Road Back On Track

A year ago this time I was in a psychiatric hospital. I sat there with a psychiatrist and psychiatric nurse, as well as my mom. Talking about why I was there and what should be done when I would get out. It was my own decision to go there, no one forced me, I decided it and I needed it. Huge trigger warning! Suicidality, mental health crisis, etc. I am here today, much because of that night I went there. I am here now to write about world mental health day that was almost a week ago (on Saturday). Just imagine, without the short hospitalization, I would not probably be here. As cruel as the fact is, it is a must to write about. Desperation The hopelessness, suicidality, the need to escape mental pain with hurting myself physically, thoughts of killing myself, not being able to cry anymore, having no emotions, the constant need to be alone. Those were the things I had in my mind all the time. Constantly. Driving off the cliff, driving towards a wall, jumping off a cliff. Just doing some...

How exactly I ended up working at the school, in a place I used to say I would never work at? When I was still in Australia, I started to think I actually want to work in something that has a meaning. Even though I absolutely loved my job over there, I realized it is not exactly what I wanted. I helped and guided in my job every kind of people, including kids, teens, and adults with special needs. I also found a guy who was a personal trainer for special needs, kids, from Instagram, and I started following him.  Something just clicked and I knew that what I really want is to work with people with any kind of special needs. Best, if they would be kids or teens. Suddenly all the hard work with tourism was flushed away. I realized I had studied tourism for 7 years, and it was a field that I didn't actually want to work in.  I thought I am crazy, how could I want something else just out of nowhere? Tourism has always been close to my heart, already in primary school, I knew what I...

You think mental illness is all about sleeping 24/7? Crying for no reason? Just being negative and unhappy? You think it is about not having the energy to do anything and just laying on the bed, miserable. It is not. Mental illness(es) is a wide concept, where symptoms vary from person to person. Some people, someone like me, actually gets emotion spikes, where one week I have super energetic days (not in a good way), those days when I do not really care about anything, I just need to move all the time. Cannot stop, it is just something I must do, going from place a to b, and from b to c, and from there maybe from c to d before I can get back to the place a. Going for a run middle of the night? Yeah, why not. Or going to run when it is raining and dark? Yeah, what would be a better time to do so? Getting to the gym at 4am and being out somewhere until 10pm with no sleep? Yeah, no problem at all. Speeding on the road and doing so risking your own life? Yeah, who car...

So how does it feel like to lose hope? To lose the willpower to live? To feel too tired to get up in the morning? To just feel exhausted? It has been a few months since my last post (in fact more than just a few months). I could list probably hundreds of different reasons why I have not posted anything. But there is just one real reason, and it is, taking care of my mental health. While writing has always been my way to tell about everything, I realized that all my thoughts were so messed up in my mind, that writing was literally impossible. I even had a short break from social media, because I just did not know what to write. And I also had to think about what I want to share, and what I want to keep to myself. For a short time, I thought I will turn my Instagram to private and not post about everything. But then I realized, that it helps me, and maybe it could help someone else as well. Getting diagnosed At the end of September, I was diagnosed with major depression , alon...

September is an international pain awareness month; Did you know that? We all have experienced pain in our lives, I am sure about it. Physical pain, mental pain, anything. Pain from one single small paper cut, pain from stepping on the Lego, pain from sprains and strains. Pain from accidents, or pain from losing a loved one. But some of us, in fact, millions of us around the world, experience pain every day. Not only every day but every hour, every minute and every single damn second. And most of us, have been told: “Unfortunately, there is nothing I can do more.” We take medications every day to be able to even try to live like we once used to. We go to work, we go to the gym, we see our friends, we go shopping, and some days we do nothing at all. We have lost friends along the way, we have lost the things we used to do, we have lost trust too many people, we have been seen as drug seekers at the hospital, we have been demanding to be taken seriously, we have be...

"I never thought, that one day I would reach out for mental health struggles.  But the same way, I never thought, that I would one day have chronic pain." I think that sentence describes everything perfectly. Right now, right at this moment. Living with constant pain is not only about pain. The longer there is a pain, sooner or later, it will start to affect everything else as well. Mental health as number one. There are thousands, or even millions (who even knows the actual number) who have even ended their own life because of chronic pain and the lack of proper pain management. A thing not to joke about. Mental health struggles are becoming more and more acceptable around the world, but still, it is a taboo. It should not be a taboo, people should not be afraid of telling they are struggling mentally. We have to be able to talk about it, share information and be more accepting. The best way to do this is through the people who are middle of everything. The on...

M51.1 Lumbar Disc Disorder with Radiculopathy. That is my final diagnose. That is something that I cannot hide, or try to hide with thinking something else. That is in my medical files and records. I can see it all the time, as well as the doctors who are treating me with any other issues. It is there, and it will not just go away. Right now I have given 3-4 months time frame. If my pain will not improve, my doctor is ready to take the risk and try if surgery could give me some relief. At this point, right now, it is too risky to try it. My issue is small, in a medical point of view, and surgery could even make my pain worse. So my doctor wants to be sure, that before seriously considering surgery, we have tried absolutely everything else. I have been told, that if during those months, at any time, I feel my pain will get worse than this, I must see my doctor again.  What does that diagnose basically mean? I was told the same by my doctor as well as the d...