I've wanted to post this for a few weeks, but I've been battling with myself on how to best to address it, how much of myself to put out there and what words to use. But this topic is too important not to talk about.
Mental health.
I'm sure many of you have gathered-- if you didn't already know-- from previous blog posts that I have some mental illnesses. I was diagnosed when I was sixteen with extreme anxiety and acute dysthymia (also known as Persistent Depressive Disorder, and while the symptoms of PDD are typically less intense and just more prolonged than Major Depressive Disorder... mine are not). This diagnosis only came about when I finally broke down and told my mom I felt like I was crazy and was thinking about killing myself. This was after years of being in therapy for past issues in my family. I remember my psychologist telling me, after reading the comment I left at the end of my evaluation begging for help to not feel crazy anymore, that she almost cried for me.
Anxiety is a special kind of hell, for me. In many ways it's worse than my depression. It's not that anything was wrong, it was that everything could be wrong. Everything could fall apart in a matter of seconds. Every single situation I was in all day, every day, I played over the worst possible case scenarios. Going to the grocery store? Worry about a fatal car accident. Make it safely there? There's probably a gunman going to shoot his former boss with no care for collateral damage. Make it home fine? My mom is going to have a brain aneurysm in her sleep. My siblings are going to kill themselves. One of them is going to fall off a ladder and break their neck and paralyze themselves from the neck down and we're going to have to take them off life support.
All day. Every day. It was exhausting. (Is, still. There are treatments for these things, but no cure. My mental illness isn't erased just because it's eased.)
And depression, for me, is like pain. It’s like I can’t breathe. Heavy, crushing my organs. It’s that moment in the ocean when the waves bowl you over, and you’re spinning, and you’re underwater too long and your lungs feel like they’re going to burst. It hurts everywhere. But it’s like my heart is empty. The pain is all over, but my heart... everything is gone. And that emptiness weighs so much more than you would think. There's a hollow spot amid the agony, and it makes me feel... so wrong. So hopeless.
I don't talk about it a lot because I still feel a lot of shame about my inability to be normal, to handle my day-to-day normally. I typically can't go a day without showering and getting ready (even on a lazy day) because it disrupts my routine that keeps me calm. I can't leave Lily sleeping on a different floor because I worry someone is going to break in and take her, even if I'm only gone two minutes. When I get a headache, I worry my brain is bleeding. When I get in a car, I have to actively fight to stave off the panic that I'm going to die. I have to do the same thing when my parents get on a flight to go on vacation. The image of the plane going up in flames plays over and over on a loop in my head until they text me and tell me they got wherever they were going safely. I know it's irrational. I know. I don't need people to tell me. So I don't tell them.
Having a mental illness can be very lonely. I can't tell you the number of times people have told me to just "chill out" or "calm down" or called me "ridiculous" for my panic, or my sadness. I can't tell you how hard it is to ask for help when nothing is wrong. And I can't tell you how scary it is to feel that alone. That unloved. That far from everyone.
It's been years since I was in therapy. My life is unbelievably good. I am so, wildly, unconditionally loved. I've been on medication that works for... two and a half years. And you know what? Sometimes, I still can't feel that. Sometimes, I'm driving and I think, "I could swerve into oncoming traffic, right now, and everyone I love would be better off." I cut chicken up for dinner and have to set the knife down because I'm not convinced I won't slit my own wrists.
This is what life is like for me, and I'm not even the worst case scenario. I'm medicated. I am, mostly, happy. I am good, and this is still what it's like inside my head. Mental illness is nothing to joke around about. It's not a punchline. It's not a gimmick. It's real, and it kills people.
I want people to know-- anyone suffering, anyone struggling, anyone feeling alone-- that you're going to be okay. I want you to be okay. I don't want you to give up, or give in, because I love you. I know it's hard, I know it feels impossible. I know how much pain you're in. I know. And I want you to stay. I want you to fight. Because you are loved, and this world will be worse without you in it. No matter what your brain tells you to the contrary, the world is not better off without you. Your friends and family aren't. We all need you. You are not a failure. You are not unwanted. You should not be ashamed. And you are not without hope.
If you're struggling, please, reach out to someone. Reach out to anyone. There are so many resources that can help you get better and work through whatever is plaguing you. And I promise, the people you love and trust would rather drop everything to help you than lose you forever. You're not an inconvenience. You're a necessity.
John Steinbeck wrote, "And now that you don't have to be perfect, you can be good." I promise, no one is watching for your façade. No one cares about the mask. They don't care if you're perfect. The people who love you, care about you. Your health. Your happiness. Not who you pretend to be for them. Please, if you're not okay, stop pretending. We want you to be happy. We want you to be good. Not perfect.
All my love, all my well-wishes for you and your happiness,
Holly
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