Some clarification

Yesterday’s post is now the most viewed post I have ever written on wordpress. Which shows that you’re all a bunch of nosey sadistics. But in the very few hours since I posted it, I have been literally inundated with tweets, DMs, facebook messages, emails and texts. I do not have the words to describe how overwhelmed I feel by this support.

I wrote most of that post at 3am during a particularly bad bout of insomnia just over 2 weeks ago. Reading over it again, it makes things seem a lot more dire than they actually are. For now, I am okay. I am not good, I am not great, but I am finding my way back to the light with routine and trying to learn to not be so hard on myself if I simply need a day.

Which begs the question, why post? Some of the messages I have received have shown concern for the fact I am broadcasting my mental health issues and personal crisis on a public forum which can be viewed a later date. Guys, I study media. I know how this works. Any employer could retrieve that post in 6 years time.

What it came down to was gain. By finally hitting the post button, I feel like I have some control again. I have turned my feelings into words, and they are words that reflect a particularly dark place. They now serve as a reminder that I don’t want to go back there.

I’ve also had lots of messages from people who feel the same, and this has helped them feel not so very alone. If I can turn my pain into something that makes others feel a little bit better, even only if for a second, than I don’t get a single fruitloop who sees in 28 years time.

On depression, and despair, and writing it out

It’s ironic that the past 3 years have been occasionally lightly sprinkled with guilt that I do not blog as much as I should. I write nearly constantly. There are drafts of not only blog posts, but novels and plays and poems and various hybrids sitting on an external hardrive at my feet, majority of which will never see the light of day. As a digital native, shellaced fingers to keys is my journal. The glow of my macbook keys at 3 am is my therapy.

It’s ironic that for someone who lives her life almost entirely online, I’m actually very guarded. You’ll see a lot of my life online. Admittedly the façade has faltered quite a bit over the last couple of months, but like most people’s digital identities, it’s filtered not only though instagram effects but through my own personal desire to pretend like everything’s okay.

But it’s not.

If by some miracle you’re reading this, I’ve managed to take what currently feels like an overwhelming step and pushed the publish button. I hope that by doing that, I hope I manage to override the knot of anxiety in my stomach with a sense of ownership.

I am depressed. I am currently a cocktail of anxiety, exhaustion, tears, and the overwhelming feeling that I cannot cope with my own life.

The irony of writing this barely post-festival season is not lost on me, I assure you. You probably saw me last week looking completely myself, and that’s what I’ve wanted- the chance to psych myself into some normalcy and remind myself of the world I live in. But the reality is that every epic dance floor session at Barrio is just a brief diversion from days where I feel so overwhelmed I cannot get out of bed.

Yes, I am seeking help for this, and I am making informed decisions about my workload (namely, my study load) in order feel like I can cope again.

Of course, this didn’t come from nowhere. I have good days and bad days, just like the rest of the world. It’s a mix of family-related trauma and a ridiculous workload. Somewhere in the back of my head I’ve know for a long time that I was taking on too much, and finally reached that point. Like most people, some major changes in my life have occurred, and they have all been detrimental and entirely out of my control, which has lead to a major disconnect with my own life.

I’ve always been one to condemn anyone suffering a form of mental illness for their lack of desire to fight it. I’m a fighter. I make a plan, I smash through it, and whatever it was ceases to be an issue any more. But for the first time in my life I’m feeling the spiral of not seeing a way to fight. I can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. It feels like there is no way through this. And I hope by writing this, and by owning these words, thoughts and feelings, I might find the glimmer at the end of the tunnel that helps me get there.

And I hope that anyone reading this who feels the same knows they are not alone.