circles and cycles and seasons.

After living out of suitcase for the last however many months, I am finally posting this from my own bed, in my own apartment, in the beautiful North London location that I am now calling home.

Home. It's a funny word. I haven't felt like I've belonged anywhere for so long. Months and months. My house that I lived in before I went into hospital, that's been my home for the last twenty years of my life felt alien to me. I couldn't settle, I couldn't breathe. The city I used to live in felt impossible to live with. Fragments of the ill version of me are scattered everywhere, I was stumbling over ghosts and heartache and loneliness. So I made the decision to stay in London where my treatment was and set myself up from pretty much rock bottom.

Eleven months and one day ago, I tried to take my own life. Eleven months and one day later and I thank every fibre of the universe that I wasn't successful.

It's been a year of learning, of making mistakes, of piecing parts of myself back together, of loss, but also of tremendous gain.

I have gained a small amount of wisdom, a huge amount of weight. I became a healthy weight with the help of the hospital, and then I made the brave/stupid (it depends which day you ask me) decision to 'sacrifice' my idea of the 'perfect' weight and to disappear into skin and bone, to go onto a large number of different medications that would cause weight gain, but stabilise the mood swings, the dark moods, the suicidal thoughts. Today is a day where I think it was brave.

Last night, I didn't. I punished myself for it. I stumbled, and I gave in to the self harm thoughts for the first time in so many months, and it felt so good. But then it felt everything it should have felt; unnatural, wrong, and something I absolutely should not be doing. I could see that there was a way through it all, without having to hurt myself. I felt that tiny ounce of self esteem that has been growing inside of me, come through and start to help me fight for what is important, me.

I've become more and more at ease as the last few months have gone on. I have been introduced to the most incredible people who have become my family, and who make each day that little bit easier. It's a cliche, but I have got the most amazing people in my life right now. People whom I adore, and who make me feel like I am worth something, who make me feel loved and accepted. People who are seeing me at my highest weight and who still love me and go out of their way to make sure I'm okay and happy.

I've never felt part of a family (with one very special exception) or that I was someone who actually mattered amongst a group of friends, and now, I feel like I've found my place amongst some truly wonderful, big hearted, beautiful people, and I'm lucky enough to call them my friends.

There is still so much to learn and to gain, I don't feel so alone in life anymore, and that makes this whole recovery thing a lot more manageable. Small steps eventually get you somewhere, and I'm getting there, slowly. As for what I lost, nothing is lost forever, even the pieces that I treasured the most are slowly making their way back into my orbit.

shadow won't let it in.

"Please, don't worry so much. Because in the end, none of us have very long on this earth. Life is fleeting. And if you're ever distressed, cast your eyes to the summer sky when the stars are strung across the velvety night."


Suicide. Depression. It has been all over the news for over a week now. We lost a legend, he took his own life and the world is undoubtedly less of a place without him. Whilst I was incredibly sad to see the actor that I grew up watching had taken his life, I was equally as upset by the comments people were making in regards to his actions, most of them I wont even waste the energy to type, but so much of what I saw on the internet was that people perceived his actions as selfish.

I am not naive enough to assume that everybody is educated on mental illness. I am not naive enough to assume that there is a universal opinion opinion on depression and other mental illnesses. I understand that to a lot of people, the concept that somebody who had a family that loved them and seemingly everything to live for could take their own life is incomprehensible, I understand that, I do. It is only through educating and discussion that the understanding of what could lead a person to take their own life, despite having external factors that, on paper, should be adding to their life. The last ten days have been incredibly triggering for me, I have been having some incredibly dark thoughts about my own failed suicide attempts, and I feel like discussing it a little more may help my mind let go some of what has been consuming me so fiercely.

I am not supporting suicide at all. I have myself seen people I have cared about take their own lives. The feeling that you are left with is indescribable. To think you could have picked up on a sign or even said something differently, you replay every single conversation that you had with them and with a fine tooth comb, search for something, anything, that could have signalled it; a misplaced sigh, a tone of voice, anything. The people who are left behind, if any, are as much a victim as the person who has gone, and I do not at all discount their pain or suffering.

Depression is a horrible, horrible disease. It creeps into your mind and steals the very essence of you. It obliterates the parts of you that feel joy, that is able to comprehend any emotion or reality outside of what you are currently feeling. It is as though someone has turned the brightness down on the world; everything is bleak, feeling becomes a thing of the past, and if you have moments where you can feel; it's extreme sadness and the pure and utter self loathing and hatred. You are noting. You are worthless. You are a waste of space. You do not deserve to be breathing in the air that you are breathing in. You are redundant. You are a disgrace to humanity.

Love unfortunately is not enough. It doesn't matter if there are people who love you, and it doesn't matter if you have 'things to live for' there is a disease inside your brain that is distorting your reality and causing an inherent lack of rational understanding or decision making. Your mind could be telling you that the sky is green, and when you glance at the sky to check; it's blue, but that doesn't matter, because the more your mind tells you that it's green, the more it becomes green when you look at it.

The mind is a weapon of destruction. Depression is cruel, and callous and takes no prisoners. It doesn't care how much money you have or how many people love you, if it wants you, it will get you. For some it's relatively minor and for some it is crippling and soul destroying.

When you are floating in oblivion, robbed of all of your senses, all of the parts that make you who you were, numbed of anything but insurmountable pain, it is hard to lift your head off your pillow each morning. There are silent warriors amongst us, who despite all of that, can put one foot in front of the other and function enough to get through a day. Some are able to fight it, some are able to reach out and ask for help, some are lucky enough to have people that are able to see their suffering and get help.

But for some people, in one moment, taking their life is an option that is put on the table in front of them, and it only takes that one moment that that option crosses their mind for them to take it.

For myself, I was in an extreme amount of pain and I couldn't take it anymore, I was flicking between pain and numbness and both of them felt too hard for me to be able to endure any longer, and my mind told me over and over again that there was a way for me to relieve myself of all of that and to be unburdened, and I tried. Twice. Thankfully for me, I failed and have been in treatment since, but some people aren't given the help that I was lucky enough to receive and still be receiving now. 

So please, the next time that you call someone selfish for taking their own life, just remember that depression is all consuming, it takes you from the inside out, there is very little that the mind is able to grasp outside of the internal suffering. It's a very selfish illness in terms of the fact that it focuses on the person and only that person, it's not a choice. It tells you how much you have failed as human being, how much you deserve to be suffering, how awful you are... With every single second of the day, there is very little time when a person isn't suffering, whether it is with feelings of nothingness, or feelings of despair. There is no future; just now, just what you are feeling. You are in a bubble whilst life carries on around you and without you. 

Being loved and loving other people doesn't make you immune from it. It doesn't make you a failure as parent/child/spouse/friend/whatever, you can be so loved, yet so deeply aching inside. Just because the person has children, doesn't mean that the love they have for their kids isn't there, absolutely not. 

Depression extinguishes the human spirit, but it can be overcome. There is help available out there, and there are people who want to listen and help you. Even if it's just me, through my blog posts, I care that you are alive. 

I recently watched a video made by Matt Ganley (which actually inspired this post) in which he says that we are in an era where by we are able to have the insight for compassion, and be concerned with human flourishing and human well being, understanding and empathy. And he is so right, our generation is a lot more willing to try to understand others. We can use technology to say whatever we want, and people are becoming more in tune to mental illness and we can use social media to help talk about it and eradicate the stigmas and misconceptions that generations before us created. All it takes is one conversation with one other person, it may make all the difference in the world for another human being. 

(US) National Suicide Prevention Lifeline - 1–800–273-TALK (8255)

• (UK)  Samaritans - 08457 90 90 90 
• International Association for Suicide Prevention

To Write Love On Her Arms

Love is Louder

Half of Us

beat (for eating disorders)

Matt Ganley's video that inspired this post is here at  http://youtu.be/ySg6nnxZdqE 

this slope is treacherous.

Wow, it's been a while since I wrote on here. Everything got very dark and my depression spiralled to a very, very dark place. In November, I felt at such a loss with myself and with this illness that I couldn't see any way out other than to take my own life. Thankfully, I was taken into hospital and have begun a degree of trying to build myself back up. 

I saw this blog as a reflection of how ill I actually was. I had the "fake it until you make it" philosophy ingrained in me, so I felt the more I tried to show that I was okay, or making progress then the more progress I would actually make. But that isn't how life works. 

One lie of "I'm okay" created so many webs of lies about my recovery that all got entangled and meshed together. No I was not okay, no I was not making all of these epiphanies and discoveries, they were just small recognitions in my thoughts. I've felt like a fraud. Writing comes so naturally to me, I figured I could write myself out of my disorder. That in itself is a huge signal of how ill I was. I was sat at my computer, writing away under my middle name Bella, preaching about epiphanies I had had about my disorder, when my mind was still consumed with self loathing and hate. People who love me were reading my blog and not able to connect the words with the girl who wrote them. I was trying so hard to "fake it till I make it" that I was just faking it and making it less and less. 

My situation has changed dramatically since I was last here, I spent months as an inpatient after an overdose and I can, hand on heart, say that I have made some progress at least. At the moment, however, I'm really struggling,.

It's so hard to keep your head above the tide. It's so hard to not let the darkness consume us. It's a huge fight to not succumb to the bad thoughts and feelings, but doing so is an incredible feat. I am proud of myself for the days, even the moments, when I can keep my head above water, and laugh, and smile and feel something. Something that isn't pain. I have felt joy, I have felt joy and I am fighting to keep those moments alive. I want that joy in my life, I want it to stick. 

I am going to continue to keep writing under my middle name Bella, because that way, I can remain anonymous. I started to use that name because I didn't feel comfortable in my own skin at all, I hated every part of myself, down to the name, but now I'm learning to feel comfortable and it's so hard. I have been having bad day after bad day, but I've got a support network who are going through what I'm going through and know exactly what I'm feeling, and just having people there with that ability has made the most enormous change in me. 

I am under no illusions that this is going to be a quick process and that I will be "adjusted" any time soon. I'm just doing the best I can. Taking one day at a time is the only way you can do it really and even then, I feel like each day has so many different moments in that it is hard to class a day as a "good" or "bad" day really.

I guess I'll just have to take it as it comes, but I want to steer clear of writing about my feelings in a public forum, because I still try so hard to keep up this illusion that I'm okay and to commit myself to recovery, I have to be honest and open in every single aspect of my life. I will return to this when I feel I'm in a place where I don't have to hide parts of myself away and give an illusion that I am somebody I am not. 

Thank you all for your continued support and messages, I have seen that over 8,000 of you have been reading my little blog and I am sorry to anybody that I have let down who has believed in me. I just want to believe in myself and not see myself as never being good enough. 

the price of love is loss.

There is an enormous amount of love in the world. I think if we were to really look at humanity, look back at important events throughout history and the present, one thing that would stand out is love. It's out there, it's always been out there, but sometimes it can be really hard to find. We are a species that create war, who kill, who discriminate, who abuse, who hate. But we are also a species that has love in abundance. You look at tragic events in history, or even just in the news, and one thing that you won't hear about is a lack of love or the lack of an outpouring of help and community that derives from that. I've seen it over and over again first hand.

 Maybe that's why I am the way I am. I wouldn't quite classify a pessimist, I'm trying to bring myself out of that way of being (as hard as it is) I would like to be an optimistic person in everything. I'd like to say one day that I am an optimist, but I've had simply too many bad things happen to me again and again to have the mentality of an optimist instilled in me over a short amount of time But I am happy to say I am trying, and my god, I've seen some pretty amazing things.

For all the negative in my life, there is a positive that outweighs it. Control is outweighed by love. As simple as. I am at a place right this second where I'm perplexed and amazed at myself. Something has happened, and I'm too tired to go into it. But it's a negative force that has hit me many, many times. Now go back 6 months, and what has happened would have affected me so badly that I can guarantee you, I would have stopped eating because of it. I would have let the words stick with me, I'd have scrutinised every single meaning behind them and punished myself. Badly. I'd have been unable to see past them. I'd have replayed the words over and over again, getting more upset and agitated each time. I'd have let them get to me so badly that I would believe they were a truth, I'd believe that the mindset caused by them was "normal" and I'd have allowed my control and my self worth to slip. I would have believed I was a failure, I was this ridiculous, inane, pathetic excuse of a human and that would have been the tipping point for me. What was once a huge trigger, is no more. 

I need to attempt to keep reminding myself that I am a good person. I am a kind person. I am a worthy person. I'm fragile, I shouldn't be punished for simply stumbling as I move forwards.  I need to really believe that. 

There are people out there who choose to be my family. Who choose to love me. Who choose to be there for me. Who choose to pick me up when I fall, hold my hand whilst I stumble, and bask in the joy alongside me when I feel it. They are the people that count. They are the ones who mean the most, who have furthered me along in this incredible journey. It's down to them that I am here now. One of them sent me this beautiful poem in the week;

The sun will shine tomorrow

The rain will somehow end

This is not only a promise

It’s just the way it is

Bad times don’t last forever

The tough times they never stay

The heartache and the let down

Will soon go away

In times of deep sadness

The pain is all too real

And it’s hard to believe

That with time the hurt will heal

The dark clouds that hang above

Will eventually move on

And the storms that dance around

Will soon be gone

Stay strong and keep in mind

That again, the sun will shine

Isn't that beautiful? I am so grateful that there are people looking out for me and who think to send me beautiful things like that. 

My outlook changes each day, some days I feel like giving up, but today, I have felt so in control and so overwhelmed at the love for me that I am proud of myself. And others are proud of me too. People I love being proud of me for good reasons is incredible. 

one blow from caving in.

I wish there was a way to describe how it feels. How it seeps into every part of your brain and paralyses you. How you are just a puppet, helpless, pathetic, whilst it pulls the strings. A master puppeteer, that's what it is. It controls you. It controls every single part of you.

It shows you over and over again what you could be, what you should be striving for, but then it constantly reminds you that you're never going to get there. Your goal is unattainable because you are weak. You are pathetic. You are a failure. It's your fault. It laughs as you try again and again and again. It watches with satisfaction as you can't pass a reflective surface without breaking down in tears of shame and disgust because you hate the way you look.

There is never a moment where you can look at yourself with complete ease and clarity and say "Okay, I'm skinny enough, I'm thin now, I'll stop" the disease is a never ending spiral of discontent and dysmorphia. 

You measure your self worth in how much you weigh and what size in clothes you are. You don't choose that. You don't choose to be crying on your bedroom floor because your size 0 jeans are getting a bit more snug than previous. You don't choose to constantly be looking for flaws on every part of your body. Not that you have to look because there's a voice in your head pointing them all out and screaming at you to sort it out. 

This disease has stolen so many years of my life, yet I found myself today thinking that I am a fraud. I'm not skinny, I'm not thin. I don't care if people say that that's my body dysmorphia talking, but it's a truth. I don't know whether to be proud, or to breakdown.

It's a constant battle. I want to be better, but I want to be thin. I can't see any how you can become "recovered" and not be "fat" I wish I could learn to differentiate between the two.

I hate that it got it's control back today, but it was only temporary. I want to be better than I am. I want to keep bettering myself. I want to be healthy and happy and continue to embrace the love that surrounds me.

Ultimately, being happy is worth more than anything.

I will not be made to feel bad for being proud of the good days. It's taken me 8 years to even have good days. I haven't fought this for 1/3 of my life to not be proud of my small victories. Just because I am having good days doesn't mean they're all like that. They're not. But I'm not going to not celebrate and revel in the good days, the days when that's exactly what they are; good days. I had years worth of good days stolen from me, I'm not letting these ones just wash over me, I'm letting them sink into every pore of my body, I'm letting them in and I am celebrating in them. I will not apologise for that. 

Love is prevalent in recovery. Love for yourself and love for your body. Whilst I may not love my body, I'm beginning to try to learn to love myself.  We are all worth something. We are all worth more than numbers on a scale. We are all worth more than this disease. We all have our own special qualities to put out there and to give to others. No one person is worth more than another. There is beauty within each and every one of us. We all hold a unique and special place in this world, never forget that. We may have to fight to find our worth, to find our beauty, to find that we are more than numbers on scale. But I promise you, the fight is worth it. At the other end, there is an abundance of love and acceptance waiting for you. I'm hoping that I can realise that and get there soon. 

all at once my heart took flight.

Sometimes, I forget that my mind is constantly at war with itself. The white noise very quickly became a normality to me, and scrutinising every thought and every interaction, and the constant self criticism became a part of daily life. I fought, but I never won the battle, let alone the war. There was always some part of me that could not get out, no matter how hard I tried to swim, the current of fragmented, disordered thinking patterns and behaviour held me under. 

When I can have these tiny, fleeting moments of joy, the noise inside my mind stops. The self criticism and doubt, the black and white thinking, the pain... It all just temporary subsides and and something else is begins to filter through for a brief moment. It's taking a huge gasp of breath and breathing life into you. 

It's like the feeling of finally getting water after days in the desert, it's like being wrapped up in a warm blanket after getting soaked from the rain, it's like finally you're warm inside, your brain quietens down and your mind, body and soul are able to soak up positivity. Sometimes, it's just for a few seconds, but my god, those seconds are worth it. I revel in each and every second. I live those moments, I let them in, I let them in through every pore in my body, I live them with every fibre of my being. They are the moments that make this battle less treacherous.

Sometimes it is impossible to see beyond the sadness and the pain. When there is a voice constantly in your head telling you that you are nothing, nobody, that you are a burden to everybody around you, that you deserve the pain you feel, that you should be punishing yourself for simply existing, and that you would be better off dead, it's incredibly hard to block out. But just getting a few moments of relief from that, for muting the voice, and letting happiness in, creates a volume switch in your brain. You are able to turn the volume of the voice down slightly, even by a fraction. One good moment can set a series of doubts to what that voice is telling you. The more you get, the more you start to realise that the voice isn't telling you the truth. You are worthy. 

I can't feel love because of that voice. I can barely feel anything at all, and when I did feel, all I felt was sadness, pain, self loathing and shame. 

I have had the most incredible few days in the last week, where I have actually felt joy.  My intake of love is increasing by the day. 

it's cloud illusions I recall.

I always seem to accidentally  preempt bad days by talking about the good ones (though I'm not going to let that stop me) today was a bad day.

I had another slip up. When you wake up with low self esteem and feeling like the world is pretty much against you, it's almost impossible to change your outlook. No amount of CBT tricks can override that feeling for me. I just have to roll with it. So I did, I hauled myself out of bed, endured a panic attack, faced the struggle of doing my make up and hair with one hand (I had to take a trip to A&E yesterday due to an accident at work which has damaged the nerves in my little finger so it's strapped to another finger and pretty much immobile) and made my way to work.

I can sense when it's one of those days that won't really get better, unless a miracle comes along, so I try not to push anything too far. I did some meditation, I took my valium on the train, I listened to music, I didn't rush, I went at my own pace, and I thought about all of the positives in my life.

I had potential things to look forward to after work, if not the following day, and also on Tuesday. I thought if I focus on them if trying to "be present" didn't work as well as it could, then I'd be okay.

Over the few hours I was in work, my skin got thinner and thinner. My self loathing grew larger and larger. It was like I was a ticking time bomb waiting to go off, any second I was just going to erupt and the tears would come and wouldn't stop.

Thankfully, they held back until I'd at least finished work. Then, not long after, sure enough, I was walking through my town's city centre and I had never felt more alone. I felt unwanted. I felt like I was nobody.  I felt like I was some kind of monster for being so difficult and such hard work to love. I felt like everybody was staring at me, pitying me. I thought about how my illness has affected me, how my life is so different to other people my own age. What a failure I've been. How I wasn't even able to finish my A Levels because of my illnesses. How I am too sensitive and how I let myself upset over the most innate of things. 

I spent my entire bus journey quietly sobbing. Gaining even more unwanted attention. I just listened to "Glory and Gore" by Lorde and prayed to God that I would be home as quickly as possible.

Thankfully I was, but I was so angry at myself for being so self loathing and sensitive and just annoying. So I went and threw up. And it felt great. It felt like I finally had some kind of control over what I was feeling for the first time all day.

But then the guilt hit me. It hit me hard. I felt disgusted with myself. I felt so terrible that I'd allowed myself to "give in" I just cried even more and I could feel a vicious cycle coming on. So I just got into bed and I slept. 

I feel so much lighter now. So much clearer. The fog that I woke up with wrapped around my brain, has gone, and I feel like myself again. 

I got myself out of it as quick as I got myself into it. It's something I now have proof of, I can do it, however rapidly I'm spiralling, I can change my course. It is possible. When I'm bad, my mind keeps me in this illusion of an infinite dark sky where there's never any cracks for the sunlight to get in. But that isn't true, and once I'm able to show myself that is not true, and what I'm feeling is just an illusion my brain is playing on me, I can make my way through. 

the winds of change are blowing wild and free.

A sweeping sense of solitude has washed over me. There are moments of pure unadulterated clarity, where I see myself as a "survivor" someone who is overcoming demons that have haunted me for too long, someone making their way towards the light. But then there are moments, like today, where I just pull the panic cord and go into a complete state of "but why?" every single one of my senses are heightened and my mind turns into an emergency check point, combing through every little detail of anything that passes through it, scrutinising it down to it's very last inch, checking it over and over to make sure I didn't miss anything.

You get stuck in this infinite state of questioning. Not just questioning where you are and how you got there, but why you feel the way you feel and why certain people arouse such a variety of emotions within you. There is never an answer. There is always another "but why?" to any form of answer you can derive.

I will not apologise for the fact that peoples actions and behaviours have caused a subconscious series of emotions and behaviours that are triggered when I am in their presence. It's not something to criticise or tell me to "snap out of" it isn't that simple and I'm working through it. But they didn't come from nowhere, sometimes the harder people try to help in their own way, the worse they make a situation. 

I have faced let down after let down, I haven't even had any kind of expectation with regards to certain people, because I get lulled into a false sense of security that maybe, just maybe, this time they may have changed. But then, there they go again and let me down all over again. Except I told myself I wouldn't get let down, because I was anticipating it, it was to be expected. But it still hurts each and every time, no matter how much you anticipate it. 

I am a strong believer that people can change. I can see change within myself daily, I like to give people a chance, because I would like to think that people would give me one too. I know how hard I can be sometimes, how difficult and exhausting I can be, I'd like to think that if I let someone down when I was in one of my "episodes" that they would be understanding and would be willing to give me a second chance. "Treat others the way you wish to be treated", isn't that how the saying goes? I think for me, there is some element of that in how I go about my daily life. But I also think that we all have an obligation, as human beings, to show care and love to the people around us. Those deserving of it. It doesn't take a lot of energy to be kind to someone. Showing kindness to somebody you care about, or love, should be a reflex, it shouldn't be something that seems like too much hard work. 

It's taking me a long time, and a lot of therapy, to at least recognise that loving somebody and pleasing somebody isn't the same thing. They do not go hand in hand. Trying to constantly please somebody and adhere to what they want, isn't love. You can love somebody and not constantly alter yourself or what makes you happy to try to please them. You cannot please everybody, I have to train myself to stop trying to please certain people or worry about other people's judgements. You just have to please and look after yourself. As long as you aren't hurting yourself or others, it's okay. If other people don't like it? Tough. It's still taking me a really long time to distinguish it, but I think I'm getting there. It's not being selfish, it's not loving those people any less, it's knowing more about who you are and what makes you happy and not letting others dictate your happiness and control what you do.

We're all unique. We don't all occupy the same brain, the same heart, the same religion, or have the same principals or beliefs. Some people look down on what they don't understand, but all we can do is help them understand, we can show them what we feel, what we think, we can talk about it, put it out there. People have a right to disagree with you, but they do not have the right to make you feel inferior for whatever you do (as long as no harm is being caused to anybody) 

I don't know where life will take me, where my mind will take me, which days will be bad days, which days will be good days, which side effects my next lot of meds will bring me, which path of treatment I am headed onto next. But what I do know is that I can get through it. I can fight against the current and win. Even when I feel like I can't, I know that I was in a much darker place twelve months ago and I made it through those. 

Sometimes the people that help us the most aren't the people you expect. Sometimes it's hard for other people around you to understand that despite the fact they're your parent/family/spouse/lover/sibling whatever, they aren't necessarily the person that can fix you. I'm sure it must be a hard thing to deal with, especially when all they want to do is help. 

But at the end of the day, the only person who can really fix you, is you. Some are lucky enough to find somebody along the way, in whatever form of love, that mends our broken parts. That helps fix you, that provides strength as you become the glue as you piece yourself back together. If you have somebody in your life who is as instrumental in your recovery, please, treat them well, let them know that they too are loved and that you are so grateful for them. 

Sometimes people come along once you've started doing the repair job. I've seen it happen first hand. Nobody is ever alone in recovery, in putting themselves back together. There is always support out there, even if it's through a computer, there are still people who want to help you and love you, and help glue you back together. Even if it's just through listening. 

Here are some useful numbers and links: 

(US) National Suicide Prevention Lifeline - 1–800–273-TALK (8255)

• (UK)  Samaritans - 08457 90 90 90 
• (ROI) Samaritans -  1850 60 90 90 

International Association for Suicide Prevention

To Write Love On Her Arms

Love is Louder

Half of Us

Beat (for eating disorders)

something beautiful, a new chance.

Today, I stumbled. Metaphorically, of course, not literally. It was a waiting game really, when I was going to have my first slip, and today just happened to be the day. 

But it's okay. I can pick myself back up, dust myself off, and carry on with my journey. I can try to not let it set me back, or let these compulsions and thoughts take over my brain and drag me backwards into the past. There is no point regretting my actions today, I am sad, yes, disappointed, yes. But cycles of behaviour don't just stop, we have to keep fighting them and instilling new, positive behaviours into our life. 

I had an interesting discussion about regret in terms of self harm scars a few days ago. I like to think of scars as battle scars. Proof that you fought the fight, and won. That you overcame. A scar, by definition, means that some form of healing has taken place. Wounds have slowly healed over, gained new strength, gained a new layer of skin to them. The human skin isn't an easy armour to carry anyway. Rarely, do we ever "fit" into our own skin, we don't feel comfortable in it, we aren't happy with it. It's is never, ever thick enough. It cuts, it bleeds, it burns, it dies, it scars, but it also heals. 

Sometimes a little adjustment is all that is needed to feel acceptance in yourself. Adjust your view, adjust a thought, adjust an outlook; maybe then, your skin, your armour might feel a little more comfortable. 

Having thin skin isn't a flaw. It's human. We aren't all capable of being able to let a comment, words, thoughts, anything not get to us. The saying "sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me" is complete and utter bullshit. Words can do more damage than a wrecking ball. It's okay to be sensitive, it's okay to not be comfortable with who you are, or what you look like. It is rare to come across people who were born with the "perfect" layer of skin to be able to brush off negativity. 

If you have scars, you have scars. It's an unfortunate consequence. I used to get incredibly self conscious of my scars and cover them up with make up. I remember seeing the horror on someone's face at work when I rolled up my sleeve and they saw my arm had been hacked away at. I know for some people, it's just "another part" of them and I am in awe of their confidence. I would like to think that we are capable of eventually accepting our scars. Metaphorical scars too. We don't have to like them or love them, or think about what lead us to inflict pain upon ourselves. But accepting they are a part of us, is accepting that we have fought the fight against our mind, and we are healing. We may not be healed, we may only be a day into recovery, or a week, or a month. But what we are is better than we were before. 

random acts of kindness.

Today at work, a stranger handed me this note. Completely out of the blue. What a beautiful spirit. They say "be kind, for everybody is suffering"  And I wonder, did he know? 

I always think to one of my favourite plays, A Streetcar Named Desire, in one of my favourite scenes, Blanche's final words in the play; "I've always depended on the kindness of strangers" and we do, don't we? 

We all start as strangers, each and everyone of us. Circumstance and situations lead us to become something more. But each and every stranger we encounter has their own life, their own world, their own belief system, their own struggles. Maybe just a friendly smile could be the only smile, the only light they see that day. Isn't it just nice to bring a little bit of happiness to somebody, whether you know them or not?

Kindness is underrated. 

everything that happens is from now on.

I've finally done it, I've started to put this blog "out there" so to say. Up until today, only four or five  people in my life knew it existed. The only people who knew the real me, what was going on with me. But today I decided it was time to start sharing it amongst people, and the truth be told, I'm terrified.

These are people who call me "constantly happy" "so bubbly" "a ball of energy" these are people who I have spent weeks, months, years fooling. People who think they know me are now going to find out they don't know me at all. I'm not the person they think I am. Are they going to think I'm weak? I'm a bad person for not letting them in? Are they suddenly going to pity me and not have fun with me any more? 

So, to all of you who are reading this and thinking "what?!?!" I'm sorry that I wasn't strong enough to tell you who I really am and share this with you. It doesn't mean I respect you or like you any less. It's just very hard for me to let my walls down, and take this "mask" off. 

I just want to make absolutely clear that I am not doing this for me, I'm doing it for other people out there who go through what I go through every day. I've already had messages from people who have thanked me for starting this because they can relate to it and it has caused them to take action and get help. And that is all I want. I'm not doing this for attention, I don't want people to feel like they are walking on eggshells around me now that you know. Just please understand that I have my good and my bad days, I'm not a complete and utter mess trying to pretend to be okay all the time. 

life is a beautiful mess.

"These words on a page, carry the pain, they don't free it."

Sometimes I wonder, is writing really a blessing? Or is it a curse? I've had people tell me that my writing is beautiful (I hate repeating compliments I receive, because 9/10 times I never believe them and hate repeating them because it makes me sound pretentious) but my writing isn't beautiful. I write my thoughts, I write my mind, and my mind isn't "beautiful" my mind is a mess. My mind is a maze of twisted complexity, I suffer from black and white thinking, I constantly question everything and search for hidden meanings, I overreact to everything, I can't process any of my emotions at a "normal" (god, I hate that word) rate, and I have negative thought after negative thought. 

So when I write, I'm really only writing my mind. A thought. A question. A moment. All of them are fleeting, in the grand scheme of my life, each and every piece that I write is a fleeting moment in time. Do I really want my thoughts, my messed up mind immortalised? 

Sometimes I think that when you write about something, it loses it's meaning. The original moment or thought you were writing about diminishes and it becomes quite literally words on a piece of paper, or through a blog, or through a screen. The thought is gone, the inner workings of my mind have changed, that no longer exists in the present now, it's gone. So is writing it down where it can never be forgotten something that is productive? 

I haven't suddenly decided to give up on my blog or my journalling or any of that. I'm just thinking through my writing, I guess. I think it's nice to chronicle your state of mind when you're going through recovery, or even anything really, to look back and see how things have progressed, how your mind has moved forward, how you have grown and flourished. 

But in reality, do you really need to be reminded of thoughts you had? Do you really need it there to see? Can't it just be lost along with the hundreds of thousand other memories that we create and forget? 

black and white begins to colour in.

"Lead me to the truth and I will follow you with my whole life." 

My mind is a maze. To me, if I'm not the perfect person, perfect at everything I do, then in my mind, I'm a bad person, I'm a failure and deserve to be punished. There's no in between for me. One mistake, no matter how trivial, means that I'm a terrible person and can't live with myself.

There is no in between with how I react to things. It's either a complete overreaction; sobbing, hysteria, shouting, screaming. Or nothing. There's no middle ground. I can't just take something on board, I have to run through every single "bad" scenario possible and then freak out over all of these imaginary scenarios. It's so unhealthy and it's something that I wasn't really aware of until today. I knew I overreacted a lot, but I never really looked at how or why. 

The last few days have hurt my heart a lot. But I think I'm better for it. I'm trying to tell myself that pretending that I'm okay brings a whole new series of problems, it affects every state of my being, it penetrates through to my relationships. It puts too much pressure on those who love me and it leaves them at a loss. Pretending I'm okay brings a whole new cycle of behaviours that have been brought to light to me that I didn't even know existed. When you're so busy putting up a mask, you don't think of the domino effect that it has on your behaviours and emotions. As long as you're pretending that you're okay, it doesn't matter. But it does.

I  have been told of the behaviours that I've been displaying, I know need to stop pretending that I'm okay and look at all of the issues that pretending that I'm okay causes for me and the people closest to me.

My behaviour has caused resentment and dislike towards me by people that I adore and who love me and all it makes me want to do is drop my "mask" and just focus on everything that comes about because I have that mask up. It's been so ingrained in me for so long because I've spent so long pretending I'm okay that I've never noticed or been shown the ramifications of what that does.

Mood altering medications do exactly what they say; they alter your moods, they can make you more low, they can bring you up, they can cause suicidal thoughts, they can do a lot of stuff. But I don't solely blame those, I blame the fact I've spent so long trying to keep this mask on - even to those closest to me who I tell virtually everything to, I keep some stuff hidden from them to not cause them worry or pain - that I've failed to see what that has done to me, my behaviour, my thinking and what it's done to those around me. And this isn't something new, this has been ongoing for years.

But how do you just stop pretending and and actually really face up to what you're going through 100% without breaking down and letting it win? I don't know. 

there's beauty in the breakdown.

"So let go, jump in.

Oh well, what you waiting for? 

It's all right, 'cause there's beauty in the breakdown.

So let go, yeah let go,

Just get in, oh it's so amazing here,

It's all right, 'cause there's beauty in the breakdown."

Sometimes, you have to decide to let go of the hatred you hold for someone. Even if it isn't hatred and just a strong dislike. Let it go. Negativity is a waste of energy, a waste of your mind and a waste of your time. 

Maybe you can't always forgive, but you can forget. Holding onto hate can cause your heart to turn very bitter. No matter the reasoning behind the negative feelings. Freeing your mind of the negative energy simply gives you more room for positive energy. 

Build bridges. Bridges don't necessarily have to have the same foundations they once had. Once it's burned, it can never be replicated, it won't be the same, it will be different. But build them anyway. You don't have to love or like the person, you just simply have to let go and move forward.

I made a choice today to try  let go of all negative energy to a few certain people who have harmed or wronged me or my friends and family. If it's unforgivable, they don't even deserve another thought, they're forgotten and not forgiven, but I can't hold onto it, it's not healthy. If it is forgivable, I'm need to learn to let it go, I want to attempt to rid all of the negative energy out of my life. I don't want to hold onto grudges or previous wrong doings. We're all human, we all make mistakes. 

catch me, i'm falling.

I hate myself. 

What is so wrong with me that I have to always do or say the wrong thing. Why can I never do anything right in my life? Why do I have to be so sensitive about every single thing? Why do I manage to annoy everybody all the time? Why am I such a burden? Why am I even here? 

Why have I let something out of my control make me so upset and angry? I cannot process these emotions quickly, it takes me a long time and whilst I'm feeling that I then have all of these "sub emotions" that come into play; irrationality, self loathing, paranoia, anxiety, and so many more. It doesn't take a simple "deep breaths" for me to stop feeling these things and understand why I felt them, it can take me hours.  This is what I call "the danger zone" it's when I react to those emotions without caution, or without thinking about the repercussions  I cut, I purge, I go to some very dark places and it takes me a very long time to get out of that danger zone.

I've been in that danger zone now for seven and a half hours. There has been no light yet. I've felt incredibly alone and isolated, through nobody's fault, and I've quite literally had to sit on my hands for a large portion of the night to prevent myself from hurting myself. 

I've had panic attack after panic attack. I' I'm like a wrecking ball. I've gained all this momentum and I can't stop. Where does it end? When will it end? 

Bad days can change everything. They can set you back. I'm trying, I'm really trying. I want to keep moving forward, I need to keep moving forward. Help. 

a lack of colour.

An excerpt from my journal from earlier this year; 

I feel that trying to describe depression can be the hardest task. Pair it with trying to describe the grip that eating disorders hold over you and how body dysmorphia prevents you from seeing reality staring back at you in the mirror, then the act of being "okay" when someone asks "how are you?" is a much easier and tangible option.  

My mind is vast. My moods are rapid. My thoughts are scattered. I have likened them to a black and white kaleidoscope*. They merge, they alter, they separate.  

*I say black and white because I associate kaleidoscopes with exuberant colour, whereas my thoughts are worlds away from beautiful merging colours.  

My world is black and white. My thoughts are black and white. All or nothing. No way but one way; one way traffic, a dead end street. Incredibly wonderful or excruciatingly terrible. No middle ground, no grey area, no white noise. 

Colourless is a reality. Dark thoughts. Sadness. Pain. Numb. Hurt. Suffering. Even the adjectives themselves juxtapose bright, vibrant colours.  

My moods are low and my mindset is bleak. I distort rationality into irrationality. I hate what I see when I see myself. I feel empty, sad, and at times; numb.  

There is a roadblock stopping me, paralysing me, not allowing me to do simple things, like get out of bed. The anxiety crushes my chest, weighs me down. I am pinned down by depression like a caged bird, unable to break free, but able to see everything and everyone moving around me.  

I get glimmers of colour. Like the early morning rays of sun creeping into the windows and illuminating the specks of dust that, without that light, would remain unnoticed, invisible. I cherish that light. I revel in the colour. 

I long for the days when they stay and are not fleeting and sparse. I cannot wait for those days, I cannot wait for recovery. 

Some days when I am at my worst, I cannot see beyond that day, but when I am out of it, I can look back and smile and say "I made it through. the darkness slowly started to colour in and I'm back on my feet, even if it's just for today, I made it."

I live for the good days. 

Suicide Prevention Week.

You are loved. You are good enough. No matter how it seems, no matter how bad it gets. somebody out there loves you. You are special, even if you can’t see it, i promise you that there is someone who does. Even if the darkest of times, there is a way out of that darkness. People out there are willing to help you, even people who don’t know you, just because you don’t know them does not mean that they don’t want to help you. You are beautiful. You are good enough. Even if it doesn’t feel like it, I promise you that you are. Please don’t ever think that there is no way out. There is a way through it and there are people that will help you along the way. However bad it gets, you are not alone. You are never alone. There are people with you in that dark place who want to help you find the light. Please talk to someone, even if it’s just an anonymous message on tumblr. Please don’t think there is no way out; there is a huge world out there, billions and billions of people, nobody is perfect, nobody has the perfect life, everybody has problems but out in that big wide world there are people who’s lives you can change, people who can help shape your life and share so many things with. There is a world out there waiting for you. Please, just hold on and live. You are never alone. 

I wrote that over a year ago on my Tumblr page and had quite a few messages after posting it thanking me for writing it. So, I thought that this week being "Suicide Prevention Week" and today being "Suicide Prevention Day" would be a good time to put it back out for people to see, alongside something else I posted which is incredibly relevant today;

Somebody I love very much has been bullied and driven to suicide. The reason? She's being herself.

In a world where little girls are being shot for speaking up for women's rights and education rights for girls, why on earth do people still find it acceptable to call people names, belittle them, completely shred their self esteem and drive them to take their own lives? 

I am far from an optimist and nobody could ever accuse me of having any sense of naivety, but love and acceptance should be something that is universally accepted and not questioned. 

We see people scorned and bullied for their beliefs, their social status, their sexuality, their race, their looks... It seems that people seek out anything that they can to make somebody feel inferior, when we should be encouraging people to embrace who they are and celebrate themselves. 

We waste so much time trying to modify ourselves into an ideal -a person that isn't real, somebody that over time, the world decided was an 'ideal' human being -  that we lose all sense of who we are. 

People are fascinating. People are weird. People are kind. People are awful. But what we all have in common is that we are individuals. Find who you are, do what you love and if people don't like or accept that then they aren't the right people for you.

No matter how bleak or horrible or terrifying or lonely it gets, there is always somebody out there who is as terrified and lonely and looking for somebody just like you to come into their lives and make them feel a little less terrified and a little less lonely. 

Words hurt. Words destroy. There is no armour that protects you from what people say and how they can make you feel like you aren't worthy or that you don't deserve to be here.

But you do. You deserve the world. All of you. Each and every one of you. 

Flaws are human. Perfect people with perfect lives don't exist, and if they do then they haven't lived. Life hurts at times and life can be overwhelming and awful but it can also be wonderful and beautiful and it goes by far too quickly.

I can assure you that there are many, many people in the world who want to listen and want to help and want to help you find yourself, amongst the hurt and pain and bullying, there is a person in there who doesn't deserve any of it and who can be listened to, and loved, and accepted.

Over the years, I have experienced suicide first hand on more than one occasion. I have lost friends who couldn't deal with pain and the hurt and the words any longer. 

No matter how insignificant you feel, I promise you, there is at least one person who wouldn't be altered by you being gone. People you haven't even met, people you don't think notice you, we all leave a mark. In years to come you may not remember their faces or names, you may not even remember their words. If you have to make somebody else feel bad to make yourself feel good then you really need to look at yourself. There isn't an excuse for it ever.

There is always someone who wants to help you, and to listen and to help you. 

Please, just hold on. I am begging you. 

Here are some useful numbers and links: 

(US) National Suicide Prevention Lifeline - 1–800–273-TALK (8255)

• (UK)  Samaritans - 08457 90 90 90 
• (ROI) Samaritans -  1850 60 90 90 

International Association for Suicide Prevention

To Write Love On Her Arms

Love is Louder

Half of Us

beat (for eating disorders)

the inevitability of prolonged discomfort.

There comes a time when you are faced with a social situation that you have to attend. You are obliged to go to, and there is no excuse to get out of it, no matter how many scenarios you plan out in your head.

Ordinarily, I like getting dressed up, going out and having fun. Even if it's just for a few hours, it gives me a perfect distraction from the 96,000 thoughts going round my mind, and just allows me to pretend that I'm okay without having to maintain that "absolutely fine, positively happy" mask that I have to put on when I'm at work. Throughout my late teens and up until I was 21, I loved going out. My job meant that after work we'd go for drinks, off to clubs, and most nights for nearly three years straight ended in the early hours of the morning, arriving home in a taxi, often crossing my Mother on the doorstep on her way to work. I wasn't one of those girls who went out to get drunk, many nights I'd only have one or two drinks, it was simply the company and nightlife that I thrived off. It was the ideal scenario for my depression and my eating disorders; drinks at night, sleep all day - no time for eating or to stop and take note of where your mind was. In my little head, it was perfect. 

Anybody who has or currently works in theatre will know that it's a very antisocial job, you end up spending a lot of your time with the people you work with, often planning nights out after performances, simply being on the same work schedule and sleeping pattern made it very easy to be extremely social despite the antisocial hours. Despite having lots of people around me, I was still incredibly lonely. I brushed any negative feelings aside and simply lived for the moment. But I was struggling. 

Fast forward to a few years later. I look back at my old self and I almost envy her, being able to ignore the overwhelming feelings that consume my mind 24/7 is a luxury that I lost a long time ago. I get fleeting feelings of happiness, which I am so thankful for because without those, I don't know where I would be, but at some point, "it" always creeps back up on me. 

Social situations are something I now dread. The thought of being somewhere that I am not 100% sure that I want to be, or in the company of people that I trust implicitly absolutely terrifies me. When I am overwhelmed with thoughts of self loathing, or my mood drops, or I am triggered by something, it does not matter where I am or who I am with, it will simply become too much and I will completely flip; there are tears, followed by panic attacks, followed by what I call "Zombie mode" where I go into what can only be described as an almost catatonic state. The thought of that happening when I'm out, or with people who don't know what to do or say to me terrifies me. Maybe that's letting it win, maybe that's me being defeatist, because I have given in, I have let it control what I do and where I go. But I know my mind, and I know that these happen too regularly to risk it, for now, that is the best course of action for me. 

So on Saturday I was faced with an occasion that required my presence; an entire day in the company of my family and extended family, in all around 25-30 people. My family as a whole tend to only get together around 4/5 times a year, so it wasn't something I could skip out on, especially as it was one of the very younger members' (whom I adore) third birthday party. 

It was hard. I struggled. I suffered. I didn't show once how I was feeling, or if I did, it just wasn't mentioned. But I did it, I got through the day, and I am so proud of myself for doing so. 

What I am also proud of is the fact that straight after I got off the train home, I went to a work friends' hen party, where I was yet again in a crowd of about 14 people. I was terrified at the prospect of having to put on a facade for two situations, one after the other with no real pause for clarity, for almost 17 hours. One I can just about handle at a time, but two at once? I didn't think it was possible, but I did it. 

Small victories. It is those I am proudest of. 

I am paying for it now. I woke up just mentally and emotionally exhausted, with crippling anxiety and the inability to feel or think coherently. But that's okay, because I achieved a huge step yesterday, today I am simply "suffering the consequences"

Every action has a reaction. Every action we take has a consequence. If the action is something positive, hold onto that. My consequence is simply my mind coping with the strength that it had garnered for a prolonged period of time yesterday. I am not seeing today as a defeat, I am seeing yesterday as a step forward.