4 months

4 months. 16 weeks. Approximately 128 days, give or take. 

Sounds like such a short time, doesn't it? I guess it is, in the grand scheme of things. 

Yesterday I finished my 5th week at my new job at Kings. I came home feeling really good about myself and even looking forward to Monday! (Wtf?!) I know it's all new and sparkly and the feeling may wear off soon but I'm going to make the most of every minute! 

It's amazing to think that only 4 months ago I was being told that I was terrible with people and that maybe customer service wasn't for me. Now, I'm in conference calls with the head IT guys at Kings College London because my input is valued. 

I'm still getting used to being treated with respect. Sometimes I doubt myself and wonder why I'm being trusted with these things. That's only in downtime though. In the moment, I just get on with it. 

It's taking me some time to settle in with the new crowd but honestly, they are lovely. My trust issues are slowly subsiding and I'm letting them in, little by little. I will admit that I went in with a big smile but also with my defences all the way up. The fact that I sit next to my boss all day was, at first, incredibly unsettling. Nothing against him personally at all, of course, but I was tense for the first couple of days.

Now we've begun to bond over a mutual love of rock music and gaming. :) 

I've found I have some kindred spirits there. People who have been through really crappy experiences, survived and have emerged stronger and with a desire to help and empower others to do the best that they can. I can't tell you how much I LOVE this! 

Weirdly, I'm actually looking forward to things like Christmas do's and social stuff that we may all do together. Haven't had that feeling in a while! I worked with a lovely group of people in my last job too but the thought of spending any more time with certain people made it an absolute 'not going to happen'! 

In 4 very short months I've gone from feeling completely worthless to beginning to gain back the self esteem and confidence I had before. I thought that it would take me years. But it just proves that when you're in the right environment with supportive people then you can do things that you never thought you could. 

I'm just so thankful and so grateful. For everything. For having the support of my family, my old friends, my new friends, all of whom are constantly encouraging me. 

For anyone who feels unhappy with their current experience, please look for something new. Try and change your situation as much as it's in your power to do so. 

Don't be like me and stick it out thinking things will change for the better as they probably won't. I'm not encouraging anyone to just up and hand their notice in, like I did. But just DO something. 

They say that the grass is never greener on the other side. I disagree. :) 

Yours, with optimism,

Anxiety Girl xoxo

Meeting Jensen Ackles

I wanted to say something about this. Not just to be all "ooooh, get me!" But because it turned out to be even more special than I could ever have dreamed. 

I'm a big fan of his, have been a Dean girl since episode 1 of Supernatural so naturally, was even more excited for this con that most. (And trust me, I am ALWAYS excited about con!) 

I will warn you now that this is going to get a little deep and may shock some of you. It may also be triggery for which I apologise, but I think it's worth telling this story of mine. 

Jensen and co star Jared Padalecki have been running what it essentially an anti-suicide campaign #AlwaysKeepFighting to raise funds for mental health projects. It's been massively successful and deservedly so. Jared has been open about his own mental health problems in the past. Anybody that knows me, knows that I am passionate about talking about and ending the stigma around these issues. 

So there I am in the autograph queue and I'm planning on saying that I don't have enough time or words to tell him how much I love Dean and the show. Autos can go pretty quickly so you have to talk fast and get to the point! 

I'm next up, have my words prepared and I'm good to go! 

Except that it didn't exactly go to plan. I say hello whilst he's signing my photo and then he looks up at me and smiles. 

And something in my brain clicks. I literally still don't know what happened to cause what I said next. 

At the beginning of this year, I had decided that I'd had enough. Of everything. I won't go into detail but I had planned exactly how I was going to end my life. There was too much pain, too much darkness and a complete lack of hope that things would ever get any better. I've been low before but this was so much worse than I'd ever experienced. I didn't tell anyone. I just decided that I was going to do it quickly and quietly and it would all stop. 

Except that I couldn't. Each time I decided I was going to do it, the thought of my parents finding my body was unbearable. I knew that my passing would cause them untold amounts of pain and I just couldn't do it to them. 

Bearing that in mind, maybe what I said to Jensen wasn't that surprising but it shook the hell out of me. I just didn't see it coming. 

"Hi Mr Ackles. I just wanted to say thank you for the #AlwaysKeepFighting campaign. I nearly stopped fighting this year, so thank you." 

Uh, wtf have I just said?!! Like I said, I hadn't told a single soul about it and yet I had just blurted it out to an actor off the telly. 

Not only that but my voice had started cracking when I was speaking to him and I had the most massive lump in my throat. 

His reaction and his words will stay with me forever. He made seriously direct eye contact with me and just kind of stopped.

 "I'm really glad you didn't. Please keep coming back here. We have a strong family (Meaning the Supernatural family, the fandom name) and we'll always support each other." 

I wish I could describe the look in his eyes. The closest I can come to it is absolute sincerity. 

I got out a thank you and he also thanked me. I walked away in absolute shock at what had just happened. I love having a human moment or two with the cast of this show. They really are just lovely people, but this was something else. 

I walked back to the panel hall with my head down because the tears had started and I couldn't stop them. Karina, my bestie, took one look at me and just gave me the biggest cuddle ever. We had a long talk later that day. It was so difficult to try and get the words out. To try and tell someone that loves you that you planned on not being here any more. 

She handled it amazingly well considering how shocked she was. Love my girl. <3 

It was a shocking moment for me. To realise how close I'd come to doing it. I'm in SO much of a better place now that it almost feels like it was someone else. 

I don't want this to be all doom and gloom, as it's not. It was a harsh reality check for me but a good one. It really made me realise how far I've come and that a fantastic new chapter of my life has started. 

The next day I went for my photo op with Jensen and the awesomely epic Tim Omundson. I knew exactly what I wanted so when Tim said "hey darlin! What can we do for you?!" (Love him!), I said "Can I have big squishy cuddles please?!" 

Jensen opened his arms out, smiled and said "Of course!" 

And this is the result. 

I love and adore this pic with all my heart! 

Can you tell?!! 

When the photo had been taken and I sadly had to leave this most epic of sandwiches, I told Jensen that I loved him. He said thank you and squeezed my shoulder as I left. 

And to think, if I had followed through with my plan, then this would never have happened. :) 

It sure is a weird way to "come out" and admit something like this but I have had some honest and emotional talks about the subject since then. 

All this good stuff from a TV show. Who'd a thunk it? 

#AlwaysKeepFighting 

It does get better. 

Yours, Not So Much Anxiety Girl anymore. Xoxo 

An awfully big adventure!

My life is going to be nuts in the next few weeks! 

Fri 8th May - Drive to Birmingham with my fandom girls and the cast of Supernatural for a weekend of insane convention epicness. 

Sunday 10th May - Leave Bham and drive to London to Kings College to start my new job training. Am staying in the mature student halls of residence! Shared bathroom and kitchen should be an experience after years of living alone! Also, cramming my brain with a brand new way of working! 

Kings have been amazingly generous and given me Friday the 15th of May off so I can travel back to Bham for yet another weekend of convention epicness with the cast of Arrow, The Flash, Gotham and yet more of my fandom girls. 

Sunday 17th May - Drive back to London for a full week at Kings. 

Friday 22nd May (after work)  - Seeing as it's a Bank Holiday weekend, I'm going to drive to Borehamwood, Herts, to spend the night there so I can catch up with my most adored cousin and very dear friend, Sian on the Saturday. Then I'm going to drive home that evening. 

That's 16 days away from home, which I believe is the longest I have been away since I moved back to Cornwall in 2000! 

The last month or so has been fairly tense in a lot of ways. I had 3 interviews for the job. I was pretty sure that I had it all the way through but it turns out that one of the other candidates had been rejected after the third interview. 

On the third interview we had been told that they couldn't envision us starting before May 26th. Then the next day I had it confirmed that there was a definite offer on the table and the contract would be sent out. The only difference would be that they wanted me to start on the 11th May and that there would be 2 weeks training in London instead of one, which I hadn't know previously. 

That's in 9 days! There may have been a little bit of a panic about how I was going to manage my hectic schedule. Ok, there was a lot of panic! Hi, Anxiety Brain! 

But it occurred to me whilst chatting with a friend that I had been wishing, for some time, for an adventure. A big adventure. 

And this is it. An adventure that's going to include quite serious amounts of stress and the euphoric high of seeing dear friends and loved ones. 

Originally I had the two weeks of con time booked as holiday so I had adequate recovery time between cons. 

Cons are when I push myself to wring every moment of joy out of the weekend and I end up exhausted but exhilarated. 

But this is the reality of life. Sometimes things are put in your path to challenge you. As much as I sometimes let my anxiety hold me back, with this, I can't. Getting back to work is something I need at this point. I need the stability, routine, regular pay check and to be amongst people again. 

My cons are my sanity. The counterbalance to the daily grind of life. Being amongst an awesome bunch of nerds and geeks lets me be free to truly be who I am. After doing a fair few cons now, I also have an extended group of friends who I only get to see at these events. I adore spending time with these people, SO much. 

It's also the one weekend a year where I get to spend 3 days with my best friend. Priceless girly time, not only to have fun but to really catch up without the pressures of family life for her. <3 I love our trips so much! 

I am so self aware at this point, that I know all the stress and worry will last until I get in the car on the Friday morning and start driving. After that, I'm in it and can only take it a day at a time. 

I want to take this opportunity to talk about medication. I agree to a certain extent that our country can be seen as 'over medicated'. However, there are times when it's imperative to me to have some pills. I discussed this with my doctor yesterday and I explained the situation with the new job and the travelling. He agreed with me that my rare prescriptions for diazepam and sleeping pills will be psychologically helpful. A preventative, if you will. If I have them, then I'm not going to be worried about not having them. 

At this point, all my ducks are in a row. I've prepped as much as possible and am now feeling considerably more settled as a result. 

Next week will be about shopping, packing and making sure Sophie's stuff is all in order for my parents to take care of her. 

To quote the great Robin Williams as Peter Pan in Hook: "To live would be an awfully great adventure." 

That's the plan. :) 

Optimistically yours, 

Anxiety Girl xoxo 

Depression Awareness Week - Day 1

I'm going to try and make sure that I blog every day this week. We'll see how that goes!! 

Today I want to talk about communication. Or maybe more accurately, miscommunication. 

When I'm going through a particularly low period, I barely talk. Partly because I don't have the energy and partly because I just don't want to. 

Although things are looking up, with a new job on the horizon and getting back to a routine, I'm actually experiencing a pretty bad slump. Over Easter weekend I didn't leave my flat. Or my bed. For 4 whole days. 

I think I had a couple of conversations with my Mum on the phone and that was it. Other than that I didn't speak to anyone other than my cat. Although I love her dearly, her conversational skills are somewhat lacking. 

I am caught in a constant battle between wanting to talk and wanting to be silent. 

I had a situation this week with a very, very dear friend that brought all this right to the forefront. I had been feeling that this person had been 'using' me to talk about their own problems and not bothering to ask how I was, despite knowing that it's been a tumultuous few months for me. Like I said, I love this person dearly and I didn't want there to be this 'thing' getting in the way. So I decided to write an email in the nicest possible way, to explain how I was feeling and why. I knew it was going to make the other person feel bad and it absolutely made me cringe to write it all out. But I did it and I felt sick to my stomach when I pressed send. 

As expected, it didn't go down well. Why would it? Any person who receives an email like that is going to feel like crap. 

Luckily this person felt able to contact me and we had a painfully honest text conversation. 

And when I say painful I mean painful. For me. 

Basically my friend told me that when she did ask how I was doing, she was met with a breezy (yet kind) dismissal and an immediate turn in discussion back to her. 

Oh. Ouch. 

(If the person I'm discussing is reading this, then you know that I've paraphrased greatly and I hope you think the above assessment is fair.) <3

As if to reinforce this, another dear friend said in a text that I had been quiet and she sometimes wondered if it was her. 

More ouch. 

The answer is no. Emphatically, no. 

It really is not you, it's me. 

I feel like I've done my friends a great disservice recently by not replying, not making social arrangements and generally not being a friend. This pains me an awful lot as my mates are very important to me. 

I can't solve this one overnight, much as I really wish I could. The only explanation I can offer is that I've needed time to retreat and start to heal some wounds that are very deep. I've asked for patience and understanding and my friends, being the epic people that they are, have granted me exactly that. 

I've given so many apologies and reassurances that these people are loved and valued by me. And if you are one of the people that have yet to have a reply from me then I am so very sorry. It really means an awful lot to me that you would contact me and if you feel ignored (which you have the right to) then know that it's not on purpose and it's certainly not personal. 

At the moment I just suck at being a human being. But it really is temporary, that I promise you. In fact, there's almost a point to be made here for enjoying the silence because as soon as I'm back at work and have news and new experiences to share then you're going to be sick of me! ;) 

In all of this, I am aware of it all. I know it's happening and I know that I want to be better. As things stand, I know that things will change as soon as I'm back in the work environment. As much as we all don't like having to go to work, there's a lot to be said for the routine and the social aspect of it especially when you have hermit-like tendencies. I realised that when I went to my works leaving do. 

I had such a great night. Yet I hadn't been on a works social outing for a really long time. Of course then I was really mad at myself for not doing it sooner. *epic facepalm* 

So let me sum up the points I'm trying to make here: 

1. It's depression awareness week. I am aware that I have it and that it adversely affects the way I want to live my life. 

2. I am asking for your patience and a little understanding. There are people that want to meet up with me, and I with them, but it hasn't happened yet. Yet. It will happen and I do want to see them because I want to catch up with them and share time with them. I'm hoping that this blog post will go some way to make them aware that this is my issue, not theirs. 

3. Even if you haven't experienced mental health issues yourself, but you find yourself in this same kind of situation with a friend or loved one, please be patient. 

4. Awareness is everything. I am aware that I cannot write a short and to-the-point blog post. :/ 

As I said, way back in the past (at the top), I'm going to do my bit for Depression Awareness Week by writing something every day. The exception may be Thursday as it is going to be a busy one. I have a meeting with my new boss and co-workers in the morning. In the evening it's Avengers time! *flail* :D 

For more information about mental health issues in general, please go to the following resources: 

Www.time-to-change.org.uk

Www.mind.org.uk 

Yours in recovery, 

Anxiety Girl xoxo 

Change is coming :)

Life has changed so much since the beginning of 2015. Sometimes it feels like  it's taken forever and sometimes it feels like it's gone at Flash speed. 

I've had a period of quiet, something so very much needed. My perception of who I am has undergone a profound change, mainly because of how I got my new job. 

In January I was spinning out of control, exhausted in every way. I was waging a battle on two fronts, one being my own mind, and the other a real life Dementor. 

The Dementor constantly fed my mind a series of lies about how cruel and heartless I was. My mind was fighting against the lies yet, at the same time questioned if the lies were the truth. 

Sounds confusing, right? Yep. 

It's not the first time this has happened. An ex partner constantly swore he was being faithful and dismissed my doubts again and again, leading me to question what I knew in my gut was right. And I was right. You'd think I would have learned from that. Unfortunately Dementors always swoop when they know you're vulnerable. 

I digress(ish). 

Actually, let me digress here for a second. I'm an emotional person. To the point of being over sensitive. I was brought up to believe that tears were a sign of weakness. Now I know better. 

Since experiencing the complete emotional numbness of depression, I have realised that my emotions are my strength. (Is that my superhero power?!) 

All emotion is real. Some can be dismissive about the reason you're feeling a certain way and tell you that it's not worth it or to stop caring about it. (Thanks for the tip, now if you could please demonstrate how exactly to do that?) 

So fast forward to more recent times and the search for a new job. Big change is always scary and I've certainly had a hefty dose of that. However, change can also be surprising in ways that you could never imagine. 

Here's how the job thing went. 

Wednesday: phone call from one of the agencies I'd sent my details to. The consultant apologised to me for having taken so long to get back to me and asked me if I could come in the following day as she had read my CV and wanted to meet with me as soon as possible. 

Thursday: Meeting with Kit at the agency (no nonsense, no bullshit, very direct, just my kind of person!). We discussed my previous employment and what I wanted to do next, all in a relaxed and friendly way. During the meeting she describes me as an ideal candidate, very placeable, and twice says that I have a lovely personality. She brings me the details of a job that she thinks I would be right for and, luckily, I agree with her. She says that she will be handing over my details to the other agent who is in charge of the recruitment for Kings College. 

Friday: Phone call from Emma-Jane to say that Kit had run into her office, waving my CV at her saying that she absolutely had to see me. Would I be available for a job interview on Monday? Why yes, I would be. 

Monday: Interview with Emma-Jane and lady from Kings College. All seemed to go well. I answers their questions, they took copious notes, we laughed a lot. They said that decisions would be made over the next 2 days and that I should expect the yay or nay call on Wednesday. 

3 hours later: Phone call from Emma-Jane asking me how I thought it had gone. I said that I felt it went well although, just like everybody else, there were things I felt I could have said better at the time, however I put that down to nerves! She laughed and said that it had gone extremely well, they thought I was perfect for the job and was one of 3 candidates they were putting forward for 3 vacancies. Was that ok? Um, yes, that's pretty effing amazing! 

Wait, whoa, hold up. Let's back it up a little here. 

So Kings College, a prestigious and historical British institution, want me to come and work for them? To be the first voice the staff and students hear when they phone? 

But aren't I really bad with people? Aren't  I a morose/angry/unkind person? Don't I constantly abuse the people I come into contact with on a daily basis? Surely the experienced people at the agency would have seen through my cheerful facade and realised that I am an individual that should not be within a million miles of Kings? 

Or maybe they just don't have an agenda and they liked the person they saw. Maybe they listened to my answers and liked what they heard and saw my sincerity. 

The truth is that I went into that interview without my defences up. That's what this time out has given me. I hadn't meant it to be over a month without work. But I have to believe that things have worked out this way for a reason. That if I had gone into that interview with all those negatives still very much at the forefront of my mind, then the outcome would probably have been very different. 

Everything that I heard and experienced that week was positive. Po-si-tive. 

Having had a little time to sit and reflect on the situation, I am compelled to realise one thing. Or maybe two things. 

As always, the first is a quote from the awesomeness that is Wil Wheaton: Depression lies. 

The second is that if you have an entity that reinforces the lies that depression tells you, then you will believe them. 

When you truly lose yourself in a bad situation, it is nigh on impossible to think your way out of it. You can't see the light and the hope at the end of the tunnel because you don't know where the damn tunnel is. You just know you're in it. 

And then one person (albeit unknowingly) come to find you in that tunnel and shows you the way out. (Sheesh. Maybe I should change my name to Metaphor Girl). 

So at this point:

Dementor/depression - 0 Anxiety Girl - 1

Now please excuse me whilst I barge my way past you and go and live a new chapter of my life. I've earned it. 

Yours never, 

Anxiety Girl xoxo 

Q&A

Ask me anything. 

The reason I started this blog was to hopefully inform and educate about what it's like to be a regular person dealing with mental illness on a day to day basis. I felt so devastated by the suicide of Robin Williams, as a fan and as a person, that I felt compelled to do it when I was asked "but he had all the money and a family and a successful career. What did he have to be depressed about?" 

That was from someone that has been by my side and seen me through all of my worst times. That's when it really struck home that this illness is still phenomenally misunderstood. 

So I'm opening up the floor to you, dear readers. What is it that you want to know? I'm absolutely fine with questions about my personal circumstances. That's pretty much what this blog is about anyway! 

But things like support for loved ones, medication, legal rights, work absence, emotional and physical symptoms, dealing with GP's, counselling, basically anything and everything. 

Obviously I'm not a trained professional but I can definitely point you in the right direction should you want more information. If you're worried or curious or you want to know why I share all this stuff then this is the place to be! 

You can leave questions in the comments on FaceBook if you're comfortable being public about it or pm me if you're not. I shall try to get back to you asap, although please bear in mind that I have times where I need to be quiet and it may take a couple of hours or so. :) 

If you choose to pm me then PLEASE be assured that all that you say will be held in the strictest confidence. I do not take that lightly in the slightest and I want you guys to feel safe about that. It takes immense courage to open up about personal issues and I absolutely respect that having been through it myself. 

If you feel that you or someone close to you is in immediate danger then please refer to www.mind.org for emergency help. 

The floor is yours..... 

Love, Anxiety Girl xoxo 

Lessons Learned

I was thinking about 'theming' this blog post but I have too many thoughts running around in my head. So it's likely that this will be a brain fart of sorts and a long one at that! Read on if you will but be prepared for the random! 

Had my works leaving do last night. Socialising has not been high on my list of priorities recently. I have been living the hermit life for many months now. But I went because I worked with awesome people and because it was a joint leaving do with my dear friend Mike, who I have worked with closely over the last 5 years or so. 

This part is hard to explain so please bear with me. My last few months at work were seriously tough to deal with. I had so much negative criticism from one person that it coloured the way I thought everyone else felt about me too. It got to the point where I was genuinely expecting people that I'd known for a long time and always got on well with, to suddenly turn and snap at me and tell me that I was letting them down and that every bad thing that happened at work was down to me. I felt that I was constantly bothering them by asking stupid questions and, at times, being phenomenally annoying because I was unable to control my emotions due to being so deeply unhappy. 

So I have to admit that I was apprehensive before I went. I knew that quite a few people would be there because Mike is a popular guy and that they all would want to give him a good send off and wish him all the best for his new job. 

Me? Maybe not so much. 

But I was pretty much overwhelmed when everyone arrived. I had compliments on how well I was looking. There were lovely moments when people would quietly ask me how I was doing and genuine smiles and lovely words. I really can't convey it accurately but each conversation chipped away at the wall I'd built up around me. 

I'm aware now that I isolated myself from them in trying to protect myself. I did my best to appear cheerful, sometimes I succeeded and sometimes I failed epically. 

It's still too soon for me to trust when people say nice things to me that they 100% mean it. That is absolutely no reflection on their sincerity at all, it's just my state of mind at the moment. But last night went a really long way to breaking that down. I felt accepted and warmly welcomed and that was more than enough for me. :) 

It still amazes me that one person had the power to break me down to such an extent. In fairness, I suppose I should be a little easier on myself. When I went back to work, I'd just been through a mental health crisis and was vulnerable. It was taken advantage of by someone in authority and used as a weapon. 

Hindsight being what it is, I should have stood up for myself from day one. 

Hindsight is a bitch. 

I should have trusted my instincts, and therein lies the biggest lesson I've learned recently. If it feels wrong, then it IS wrong. 

Despite knowing that I was heading down an incredibly rocky path, I persevered, fooling myself into believing that it would get better. 

I should have stopped it the moment the suicidal thoughts appeared. That's the honest truth about how low I got. I genuinely believed that I was worthless and an unkind and cruel person. I haven't admitted that to anyone and I don't do it now for any other reason than that I don't want anyone else who finds themself in a similar position to get to that point. 

I knew about 2 weeks in that this situation was potentially very harmful to me. Yet I stuck it out. Why? I wish I could give you a proper reason. Maybe because I'm stubborn, maybe because I didn't want this person to 'win', maybe because I want to believe the best of people, maybe because I'm an optimist at heart, I just don't know. 

There were many conversations had between my loved ones and I about how to deal with the situation. As is prudent and practical, most advised to stick it out until I found another job. 

But I couldn't. I was getting progressively worse with every day that went past. There were days when I would finish work, get back to my car and then have to run for the nearest shrubbery to throw up in. 

Then came the day that I had had enough. Another reprimand, another bout of cruel words and that was it. 

What follows is the most valuable lesson I have gained from this whole experience and it's going to sound so simple and trust me when I say that I have facepalmed over this many, many times. 

No one else is living your life. No one knows exactly how you feel. No one goes through the emotions that you do. People may have been through similar situations and found a different solution. But not one of them can tell you what's right for you. Only you know what is bearable, how much you can take and when it has to stop and change direction. 

It may seem insane to some that I would just hand my notice in without a job to go to, hence a financially uncertain future. I can understand that from a logical point of view. But I also know what the consequences of me staying in that situation any longer would have been. 

So I took a leap of faith and trusted that everything would work out. So far it's going ok.  It's taken me a little longer than I thought to start recovering but again, I'm fine with that. I'm now in a place where I'm looking forward to finding work and beginning to regain the confidence I'd managed to build up before all this happened. 

Weirdly, I know I'm going to be temporarily embarrassed when I publish this entry and post it where my friends can see it. But I'm going to do it anyway. When I decided to start this blog in August last year, my aim was always to be as honest as I could be about being a person that has to deal with mental illness as best they can. Much as there was a temporary derailment, things are getting back on track. 

It's just that now I don't give a flying fuck whether anyone thinks I'm weird. Or decides to judge my actions or my personality. I may have my issues but no one has the right to put me down for that. No one had the right to use my honesty as ammunition. 

I'm not a useless superhero, I'm just an unlikely one. :) 

Love, Anxiety Girl xoxo 

Relapse and Recovery

Question: When is a superhero not a superhero? 

Answer: When they don't feel like a superhero any more. 

The Anxiety Girl 'identity' came about because I realised that, for people like me, daily life can be a (sometimes) massive fight. It's my way of recognising that as bad and as pathetic as I feel, I'm actually doing ok because I'm managing to get out of bed in the morning. 

The reason I stopped blogging for a while is because an unknown someone decided to 'report' a status I'd made about being kind to people in service industries at Christmas to my manager. I was taken into a room and given a reprimand (one amongst many I had over the last 3 months I worked there)  because it was deemed harmful to the company I used to work for. 

Not only did it stop me blogging but it also stopped me talking about my life in general. I got too afraid of anything I said being used against me. I'll probably never know who did it, I can't imagine someone fessing up to it, but in case they happen to be reading this: thanks for the damage you caused. Thanks for making me shut down and stop communicating in one of the few ways I feel comfortable with. Thank you for giving someone a reason to put me down that was so not needed, at a time when I was struggling anyway. You may have thought you were acting in someone's best interest but it certainly wasn't mine. Maybe a quiet word or a private message could have been a solution had you been genuinely concerned about an innocent status being harmful. Instead it got used as ammunition. 

Do I sound bitter? That would be because I am. 

Without going into detail, after nearly 10 years of working for the same company and feeling relatively happy with it, I handed in my notice. Why? Because if I had kept going the way I was then I would have had a breakdown or worse. 

I really can't tell you how much I wish that was an understatement. I have never been made to feel so worthless, so pathetic and like such a bad person. I expended SO much energy during the day that I was coming home and getting straight into bed. Then when I tried to sleep, my mind was going into overdrive. Trying to work out if anything I had done during the day could be conceived as being 'wrong' and dreading what the next day would bring. 

That's no way to live. We spend a good percentage of our life at work and when you end up terrified of being there then it takes a massive toll on you. 

Within a day or two of me handing my notice in, people started to remark how different I looked. Apparently I went from looking "grey, washed out and haunted" to looking like a human being again. Says a lot, doesn't it? 

So, as of right now, I am not beholden to anyone. I am free to speak my truth without fear of consequence. 

However much I may get worried about the future, nothing and no one will ever convince me that I made the wrong decision. I didn't need confirmation of this but I got it from the people that are closest to me anyway. To a person they told me how proud they were of me, how it was absolutely the right thing to do, how much they were relieved and how much they loved me. 

As things stand right now, I have some major issues to start challenging and working through. The world swings from being a terrifying place to one filled with unknown opportunity and the promise of better times to come. However, the best news is that my interest in life has started to come back. Small things like getting a haircut, going to see my best mate and beginning to look forward to upcoming events. 

My main problem is confidence. I've never felt so devoid of it. I know that this will start to come back as I find a new job  and open myself up to the world again but it does make these things more difficult to face. 

I have made decisions about my future and I'm comfortable with them. 

Now begins the road to recovery. It is the most difficult one I have faced to date but if there's one thing I've learned over recent times, it's how resilient I am. 

I have some hope back and that's what's most important. :) 

Anxiety Girl xoxo