For The 3 in 4.... - I am 1 in 4

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By LegoBeast

Shame, guilt, failure … it’s amazing that in my good months and thankfully I have many I really try so hard to remove this stigma around mental health – I am devoted to it. You shouldn’t feel ashamed, I want to reassure people that feeling in turmoil fighting demons every second of every day is not a failure, it’s not weakness – we know the cliches but they are true. It takes real strength to stand up every day, to wake up with your head at times, the self-sabotaging guilt for being useless, worthless… it’s terrible, it’s painful and highly embarrassing.

3-in-4...-pin -I am writing this for the 3 in 4 who luckily might not suffer from mental health issues to give an insight into what life can be like.

For the 3 in 4

I am writing this for the 3 in 4 who luckily might not suffer from mental health issues to give an insight into what life can be like. How flipping hard it is to need to be a total warrior to save yourself, to make sure you stay upright and alive when your mind is stacking everything against you. And I mean real stacking; when you discover something positive, there we go… another stack of self-loathing or low energy or feeling guilt for even discovering something positive…

The amazing thing is … you know deep down your mind is playing tricks, that you’re in another reality, that is if you are lucky with a certain level of self-awareness, it’s just a ‘shame’ you struggle doing anything about it.

It’s like being beaten up every day in a fistfight with an evil demonic Lochness monster whilst being blindfolded and having your arms tied behind your back… and losing every time and doing some intermittent drowning thrown in for good measure just to make sure you realise it’s hard. It’s holding on with all of your might to a few bits of delicate string and squinting your eyes so hard till they bleed to try and see some light somewhere… to remind yourself that one day it will pass or it will feel less. That takes strength because your life depends on it… if you don’t fight you won’t stay around for long.

What suffering can mean…
– you are lost, you are lost in the day to day, you either are operating on autopilot or staring into the blue yonder or crying your eyes out (inwards or outwards). Total wet dishcloth – worthless.
you feel pain; everything hurts, your head, heart, limbs – it’s like you have been in a deep-sea diving suit made out of steel for the last weeks.
– you lose all confidence; I mean with self-loathing going on and wishing you could have a frontal lobotomy or not do an entire brain transplant, there is very little to feel confident about. Why are you here anyway and those dark thoughts come to the fore.
– you don’t believe or trust anything – why talk. You are desperate too, for anyone to notice however the fear of a. the wrong response and b. judgement can simply be too great. We judge ourselves extremely harshly we don’t need more.
– you struggle seeing colour, anything good fleets out so quickly and it’s struggle holding onto it.
you feel you are dragging everyone down with you … guilt and shame.

All that said, we need to remember battles don’t last, they might re-appear and for some of us they live on forevermore… we know that we have phases where everything implodes where the only priority is to simply stay alive… don’t stay silent get help, you face demons daily so to be brave once again to reach out is a must – but yes it also again hard and painful as requires to recognise you are totally not OK. So whilst many of us don’t have big muscles – we are built like quiet rocks; rock hard with the strength our mind requires to keep fighting.