A day in a life with me and my mental health thoughts and how it taught me to look through new lens

A diary entry from my journal 2015 ,

It’s 8 a.m. and I wake up, often wishing I didn’t. “Why couldn’t I have just passed peacefully in my sleep?” I ask myself. But with a long sigh, I know I have to face the day eventually. Many times, I don’t have it in me to brush my teeth,it takes so much energy so I get up, go downstairs and make my coffee. I bring it to the couch and crawl intosomesort of a comfy position .

Even finding a comfortable way to sit is hard , I can feel my muscles cramping my arse bones are like knives digging into the couch . I don’t want to deal with today. What’s the point?

The funny thing is last night my joural has in it that today I will wake up have breakfast drink all my ensures and really try for every meal . But again that’s changed .

Its like I record playing over and over .

Im sick of the same routine same meal time same meal same panic attack that comes with each and every meal .

WHY OONAGH CANT YOU JUST DO IT!!

after having this little fight with myself in my head , I scroll through Instagram looking at all the fitness people with there abs and their healthy lifestyle .. why cant I just be like that ..why cant I overcome this stupid voice in my head .

Here she comes ensure and straw in her hand . ugh I don’t mean to be mean but jesus I just don’t want anyone to talk to to me or be nice to me .

I wish I could leave, I just don’t want to feel this pain anymore.

I might take a nap, trying to block the day out.  I distract myself with mindless scrolling through social media, scared of being alone with my thoughts.  I need to get outside, but partly because the voices of my eating disorder tend to get louder as the day goes on but I cant leave the house. I cant even be alone upstairs , incase I exercise when in fact I actually have just bursted out 50 sit ups lying hereon the couch . I used to get 60 jumping jacks when I went to the bathroom tbh maybe my heart will just give up and everyone will be free’d from the hurt im doing .

Il take a shower , stand there let the water just run down me and let it wash away my thoughts . I could stand here for hours and listen to the water feel the water and feel the heat .my skin is bright red from it because well im pretty fucking cold .

After a day of fighting with my mam over her just trying to help me and I want the help I just cant do it I go to bed .

As I turn off my lights, it hits. This is when it’s the worst. The darkness of the night consumes me. My thoughts go haywire. I have urges to self-harm. I feel like a burden and don’t want to reach out to anyone. Some nights, I spend hours crying; on others, I lie numb, unable to feel anything. I don’t want to wake up in the morning, not to just do this all over again. I tell myself that while I can deal with suicidal thoughts to some extent forever, I can’t keep going at this extent. It’s too dark, it’s too painful and it’s too much.

That’s what a day with chronic suicidal thoughts can look like for me. And I’ve done it over, and over, and over throughout my recovery. While my brain often convinces me I’m weak, when I really sit down and look at how much I put into just staying alive — it blows my mind. This might not make sense to people who haven’t been there. What did I actually accomplish with my day? . It doesn’t seem very impressive. But I eventually got out of bed. I took a shower, which I don’t always do. I took my medicine. I didn’t self-harm, despite having urges to. I journaled , I ate meals that were the biggest challenge . I socialized a bit, even if it was just by phone. I made it through the day. Despite my brain screaming at me that the world would be better without me, I chose to stay. I chose to hope. I chose to hold onto the slightest possibility that maybe my life won’t always be like this.

I made 2 suicide attempts.Ive thought of suicide a million time ,  but almost no one has known until now. Not even my Parents .

I will tell you, in what I thought would be my last moments, I remembered my dad & Mamand the love I had in my life (and the pain I would be causing). And I remember feeling sadness over the loss of unfulfilled dreams. I suddenly felt the desire — to travel, meet, learn and try things — I had lost. And I was truly sad about it, and then suddenly afraid.

I thought of my nanny and gaggy , that if I done this I would probably kill her too . How could I leave her with the pain of losing me after everything they gave me and helped me with .

I will tell you I woke up in disbelief. Wide-eyed, weak and horrified, but ultimately, relieved. I hugged myself for a long time.

I will tell you although the months that followed brought some of the worst hardships in recovery that I have been through, it never stopped giving me new, exciting, educational experiences; there was never too long of a time I went without awe or laughter. It never ceased to bring me love from at least one direction. The world never stopped being beautiful again. But I was lucky.

I fell in love with capturing simple moments, like the first walk I done in weeks with my mam I got loads of photos (I look awful but I got them ) they made me happy and I still remember how happy I was to just be out that day.

You see, our lenses have to be cleaned every so often, and if we neglect our camera for too long, by not prioritizing its well-being, our pictures come out wrong. But the camera cannot take itself apart and clean the dirt out alone, it needs the help of others. And if the camera is left on the shelf for too long, it needs a really thorough cleaning before it can be used.

So, take time to care for yourself and let in the love of others to help you do so. And if you accidentally get too dusty or an inside piece falls out of place, know someone is there for you — be it a friend, parent, doctor or a person on the other end of the hotline. There is always someone to help you clear your view. And the possibility for pictures is endless in this life.