- the dangers of being misunderstood -

i've written this blog for about 3 years(ish) now and throughout it all people have come and waltzed straight out of my life, and that's because people don't understand. 

people don't understand the severity of mental illness, the day to day life with anxiety and depression. 

nobody see's the challenges, the breaking down 20 minutes before i have to go out, the crying the night before before i'm trying so hard not to just puke everywhere because my heads telling me somethings going to go wrong. 

so let me TRY and help you understand my personal struggles..

first of all, i'm not shy. i'm socially anxious, i tend to stay quiet because i'm so afraid of saying the wrong thing, or to be misunderstood. ironically. 

i always without doubt use my phone as a crutch, if i'm in a situation where it's a room full of people i always reach for my phone, not that i get any messages but i play these dumb little games on my phone and eventually i'll feel like the world has decided to stop swallowing me whole. 

i personally feel like there's only one or two people in this world that actually understand me and it isn't because people don't try because they do but once they've assumed there's nothing else to understand they stop trying, they in my eyes give up trying. 

people romanticize depression and anxiety, like the amount of times i've heard someone say 

''i just want to make you better'', ''i just want to help fix this.'' 

and honestly, you want to help fix me? am i broken in your eyes then? 

i'm not some piece of glass you can just glue back together, i'm not some broken fragile mess. 

i genuinely can't explain my frustrations when people say this because i don't portray myself as broken, i don't allow them to see me vulnerably just for them to assume i'm broken. 

i'm severely depressed, there's a difference. 

i'm on antidepressants to ''fix'' me, i don't need someone being romantically involved with me if that's all they see.

i think about suicide alot, but that doesn't mean when the going gets tough i'm just going to do that. 

purely for the fact it takes an incredibly strong person to actually do that and i know for a fact i'm not strong enough. 

i have hope, i always expect the worst but i hope for the best. 

i don't entirely believe in religion but when i'm at my worst, i pray. i don't pray to a God which sounds dumb but i always reach out for the help, i'll reach out to my Grandad.

i didn't get to meet him when i got old enough to remember him but i've seen pictures and when i'm breaking down, my face is swollen from all the crying, i want him to take my pain away. 

i get how dumb it sounds but when you're at your absolute lowest you just want someone to take that pain away and yeah. 

i'm anxious, anxious as hell. yet people can't understand why sometimes i can just force myself to do certain things like get on trains, go outside of my house, go to someone else's house etc. 

i have anxiety attacks about doing all of that though, i always have to wake up like 6 hours earlier because i always think maybe i'm gonna miss my train, maybe i'm gonna get lost. 

i can put myself in these situations because i'm so scared everyone will think differently of me.

if i didn't have some kinda hope, i wouldn't be here. 

i just want someone to not give up on trying, mental illness is a complex thing but when the person suffering loves you and just wants you to listen without them having to comfort you because again, you didn't like what they said is alot worse. 

i always try to be silent about my struggles, i always try to keep everything to myself and that's more unhealthy than i like to admit. 

so please, if you or someone you know suffers with mental illness of any kind, just listen. don't talk, don't try to comfort them, just let them get everything out, even if that means them ending up sobbing their hearts out, let them. 

for someone to allow themselves to be vulnerable in front of you, that shows they trust you, they respect you and they just want someone to finally listen because they're so used to people giving up. 

prove them wrong, prove to them you won't just get up and leave after they've said everything, prove to them you're actually different to everyone else. 

L x

- Antidepressants -

 antidepressants are quite scary. 

for me personally anyway, it was at the most pivotal moment when i decided i needed to be on them.

i'd had a rough day, i'd ended up crying over something and it was crying to the point of not being able to breathe, i'd built up all these feelings and i'd bottle it up every single time so when i did eventually just breakdown, i BROKE down. 

to the point where i just couldn't stop crying, no real reason but i just couldn't stop and i needed help. 

and that's me in a nutshell, i bottle everything up and so i'm just a ticking time bomb of tears ready to happen. 

i didn't wanna be on antidepressants not because of the stigma around them but because they make you put weight on and if you've previously read any of my other posts you'll know that's something i absolutely dread. so after a while i just stopped taking them because i was scared of getting sick again. 

and then it'd happen over and over again until i felt like i was finally stable enough in my recovery of anorexia that i could put weight on without it being the end of the world, so i decided to give antidepressants another go. 

it took me ages to finally find the pill right for me, some had lactose in and i'm allergic, some made me see things that weren't there, some just generally made me feel worse and then the 'magic pill' came along. 

it finally felt like a weight off my shoulders, i personally began to feel like a lost cause and that nothing was ever going to help but it has. 

don't get me wrong, it's taken since my early teens to now to actually find something that works and is effective. i remember being so against pills not for anyone else but for me because i know pills do work but it takes time for them to actually work and you've got to be patient and know that pills aren't just a quick fix like some may think. 

i still on occasion have my little breakdowns but that's just because i absolutely hate talking about my feelings, i absolutely hate being vulnerable to anyone and i guess sometimes my own feelings scare me. 

anxiety, depression and my eating disorder they all still have their voices very prominent in my mind, on a bad day it could go from 0 - 100 real damn quick but i'm learning how to keep them at the back of my mind because i know damn well they aren't just going to leave. 

i'm the one that's in control and you've always got to think about what's the best possible solution for you, whether it be counselling or medication or something completely different. there's always a solution and you'll always find it no matter how long it takes. 

L x