I am raging right now, anger, confusion, frustration, annoyance.
I will make this very clear, I am writing from my own point of view, my own experience. You may read this a certain way, that is your right. I have never expressed a belief that I am an amazingly articulate person. I have never written on behalf of someone else, expressed their views, experiences, thoughts, or disparaged them.
I do apologise if you read this and it upsets you in anyway, if you find it triggering please don't read on. Find another post or website to read from.
I have struggles, challenges, thoughts that are not easy, in fact they are very f'ing hard. I continue to be challenged daily by thoughts of low self worth, self doubt and self harm. I write this not so you feel sorry for me, not to make you feel that your own troubles are not equal or worthy. I write because I NEED too. I write because I would encourage others to do the same. Because for many of us that suffer with illnesses like depression and borderline personality disorder, we struggle to communicate to others. We struggle with verbal, physical, emotional communication.
I write because I worry that one day I won't and that day day I may do something silly. Something that I can't take back.
This (finished by the way) post having just deleted itself, obviously does want to be posted. But I will re type it because its important.
Today I was told that I shouldn't have uploaded one of my previous blog posts. While I understand that what I wrote may have affected that person, that I feel, is almost something I can not control. I write because I need to, because I believe it is important too. I suffer from an illness that is a KILLER. Crap, its the biggest killer of men my age! Mental illness is real.
I have never written on behalf of anyone else, I do not know what other people think or feel, even if I thought I knew, I'm pretty sure I would be wrong. I have written about my struggles and the challenges that have come from all my relationships: partners, friends, family and colleagues. I write knowing they could read, but not expecting them too. In my mind there is a big difference. I write at risk to myself, because my friends, family and colleagues could read this. They could read about my difficulty in talking to them, they could read that I think about harming myself. Do you think I want them to ready about this and see it on hear and not hear it from me? This is not my 'preferred' method of communication, it is often my ONLY method of communication when it comes to topics and thoughts like this.
Having a day were I can look at sharp knifes and not think about cutting or stabbing myself is a success for me. I am VERY aware this is not the world that most people live in. I am not asking you to understand, I only ask that you consider this is my life. It is not a bad two weeks, or a crappy summer. This is it day in day out! Please respect that.
Again, I am not saying I have it any worse than someone else, or that you shouldn't talk about how you feel. In fact I would encourage you to talk about how you feel to whoever you feel committable with and however you feel comfortable doing it. That is partly why I write, to encourage conversation, to encourage others to reach out, wether it is mental health related or not.
The person I spoke to said that I should have asked permission before writing about our interaction. I am sorry but I only wrote about my side, my thoughts struggles, insecurities and essentially inabilities and failures. I am sorry if you are upset about this, but you are not my editor. If I choose (with all the self loathing I'm not good at self promo, but) to write about something I failed with then I am actually proud of that. This is not a reflection on you. I am owning it. It is my failure, my inability, the person I am exposing is ME.
Again, I would encourage others, talk about your struggles, your mental health, whatever. Own it, don't let it own you!
I find this method works for me, some think its confident or big header to write about myself. I don't really see it like that. I try to see the good in it. But I often feel a failure. I write because the likelihood is that the people reading this are people I do not know and likely will never know. I write because I am unable to do what many people are able to do without thinking about it.
I understand that it is difficult for those around me, I have no idea what it would be like to love someone that was experiencing something like this and having no idea how they felt or how to help. I am just saying its not great here either.
I also don't think it is arrogant to talk about myself, it the only thing I know... well, mmm yer ok so I don't exactly 'know myself' (is that a Grado quote?). But I talk about something I need to and hopefully something that helps one or two other people. Which I know it has because some of you have chatted to me. I write about myself because I can't write for other people. Because I would be lost without it. Because I know where I could be without it.
I feel quite typed out now, especially as I've typed this twice after being quite worked up and it self deleting.
If I have affected anyone during this post I am sorry, that was / is not my intention.
If you are struggling for whatever reason please do reach out. Remember Samaritans are always available.
While I do have some posts that are: I did this, I saw this, ooo this product. Most of my posts are about mental health. I do NOT apologise for this. I know that this may in the future push people away, but hey thats my speciality. So yes, I may have written and will write again about my parents and my childhood, I may reflect on friends and past relationships, I may discuss my experience in workplaces. But I will never knowingly disparage someone or be hurtful to them. I am and can only ever write from my own view and experience. You can disagree, think I'm a fool or whatever. But I will have written my truth and since this blog started out as being for me, I am ok with that.
Thank you for reading
YNA
