Mental illness- lets talk about it

Its absolutely crazy for me to think that in this day and age that some people still think it’s not ok to talk about mental illness, some people still want to hide people who suffer from mental illness away and pretend that the problem isn’t there,

Regular readers of mine will know that I’ve never been one to hide my struggles but for those of you who are new to my blog, Hi I’m Katt, I’m married, 35, I’m a carer and I suffer from Depression and Anxiety and I’ve even tried to take my own life,

As someone who has suffered with this for over ten years I’ve found ways to cope, but it’s been hard, stressful and exhausting too, I’ve lost many friends who just couldn’t or didn’t want to deal with it but I’ve also found some amazing people that I can turn to when I need them the most. I’ve had many different anti-depressants and even seen a therapist, I’ve had people tell me “it’s all in my head” “aw your just down” and my personal favourite “just get over it” the truth is, I wish I could just “get over it” as when my “derp” brain hits its awful, I have trouble eating, all I want to do is cry and sleep, self-care goes completely out of the window and I end up feeling run down and sick.

I’m currently going through a dark period again and I hate it, I keep a smile on my face for work, my body is in auto pilot doing what I need to but my brain is away being a mess and stressing out to the point that my shakes are 100 times worse, When I’m like this I can never see a way out, Now let me just say that I’m not thinking of self-harm as that’s not how my depression works anymore (thankfully) but it has in the past (I also must say that everyone suffers in differnet ways) I’ve managed to deal with that particular demon but there is still a few others left that I battle with daily when I’m at this stage, I find that reaching out to friends just to let them know I’m having a bad time helps, I do try not to put too much on them though as I’ve lost a few “friends” through this illness and I would hate to have to go through that again and to be honest it hurt me a lot. So now what normally happens is I will message the few friends I need to, let a couple of work mates know what’s going on and then retreat to my flat when I’m not due in work, I try and stay off most forms of social media as looking at things like Facebook really don’t help my mental state, I do keep a check on my messages though as some of the people in my life that know what’s going on to check in with me every so often,

I’m really struggling this time round though and I have no clue what’s triggered this particular dark cloud but writing this is helping and I’m also taking extra time to make sure I look after myself, forcing myself to shower and to take time to eat, when I’m really low I try and eat as healthy as I can but sometimes I just binge on junk and that helps me feel a little better for a very short amount of time, I’ve just had my junk binge so now it’s time to get lots of healthy fruit and veg into my body as I know that making my insides feel better will help with the fog that’s currently in my brain. Hopefully this dark time won’t last very long this time but my brain always has that little voice right in the back telling me that this is just how it is, I do try to ignore it but every now and then that little voice becomes a shout and gets noticed.

Writing this is just a way for me to get out some of the thoughts that are in my head and hopefully it helps life my mood a little.

If like me you suffer from any form of mental health issue or you know someone who suffers don’t be scared to reach out with a little message as it really can make all the difference, I want more people to start talking about this issues and stop trying to hide them away, the more we chose to ignore it the worse it becomes and that’s when tragedy can strike, stand up, speak out and own it, I’m trying to and I will happily support any of you guys who choose to do the same.

Much love and thanks for reading

Kitty Katt 🐾