Living with My Mental Illnesses

What I want to talk about today are my mental illnesses. They are the reason I started writing. I have anxiety and depression. As a result of these, I have an on/ off relationship with food and have great difficulty sleeping. I also suffer from sleep paralysis.

If someone was to ask me what I change about myself I would say "none, because I love myself and I have worked hard at it" in truth I gave up fighting. I gave up fighting my insecurities, the demons that fed off them. I gave up fighting the little voice in my head that told me I would never be good enough. I gave up fighting the numbness and cut anyway. I gave up fighting for that perfect skin, the perfect body figure, the ideal waist size because what's the point if everyone hates you anyway?

I would describe anxiety as this feeling of drowning. Like every social interaction is a test: will I sink or swim? All the thoughts after a social interaction: did I say that right? Was doing that the correct response? What should I have done differently? These things often keep me up at night and play on my insecurities. During the day anxiety made it difficult in social situations. I often had to release this stress through chewing my lips, fiddling with hair bands and picking at my skin. This left me with scabbed lips, many overstretched hair bands and bleeding hands.

After leaving high school I've had to put myself in some stressful and anxious situations. Such as starting University, trying to make friends and moving away from home for the first time. These have left me mentally and emotionally drained. However, by being forced to do theses and having the time to recover I have gradually become more confident and been in situations that I would have previously found stressful to have become less and less stressful to the point that they have caused me little to no anxiety.

My depression is a lot more complicated than my anxiety. I remember starting to experience depressive episodes at the age of 12. I found it so hard to cope with how I was feeling so when I was 13 I accidentally overdosed. This lead to a rise in tension between me and my mum. I started cutting aged 13 not long after the accident. It was and still is a way for me to cope with my feelings such as feeling overwhelmed or numb. It reached a point when I was 14 where every time I came home from school I was cut. It became an addiction. It was a way for me to feel and to cope. Until recently I had never opened up to a therapist about how I was feeling. When I did she only talked about my anxiety and not my depression. This took its toll on me and I relapsed after not cutting for 3 months. With the help of close friends, I managed to deal with this and slowly help myself out of depressive moods. I still struggle remaining cut free but I'm working on it and that's the most important thing.

Food and sleep have been a major issue for me especially being at university. I have days where I'd barely eat and other days I'll have an insatiable hunger. This has caused me to lose and gain weight frequently. This has also had an effect on my sleeping schedule too. As often experienced with depression they are days where I cannot get out of bed for anything and will happily sleep the day away. And there are other nights where no matter how hard I try I cannot get to sleep before 4 am. Then there are nights that I have a sleep paralysis episode.

Sleep paralysis is feeling of being conscious but unable to move. It occurs when a person passes between stages of wakefulness and sleep. During these transitions, you may be unable to move or speak for a few seconds up to a full minute. I often experience a sense of being chocked or if someone is in the room looking at me. This has often left me screaming and crying with no way to get back to sleep. Fortunately, this does not happen enough for me to be put on any medication.

I thank anyone who has read this and I hope it hasn't been too triggering for those who suffer the same as I do

xxx