This is something I posted on my Instagram upon returning home from residential. It spread so much awareness and positive energy around mental health, so i wanted to add it on here too 🙂
I am currently sitting in an airport in CT, waiting on my flight to go home. Yesterday I got out of a mental health facility/rehab I’ve been at for the past 6 weeks. A lot of things happened in the past year. I struggled with suicidal ideation, self harm, and substance use. Since August I was just having a very difficult time with the concept of living. My anxiety and depression led me to one of the darkest places I’d ever been mentally. My family & friends have never showed me anything but love and acceptance however my depression convinced me otherwise & led me to feel the worst I have ever felt. In December I lost a lot of important friendships in my life & it really took a toll on me and my mental health. I felt as if I weren’t worthy of love or for anyone to stay in my life and the abandonment of those friendships hit me very deeply in the heart. Fast forward to March 19th, I tried to take my own life by overdosing while my parents were asleep. At 2am that night I woke up, feeling more sick than ever and eventually went and got my parents & told them what I had done. They took me to the ER and I don’t remember much after that. I do remember my mom seeing my self-harm scars for the first time ever. I saw her cry and break down in the hospital because she hadn’t known that I’d been struggling with cutting for months at that point. It was all new to her. After being given several doses of Ativan my heart rate would not come down. The next morning, I was taken in an ambulance to Memorial in Savannah and was there for 4 days in ICU. I don’t really remember any of those days. I then got transported to a critical care mental hospital. I was there for 7 days and I hated every moment. I had never felt so alone in my life. At that point my suicidal thoughts were nothing but worse. For the month after that my derealization was insane and I felt crazy at times because nothing felt real. I felt like from the moment I decided to swallow two bottles of pills from my kitchen cabinet, I was floating outside of my own body and only in my dreams did it really work. I continued getting worse after returning home. I relapsed with self-harm. I wore sleeves every day because I was terrified anyone would see my recent scars and would send me back to the mental hospital. I made friends with a lot of the wrong people. All I cared about was that temporary happiness that getting high left me with. I was constantly chasing that short term feeling and in the moments when I wasn’t using, I felt empty. Shortly after that I spent two weeks waiting for residentials to accept me so I could get the long-term care that I needed. Finally, Turnbridge accepted me. At first, I was angry at everyone for the fact that I was leaving. I didn’t I know that this facility was going to change my life and perspective on the world. I met some of the kindest, most amazing people while I was there. I formed so many bonds with the other people there and I feel so differently about life now. I’m posting this because there have been so many unsaid things about my story that I felt needed to be shared. Also because no one really knew I was struggling and I want every person who reads this to know that you are not alone. Mental Health is just as important as physical health and I spent so many months of my life truly sick. It affected not only me, but my family and every person that I love. Through all of this I have learned the importance of trusting the process. I couldn’t have done it without the help of Turnbridge and everyone there. Know that you are loved and you deserve to live a happy and long life, even though we might not always feel like it. I hope that sharing my story will bring hope to anyone else who is struggling with the same things that I struggled with. I am thankful that I am here today to say all of these things because at one point I didn’t know if I would be. Recovery is so so important and it is seriously the most bad b!tch thing that a person can do❤️
