Hello again readers. If you have returned because you found my last post a good read, I thank you. If you are new here, Hello! Pop on over and read Part One before reading Part Two.
Last night I left my prologue at the point where I had just left a long term relationship full of deceits and deception, and my depression and anxiety were making themselves well and truly present in my life. I had left hairdressing by this time. How could I stay in that kind of environment? My mind said I could do something more with my life. So by this point, age nineteen, I was attending university studying a Bachelor of Education to become a primary teacher. Gone was the toxic relationship and queue the next series of unfortunate events.
I won’t drone on about how broken up I was, what annoyed me was I was in the middle of University and I get a fucked up break up to have to manage alone. Some friends knew the real reason, some didn’t. Even though I was still living at home at the time I wouldn’t tell my mother until years later the reason it ended, that he cheated all the time. I felt ashamed. My mind would tell me “What kind of mother would want this kind of daughter, and what a failure you are as a woman.”
While I was studying, I was also working as a waitress at fancy winery. A job which respectively isn’t rocket science but you can’t be a complete moron with no social skills either. There were days where I was on fire, and days where I felt a bit cooler. There were times where I had a woman call me a bitch at her table to my face, and another feel it was appropriate to yell and humiliate me in front of the entire restaurant. I may suffer from “resting bitch face” but I also have emotions and it astounds me the amount of crap people in customer service receive. Enjoy your sneezed on steak ma’am.
Nearing the end of University in my third year was when I turned to medication for my mental health. On top of the usual two demons, I was dealing with rejection and self-esteem issues, and had a few male friends literally fuck me over. Trying to find my own self-worth in a sea of selfish humans is difficult. Where people will tell you only what you want to hear to defuse a situation, or in contrast, to manipulate a situation into their control. My doctor had confirmed my thoughts and feelings and explained that I was suffering from severe depression along with anxiety which has a long list of triggers attached.
Having been on both sides of anti-depressants I can honestly say in my case they did not help completely. Yes, there were less bad days. But that does not equal good days. They just turned into complete repetitive zombified days. Sure my anxiety was under control but I also couldn’t feel any emotion under the sun. I would rather be feeling my sinking dread than to feel so spaced out on drugs. I also was given sleeping pills, as my anxiety would give me insomnia. I did my research after taking the sleeping pills for a couple of weeks and decided I didn’t want to continue down that road. Anti-depressants on the other hand, I was taking for at least a year until I said no more – There must be another way.