My Depression and Anxiety Story.

I'm not writing this blog because I feel like I need to explain myself or my behaviour lately to anyone but rather because I'm sick and tired of constantly trying to hide these feelings for fear of the stigma attached to depression and anxiety. I don't want to be treated differently or babied. I don't need to be minded, I just need people to try to understand.

Depression hasn't got a type or a preference. There is no rhyme or reason for why it happens or who it happens to. People think depression is sadness, constant crying and feeling down. It can be those things sometimes but mostly it's this constant feeling of being numb. You wake up every morning just to go back to bed. Days are really just these annoying obstacles that need to be faced. People handle that differently, by medicating, by drinking, by smoking, by cutting. When you're depressed your grasp onto anything that can get your through the day. That's what depression is, it's not sadness or tears. It's the overwhelming sense of numbness and the desire for anything that can help you just make it from one day to the next. 

People would look at me and think that I am a happy go lucky average 21 year old girl who always has a smile on her face but looks can be deceiving. When I was 16 my Mam & Dad split, people around us like neighbours, family and friends were shocked because we seemed like the "perfect family". You never really know what goes on behind closed doors. That experience taught me how to hide my emotions when there was something wrong, this is something I carried on years later, until now. Sometimes it even scares me how good I've gotten at hiding feeling like this for so long. Looking from the outside in I had a good life. Yes, my Mam and Dad split up but that's not anything extraordinary, plenty of kids go through this sort of experience. Bad personal relationships around the same time also took it's toll. I beat myself up day in, day out because I have no real reason to feel depressed, there are people out there so much worse off than me so who do I think I am feeling this way. That's what society has done to this illness because that's what depression and anxiety is, a mental illness. People with depression feel like they have to hide it for fear of what society will think, like they're weak or less of a human being. When someone has a broken leg everyone rushes to sign the cast or help with day to day tasks but when someone is depressed where are the people to help then? 

Being depressed isn't a choice, I don't see how anyone could wake up every morning and decide to feel like this. It isn't as simple as forcing yourself to feel happy, I truly wish it was. I forced myself to make plans and to go out with my friends, making plans to do things I didn't really want to do but doing them anyway because I know I should want to go and at some point I would have wanted to go. I would drink ridiculous amounts of alcohol desperately trying to forget how I was feeling for even just a couple of hours but that didn't work so I got a job in a nightclub pretending like my social anxiety wasn't an issue but that was short lived. Not many people understand the feeling of being in a nightclub with hundreds of people and still feeling like the loneliest person in the entire world. Even surrounded by people I felt lonely so why bother anymore? So I distance myself from the people in my life. One of the scariest things about my depression is how comfortable I've gotten with spending so much time on my own. 

On the bad days there is no motivation to do anything. Daily tasks that others will do without even having to think twice about like getting out of bed, showering and getting dressed become like mountains that need to be overcome. On the bad days I am content with being alone, it's easier. On the bad days long term planning doesn't exist. On the bad days I seem to have no future. Sometimes it's the good days that hurt the most, the days when I get a glimpse of the old me when I thought about having a career, a family, a life, before depression and anxiety took hold of me. Ironically sleep is my only escape from feeling depressed but more often than not insomnia kicks in. I find myself on the couch at 3, 4, 5 am watching crappy re-runs to avoid the tossing and turning in an empty bed. 

Recently this guy I know wondered why I became so interested in him. He is such a sweet, easy going, funny, little rough around the edges but good to be around kind of guy but he spoke of being alone and seeing to change in his future. He was residing himself to being alone forever. I couldn't bring myself to say it when I had the chance but I don't want him to be alone because I cared for him & I knew all too well what it's like to feel alone and useless and that feeling of hopelessness that things would ever get better. I didn't want him to accept that as his future because that was my past and I understand how hard it can be and I would never want anyone to have to face that. Often you find that the people who are the most damaged have the kindest things to say. I believe that's down to the fact that they would never want anyone to feel any ounce of what they have felt. 

In the past 3 weeks I have had multiple panic attacks for a range of different reasons and the scariest was while I was working behind an extremely busy bar at Body & Soul. Nobody knew how to deal with it, which didn't help the situation. I later found out from another girl on the bar that that was the first time any of them had seen someone had a panic attack, even some of the first aid trained guys. It just reinforced this stigma in my head when I saw these shocked and panicked faces frantically trying to figure out what to do. Things like this differ from person to person but if you ever find yourself in a situation like that you need to keep calm, try to get the person to inhale and exhale, get them to pay attention to their breathing and getting their control over it, keep their attention and try to hold eye contact.

I spent so much time and energy trying to hide what I've been going through while preaching to others to seek help and speak when they're feel exactly how I've been feeling... Hypocritical much? I was part of a team who ran an event to help raise awareness and funds for a Mental Health Awareness charity and still couldn't express how close to home this issue actually was. Blogging has been a good distraction/hobby for me and really helped me deal with some of what's been going on, that's why I wanted to do a post like this. I felt like it was finally time to put this out there. We need to break the stigma again mental health issues, things like constant doctors appointments, counselling and meds are tough enough to deal with, without the added stress of making excuses and lying to protect others around me from being made feel uncomfortable.

What I want from this is people to try to understand mental illness, become more compassionate and mindful of what they say to people because I am a prime example of someone who hides shit extremely well and we'll never really know how what you say effects me because I wait till I'm at home by myself. As stupid as it sounds the likes of Instagram and other social media can seriously fuck with your head. Just because I post makeup selfies and pictures of nights out doesn't mean my life is perfect. This is so important for those of you struggling with mental health issues, don't let social media trick you, nobodies life is a perfect as it seems. Don't let that stuff get to you, I learned that the hard way! 

I'm not ashamed of my depression and I don't want to be just another statistic. This is going to be a life long battle but the life that I want is worth fighting for. 

If you have similar feelings or know someone who has, please get them the help they need and deserve. 

www.aware.ie 

(01) 661 7211

www.walkinmyshoes.ie

(01) 249 3333

The Samaritans 

116 123 (free to call) 

Pieta House 

Lucan (01) 6010 000

Mid-West, Limerick (061) 484 444

Love, A

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