My Mental Health Breakdown – A Reflection | Part Two

My Mental Health Breakdown – A Reflection | Part Two

I want to start off by saying thank you! After being extremely nervous to post the first part, I am blown away by the support.

Genuinely, I can’t even begin to explain how grateful I am for all the messages of support I received not only in the comments of the first part – Reflecting on My Mental Health Breakdown | Part One – But also the DMs I got on twitter.

My heart is filled with so much love right now and I’m very thankful to be part of such a supportive and understanding community.

I’m doing a lot better than I was last year. There’s still some work to be done, my mental health isn’t 100% yet and I’m now on the waiting list for therapy. But, compared to my mental state last year, it’s a world of difference.

With all that being said, it’s time to get into part two of this series.

Trigger Warning

In this post there will be talk of death, suicide, grief, drug use and more. Please, look after your mental health and click off this post if any of these themes affect you.

My Mental Health Breakdown Part Two

For about a month after Teddy’s passing I would allow myself some time at night to cry and let feelings out a little bit at a time. But then I would bottle even more things up like flare ups and suicidal thoughts, so nothing ever changed.

The best way I can describe this is if I were holding a balloon and only letting a little bit of air out at a time, only to blow it up again. It completely defeats the point.

Now I know that isn’t healthy, it’s actually more detrimental in the long run but I didn’t know how else to cope.

Allowing myself to feel any sort of grief was a big no. I still hadn’t dealt with the reality of the miscarriage so my mental health declined and when Teddy passed, I was basically stuffing it all into a tiny pocket so to speak.

Eventually it would have to overflow.

This is exactly the same thing I did when my mum passed away, except I wasn’t using drugs to numb the pain this time, I was using food.

Background information

I should probably add a bit of background information here on my mother so you can understand why I turned to drugs and medicated with alcohol. I don’t want it to seem like I just used drugs all the time or that I still do.

On August 2nd 2008 I walked into my mum’s room to tell her I was going out to meet friends in town. I started to talk but never got an answer. She was laying in her bed, not moving a muscle and I just knew something wasn’t right.

No one else was in the house, just mum, the dog, the cat and me.

I tried shaking her a few times but there was no response. Nothing was happening and I didn’t know why. I shook and shook and shook but not once did she move. Then reality kicked in, she wasn’t breathing.

Her lips were blue, her body cold and suddenly the whole world was silent. In that moment my world came crashing down in ways I never even knew possible.

Finding your parents dead after they take their own life is an experience I would never wish on anyone, not even my worst enemy. It’s something that changes you, it breaks part of you that you never even knew existed.

Going off the deep end

I was 15 when I found her, and I went off the deep end. There would be times where I would be gone for days, leaving my gran worrying about me. Most of the time sleeping on “friends” couches, hopping from house to house and taking any drugs they offered me.

I just wanted to hide from all the pain and push those feelings down as deep as they could go. Honestly, I just didn’t want to face the reality of my mum being dead.

I would take ketamine, cannabis, ecstasy and drink excessively till I was numb. This went on for about 3 months. 3 horribly excruciating months when I didn’t know where I was half the time.

Waking up in strangers’ houses as there was a party and I’d gone with people I knew. I ended up 2 hours away from home one time with no money, lost phone and no jacket or shoes.

Turning point

The turning point was when I stumbled into the house one morning. Walking into the living room at 5am only to see my gran crying her eyes out on the couch.

It was at that moment I realised that I had been utterly selfish and thought only of myself.

Yes, I had lost my mother, but my gran had lost her daughter. Both her children now dead and I was out god knows where and she constantly worried she’d get a call to come ID my body.

After that encounter I promised her I’d turn my life around. I promised that she would never have to worry about me like that again. And I did, I changed.

Although I went through an awful withdrawal stage with shakes, sweats, vomiting and excruciating pain, I knew I had to see it through.

Once I was at myself again I got accepted onto a college course for childcare as that’s what I had promised my mum I would do since I had left school the May before she passed. I stopped abusing my body with drugs and I did everything within my power to change.

Back to present times

That was the lowest point of my life and I know myself I never want to go there again. It’s not worth it and I’m still unpacking trauma from that time in my life.

But when everything started to go wrong in 2021, I began to spiral, only this time I wasn’t using drugs as a coping mechanism. This time I turned to food and fell into a deep depression.

Looking back at last year with a clearer mind I can see where I went wrong. But at the time I wasn’t thinking straight. I allowed myself to get into an unhealthy cycle of self loathing and grief.

What I should have done is allowed myself time to process my feelings. To come to terms with it all and be vulnerable, to ask for help without feeling shame.

Hindsight is 20/20

But, hindsight is 20/20 as they say. I might know now, but that didn’t help at the time.

Thinking back to it all really does turn my stomach because there were days I would shut myself away from the world, binge eat in my room and self harming was on my mind constantly.

Luckily I didn’t relapse with self harm because Little Bear was my anchor. Whenever I thought about it I would turn my mind onto the fact I have an amazing son who doesn’t deserve to be put through that.

Growing up I witnessed my mum self harm multiple times. There were nights where I’d have to stick my fingers down her throat to make her sick after swallowing copious amounts of pills.

I watched her abuse her body in ways a child should never have to know about.

I’d visit her in hospital for months on end sometimes as she was on a psych hold or being kept in on suicide watch. I’ll never forget sitting on the hospital bed one day gazing up at her with her face, wrists and chest all cut up.

It’s easy for me to say now I shouldn’t have been going to see her. But I would literally scream the house down. I would try to break toys, doors and other items just because I wanted to see my mum.

Safe to say I put my gran through hell with that.

Breaking the cycle

Don’t take this as me bashing my mum though because I love her fiercely. But my mum had a lot of mental health issues along with schizophrenia, epilepsy, heart condition and more.

She suffered daily and I can only imagine the mental and physical torture she went through.

Because I know what it’s like to be exposed to these sorts of things, I’m very conscious of the fact I NEVER want Little Bear to go through the same.

It’s my duty as his mother to shield that from him and then approach the topics at a mature enough age without personalising the experiences.

It’s not his job to be put in adult situations like that and it’s certainly not his job to take on the emotional labour of my mental health struggles.

My Mental health was in a steady decline

With my mental health declining everyday, I began to lash out at those closest to me. There would be days I’d argue with my gran just because I didn’t know what to do with my anger.

I stopped keeping in touch with friends and family and only messaging them if I absolutely had to for the likes of birthdays or for Little Bear to speak to his cousins, Aunts and Uncles.

Keeping in touch with people was the last thing on my mind because all I wanted to do was crawl into a hole and hide. It took all of my energy just to make sure I was still very present for LB and making sure he didn’t suffer.

I’d paint on a smile and go about my day like normal. We would go out, have movie nights, play games, do crafts and everything that children should be doing.

Inside I was a wreck though and I found myself losing interest in everything. I didn’t find joy in the things I loved or my hobbies. Everything became a chore and I resented having to get out of bed everyday.

End of part Two

This is where I’m leaving part two. I’ll be honest, I found it extremely hard to write this part as it brought back a lot of unpleasant memories from my teens and that day I found my mother.

I look back at that time in my life and my heart breaks for teen me. She was a lost little girl who just wanted her mum to hold her and didn’t know how to deal with her feelings.

Again, if you have read this whole post, thank you. I know it’s a lot and I’m talking about hard hitting issues, but I couldn’t do this reflection series without them.

It’s been very cathartic opening up and sharing. A weight is definitely being lifted with this.

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