It’s been a long time since I’ve posted about mental health (or anything, for that matter), but with World Mental Health Day coming up on the 10th of October, it felt like the perfect time to get stuck back in.
When it comes to my own mental health, I never really know where to start. Even though I’ve had plenty of years to reflect on it (and have been asked countless times by professionals), I still don’t think I can really put my finger on how it all began. It’s like when you find a bruise on your leg and you don’t know where you got it from, or when you get a headache but you don’t know the cause. Maybe you didn’t get enough sleep? Maybe you didn’t drink enough water? Maybe you stared at a computer screen too long?
These are all just guesses, though. You can’t know for sure.
It’s the same with my mental illness.
What I do know is that my confidence dropped drastically in high school. I suppose this is when the sweet innocence of childhood disappears and it's time to face the scary realities of The Real World. Suddenly, you had far more to worry about than colouring inside the lines or being on Santa’s ‘nice’ list. Insults increased vastly in viciousness from the days of boys calling you a “scaredy-cat” on the playground. Popularity contests were no longer based on who ownd the coolest colouring pens, and instead, people started judging you on how you look.
Teachers piled on the pressure, hormones were raging, I began worrying about my future, and I found myself thrust into an institution jam-packed with hundreds of other teenagers. (And, let’s be honest – teenagers can be arseholes.)
High school was where a boy rejected me for “being too pale and too skinny”. High school was where people thought it’d be funny to call me “anorexic” to my face and behind my back. High school was where I realised that my boobs were smaller than everyone else’s, and that all of my friends were prettier than me, and that everybody was getting boyfriends before I did. It was where teachers told us that if we failed one maths test, we didn’t stand a chance of having a future.
High school was, to put it mildly, pretty miserable at times. And maybe all of those things combined slowly but surely began to grind me down.
Maybe that doesn’t explain it though. Maybe nothing can.
I can’t really even pinpoint exactly when it started. I just seemed to sink deeper and deeper into misery, until – surprise! – all of a sudden, it had gone from a spot of the blues into actual, diagnosable depression. In all honesty, most of my memories from that time are a blur.
What I do remember, though, is the day that I looked in the mirror and realised how much I hated myself.
I’d just gotten out of the shower and there I was, standing in the mirror, staring back at myself blankly. I took in my scrawny body and my flat chest and my sickly pale skin.
I took it all in, and I cried.
Before this, I’d been watching Gok Wan on the telly, where he’d been helping teenagers tackle their body issues. One of the boys on the show had anxiety, and – although at that point, I didn’t realise we both had this in common – I was struck by how much I related to him. He was scared to leave his house, afraid of people judging him… and I knew exactly how that felt.
And, in that moment, I realised just how unhealthy these feelings were.
I'd watched as Gok built up these teens’ confidence and helped them to turn their lives around. I'd watched and I'd cried. I cried, because I knew that I didn’t have a Fairy Gok Mother who could come along and save me.
That night, after my shower, I found myself writing the word “hate” in the condensation on my bathroom mirror.
It’s a strong word. But it seemed to sum everything up. I hated myself. I hated how I looked. I hated how I acted.
I hated my life, I hated this world, and I really, really hated existing.
✽✽✽
As time went on, my depression and anxiety only seemed to get worse. I was 15, and had just started socialising and getting drunk pretty much every weekend. Thanks to these boozy extra-curricular activities, I’d been getting to know more people at school – but weirdly, this only made me feel worse about myself. I started getting acknowledged more in the hallways, which just made me feel even more anxious. I was embarrassed by myself. I didn’t want to be noticed. (Basically, if I could have owned an invisibility cloak, I would have worn the shit out of that thing.)
I constantly wondered what people must have seen when they looked at me. A scrawny girl with greasy hair and bad eyebrows, wonky teeth and a spotty face. I was clearly ten times uglier than my gorgeous friends, who were all far too pretty for their own good, and I felt for sure that other people couldn’t help but think it, too. They probably all laughed and talked about me behind my back. They probably wondered why the boys I’d kissed had ever wanted to go anywhere near me. I was so sure that everyone was picking me apart, terrible piece by terrible piece… and I just felt so ashamed.
What I know now is that these anxious thoughts are what’s known as ‘mind reading’ by cognitive behavioural therapists – in other words, believing that you know the thoughts of other people. It’s stupid, really, because of course, it’s not actually possible to know what people are thinking. Or at least, not unless you’re telepathic (which I’m going to reasonably assume you’re not).
For me, it feels like anxiety is the devil on my shoulder, whispering nasty things in my ear. But, if anxiety is the devil, then I guess cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is the priest, whose job it is to cast the devil away.
CBT works to recognise negative thoughts (known as ‘automatic negative thoughts’), which tend to come naturally with illnesses like anxiety and depression. The good news is that, once you start noticing them, you can start trying to correct them.
So if, like me, you ever catch yourself worrying that other people are judging you (which I’m sure we all do from time to time), here are a few CBT-style steps that you can try to take:
1. First, you need to catch yourself in the act.
Become aware of your thoughts, rather than letting them come and go without acknowledgment. And, if you find yourself thinking something negative, pause.
2. Now, evaluate the likelihood of your thoughts.
First of all, what are the odds that everyone around you is completely focussed on you? Let’s be real: they probably have plenty of other things to be thinking about. Consider whether you have any proof to support what you’re thinking. Can you be 100% certain that it’s true? Probably not.
3. Then, look for alternative perspectives.
Was the girl that you just walked past really judging your appearance? Or could she not have been thinking about something else entirely? Maybe she was thinking about the latest piece of coursework she has to do. Maybe she was wondering what she's going to have for tea tonight. Maybe (probably) she was questioning how the hell someone like Boris Johnson is our current Prime Minister. Or maybe – just maybe – she was too busy worrying that you were judging her to judge you!
4. And finally, ask yourself: is this way of thinking helping me at all?
Consider whether this thought that you’re having is actually in any way productive. If not, simply refuse to buy into it. Don’t allow it to take up any more of your time. Basically, it’s time to take a leaf out of Elsa’s book and Let It Go.
Consider whether this thought that you’re having is actually in any way productive. If not, simply refuse to buy into it. Don’t allow it to take up any more of your time. Basically, it’s time to take a leaf out of Elsa’s book and Let It Go.
Even though it all sounds so easy when put like that, so often, we let our thoughts come and go without ever stopping to challenge them. Essentially, CBT is about monitoring and altering unhealthy thinking habits, which should then help our mental wellbeing. Really, it’s no different from, say, monitoring and altering your junk-food consumption to improve your physical health. In the same way that you try not to put too much bad food in your body, try not to allow too many bad thoughts in your brain.
And, I can promise you now: you will absolutely thank yourself for it.
“Dwelling on negative thoughts is like fertilising weeds.”
Love,
I’ll be blogging all week up until World Mental Health Day, covering different parts of my experience with mental illness. Keep up with my posts on Facebook or bloglovin’.
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