. i hate the way i look, but i still have something i'm clutching onto to keep it from spiralling. i don't know how to let myself be happy with the way i look when i look at myself and i want to cry. my first thought is always how could anyone ever love this body? if this is my first thought, how am i ever going to love it?

i think there are too many things on my mind. too many scary things. too many things that make me wonder if my mental health is going to ever get better. does any of this get better? 

the worst part is that i feel fine. i know a lot of the things i say and i think are worrying to me but i truly am fine. i think i am used to it now. i dont want people to worry about me. i am content with life, it all just can be too much all the time.

nice while it lasted

 "what happens if i relapse again?" - bojack

there was one point a few weeks ago that I couldn't even tell which was was up. it was like i was 14 again. suicidal, depressed to the point of feeling nothing. anxious about even breathing. i couldn't tell you why but for one night, not even for a few hours everything felt like it was back to the way it used to be. 

and for one point that night i was holding a razor and it was not to shave. i was ready to relapse. 8 months felt like 8 seconds of being clean and those 8 seconds was not enough to stop the feeling that relapse was the only way any of this would feel better.

this was how i felt everytime i thought about it the last 11 years. it felt like that feeling was the only thing that could make everything feel right again and the more i did it the more it almost became my truth. it is why self harm became so addicting, it just felt like the only was anything would be better.

i used to, and still do to some extent, wonder if i could ever bounce back from a relapse. i wonder often if i am strong enough to keep it up if i go back to the habit again. the last 2 years have just been that constantly. a relapse or two every so months that would just make me think, why do i even try if i always end up back here? if i relapse again, what happens? am i able to keep going?

now i am nearly at my nine months. i think that night will constantly be on my mind. the knowledge that any day, i could go back there. but more importantly, i could go back there but i have the ability to get through it.

if i relapse, i relapse. if i relapse i relapse.

"you'll get sober again" - todd

the weight of the world

 I know there are only so many ways I can write and talk about anxiety but there are times like this that it's all I can think about doing.

When I think back, I can see signs of anxiety in myself for all my life that I can remember. I have always had the need to do everything right and to make people happy. From the earliest time I can remember, I would cry when I did absolutely anything wrong, when my parents caught me doing something I shouldn't have, when I once was told off in class for something I didn't even do. I can't remember a time in my life I wasn't like this, but I remember when I found out it wasn't normal. I was in year 10. A new girl came to our school and as usual, I was the one who would act as their buddy to settle them in. Soon enough they became one of my closest friends, and they would be the one to teach me the word anxiety. The more they conceptualised it, the more I began to picture how I was feeling with what they were saying. I learnt that the panic attacks I was having were that, panic attacks. I learnt that this intense and unbearable worry and panic at doing most things was not a "normal" thing, it was not something that everyone experienced and was not something I should be experiencing. I learnt that my fear of talking on the phone, of going anywhere alone, the worry about even speaking to teachers or going somewhere alone for the first time or just being alone was anxiety. I learnt that the fear I had of eating was a manifested form of anxiety. I learnt that everything I felt, everything everyone just said I was a nerd or a teachers pet for I did because of anxiety. 

As I got older, it just grew. It became not being able to leave my bed because the idea of literally existing just made me panic beyond belief. It became the inability to sleep because sleep was too scary. It became not being able to go to a doctor or dentist because I would have a debilitating panic attack. It became passing out in my room because I was so anxious. There were clothes I couldn't wear because they were to anxiety inducing. Plans I cancelled that I was looking forward too because I simply couldn't. It became everything but functioning. It became having to get drunk to be able to sleep, but being drunk just made everything more anxious the same time. It became self harm to make the anxiety just go away which again just seemed to make it all worse in the long run. 

And whilst now I can function most days, it still has it's moments where I cannot function. Like right now. Where all I can think about is anxiety. Where nothing I do is making the feeling my chest is caving in and drowning at the same time. All I want to do is cry. How do you cope with the weight of the world when the weight is you?The ways I calm the anxiety down don't work anymore. At least none of the healthy ways. Where do you go when it feels like nothing you do is making it better? I push myself each day to try and make the strides to making the scary things that bit easier, but if anything it overall just makes everything feel so much worse. 

This was supposed to get easier as I got older, but somehow, after everything, it just got worse. The weight of the world just got heavier. I'm struggling to see a way to carry it. 

Emotional Recognition

There was a time in my life where there were rarely any good moments in my day. 

I used to wake up sad, exist sad and go to bed sad. Any good thing was still so overshadowed by the feeling of being sad. This sad used to be a good day. On a good day I would wake up sad, exist sad and go to bed sad. When days were worse I just wouldn't wake up, I wouldn't exist and there would be no reason to get back into bed because I probably never left. Sometimes I emotionally was at home even if I physically was somewhere else. On a lot of the bad days, the feeling was rock bottom melancholy which involved just listening to mayday parades terrible things on repeat until I was able to fall back to sleep. 

But it was to the point that the sadness just truly felt like nothing. I knew it was sadness, but it was sadness to the extent where it just felt like I was feeling nothing. Any feeling felt like sadness but sadness just felt like nothing.

When everything started to get better, I was able to start to properly feel again. One of the most prominent things to me when everything started to get better was that I was actually able to feel other things again. Eventually happiness actually felt like happiness, anger started to feel like anger and more importantly, sadness truly felt like sadness. When I was having a rough day, I truly felt it. I felt it at different intensities, for different amounts of time, and even felt different things at once. I almost forgot that I was able to feel both sad and happy at the same time, that I didn't even have to feel anything and that was okay.

Whilst this to some may not sound like the biggest thing in the world, it truly was one of the most important things that ever happened to me in my pursuit of better mental health. When I was able to feel different emotions, I was able to easier grasp what made me feel these things and then prioritise the things that made me feel better things. Making people laugh made me feel good, so I tried to be funnier. Exercise and sport made me feel energised and happy so I threw myself properly into sports again and focused on that. Similarly, I could start to understand what, even if temporarily, made me unhappy. At one point, the things that used to make me happy started making me feel anxious so I stopped doing them, and that made me feel better. I learnt slowly how to balance my feelings, how to push through things that I had to do that stressed me out and balance it with what made me happier. 

Throughout the last 12 years of my life I have experienced so much that have affected me. They didn't stop because of any of this. If anything, a lot of these elevated and the sadness grew into other things. Anxiety felt like nothing but now it feels like everything. When I have bad days, I often feel them ten times worse than anything I used to feel. But none of this takes away how much being able to feel gave back to my life. With each day my ability to recognise and accept my emotions continues to develop and I am getting better at it each day. 

In my life now, even though there are days where there are rarely good moments, there are so many more days that the good is there.