I’vedecided to create a blog that can be used as a space for learning, developing,understanding and supporting those who suffer from extreme anxiety attacks, MajorDepressive Disorder and PTSD.
I’vealso created this blog for my own personal-selfish-gain, as motivation can onlyreally be accepted when it can be seen and for me, seeing myself progress ismotivation.
Iam a soon to turn 32-year-old who will cut straight to the chase on any topic,always be truthful because what’s the point of lying (no, really?), who likesher isolation and is trying her best to live instead of just being alive.
Thecards that life dealt toward me in my mid-to-late 20’s is the reason Isometimes feel like I am not a part of this world or perhaps, why I experience depressionand anxiety to the point of being diagnosed with the extreme version of this.Some people that partake in my everyday life don’t even realize the strugglethat I deal with on a daily basis and the ones who do know about my struggle,fall into two categories: They have already been diagnosed with their own formof depression/ anxiety or they tell me to pull my socks up and carry on movingforward.
Iremember when I use to be like the latter; always going around to people whowould sulk and look so down in the dumps,tell them to keep their chin up and to keep looking forward. “You can’tmake a difference if you don’t try”, “It’s your own fault you feel like this,only you can change it.” Ah – how uneducated I was.
Idon’t think that I will ever be able to approach another person who I know hasor is experiencing anxiety or depression (on any level) with that kind ofmindset again. If you are one of these people, I urge you to stop and thinkbefore you release a storm that you may not even see brewing in the cloudsabove said persons head.
My post started withme saying that I prefer honesty and so, in keeping to true form, let’s behonest:
Anotherpost may explain how I first started to feel and think when the anxiety startedto creep in and consume me, how the feeling got stronger and stronger, and how,eventually, I felt like I was drowning in an ocean too deep and too dark foranyone to find me or to save me. It was one of the most terrifying andloneliest feelings for anyone to have to experience.
Manymonths after being diagnosed with Major Depression Disorder and after findingan anti-depressant that worked after weeks of trial-session hell, I had foundmyself in the same dark mindset, with the same haunting questions in the middleof the night and I sat there awake, not crying, but fighting.
Iwas fighting to stay alive.
Inmy hand was the sharpest item I could find and I was squeezing it with all ofmy physical might begging my emotions to not get the better of me. It was oneof the hardest fights I ever had to face and that night, I won.
Whenthe next morning came, I phoned my doctor for an emergency meeting and told mymom she was to come with me. Sitting in the doctor’s room, I had nothing leftinside of me to pretend that I was fine or that the night before was not a hardone, and I collapsed into a snotty mess of hot tears. I told my doctor that Ihad been thinking of suicide non-stop for some time and to the point where Iwould research ways and levels of pain online. I had started to write mygoodbye letters to the people closest to me and I just didn’t want to be onthis earth anymore.
Sjoe.That’s a pretty big something to have to read after typing it out.
Why amI telling you this story?
Because,it was in that doctor’s room that I was taught about the levels of depression.
Inmy case, the chemicals within my body had become unbalanced and the medicationwhich should have been working as both an anxiety & depressant, was workingas more of an anxiety tablet than an antidepressant due to this imbalance.
Whatdid this mean for me?
Thismeant that when people came up to me and told me to Pull myself towards myself, I was mentally and emotionally unableto do so. This is why I say what I saidabove. You can’t just go up to someone you know or love and tell them to “sortthemselves out” because the hard reality is, Depression is not a boy shoutingwolf, it is a wolf in the darkest shade of wolf clothing and sometimes, wolvescannot be tamed.
Mybody had lost its path to sane thoughts and instead of being able to prioritiseand lift myself out of the situation, the chemical that would take over would controlme physically in the sense of: When I started to feel upset, I would getdepressed and then I would instantly get tired and not be hungry. My body wouldgo into survival mode (as they call it) and I had no control over it.
Whatcan be done about anxiety and depression?
Asa girl who isn’t fond of medication or antidepressants (especially after6-weeks of hell on earth (not kidding)), I know that I need to be on them fornow until a balance within myself is sought, but this cannot be the only way.
I’verecently met with a great Psychiatrist who does analyzations on his patientsand works out a plan that benefits them by uplifting them to who they werebefore, he assists them in dealing with PTSD by securing counselling sessionswith like-minded Psychologists and eventually, you’re taken off the medicationand left to fend for oneself in the wild.
I am so lookingforward to that day!
Butfor now, my baby steps are dealing with one day at a time and findingmotivation again in something that brought me out of my depression in the past:Exercise.
Theone thing this journey has taught me is that you can only do as much as you can, and that is enough.
Therefore,in trying to look after myself so I can breathe the air of freedom andhopefully feel like a human again, I have now started with my exercise routineagain which includes meditation, yoga and physical fitness.
Here's to my Journey
