"I really thought I just hit rock bottom. But today, it's like there's rock bottom, fifty feet of crap, then me"
- Rachel Green
Working on your mental health is not a one-way street. It's not even a two-way street.
It's a goddamn trek. Hear me out.
Just like any trek, it's a very long journey. You see some beautiful views on the way. You also meet people, who on their way back say things like "It's worth it!" or my favourite "It's less than a mile" (which is never true).
And then you fall into a ditch. You hurt yourself so bad that you have to go back home to heal, only to start from the beginning.
This time, you take advice from trekkers in your circle. You work on getting healthier. And choose to start again.
This time you are more confident. It does go great. You do your personal best. But then you end up getting lost and have another fall. This time into an ever deeper ditch than before.
You find yourself back to square one.
Now this time, you finally accept that you need professional help. You probably also need a compass that can help you with directions. And perhaps a different goal and a different summit.
This is what managing a mental health disease feels like. Except it gets worse. Sometimes it will be the wrong friend, the wrong doctor or the wrong job.
Until you say no to them all again and again. And you finally meet, the right friend, the right doctor, and the right job (although never all at once, not so far).
There is one secret, that no one tells you or, maybe you don't believe it when they do. And that is that there is no summit. All you have is a journey filled with peaks and valleys while constantly getting redirected from one trail to another.
But if you want to be on the trek, you still need the tools and resources to help you enjoy it and help you get back up when you fall else you will be miserable.
I heard this dialogue in a movie that aptly defines what it is like to suffer from chronic depression, "You don't know what better feels like".
Falling into depression, denying its existence, finally accepting it, and recovering from it, was a very long and painful journey, like any trek.
And like any other trek, I did get lost, I did fall, and hit rock bottom. And just like Rachel, I fell again, fifty feet further down.
But this time, the only difference was that I did know what better felt it.
Comentários