Author: Aimee Eddy

Self-love is more than loving yourself for who you are, but it is also taking care of yourself. To love yourself is to take care of your needs, to pamper yourself, to respect yourself, and to love you as the person God made you to be, not only as a person with an illness. Learning to love yourself inside out is important to reach the road to recovery from mental illness.

When you’re sick with mental illness, you lose your self-esteem, your self-respect, and self-love. You begin to hate and neglect yourself. You rip yourself apart with your thoughts and you may harm yourself. You don’t give yourself the care, love and respect you deserve. You don’t even know you deserve it. You’re too stuck in self-hate and darkness to see your own worth.

Practicing self-love will help you reach into the light and pull yourself out of that hole. It took me a long time to learn how to love myself properly. When I was sick, I hated everything about me, how I looked, how I acted, my personality, and so on. I had to learn to love me as I am and not the illness that plagued my mind. To love myself I had to learn and practice self-loving techniques.

Here are some self-loving techniques you can practice:

• Get help with your illness. Find a therapist you feel comfortable confiding in and a psychiatrist whom you trust. Good therapists and psychiatrists may be hard to find. Try different ones until you find the ones you feel the most comfortable with.
• Go to the doctor when you need to. Don’t ignore your health. If you’re sick, don’t push yourself to work until you collapse. If you’re having health problems, go to the doctor. If you love yourself, you will take care of your health and not let it go until something major happens. You will also do annual physicals to make sure you’re staying in good health.
• Pamper yourself. After a hard day of work, take a soothing bath. When you feel down, treat yourself to something special like a movie or that shirt you’ve been wanting. When you accomplish something, treat yourself to something special like a piece of cheese cake or just do something to help you feel good, like get a haircut or get a massage.
• Practice positive thinking. Keep a journal of the positive things in your day or in your life. Use your journal to turn negative thoughts into positive. Practice complimenting yourself.
• Ask three people four things they like about you. Take those things and put them on index cards. Post them around your home where you will see them. Read them over and over again until you begin to believe them.
• Write self-affirmations. Write one each day and slowly increase it to two, then three, and four a day. Don’t write something you don’t believe in. An affirmation like, “I am a strong and beautiful woman.” Look deep within yourself and find the positive behind the sadness.
• Find God. Go to church, go to a Bible study, or sit down and pray. God made you and he is the one who can guide you and show you how truly unique you are. Loving God will help you love yourself.

When I was working towards recovery, I struggled with many of these techniques, but in time they became natural. When I find myself dipping into self-hate, I turn to these techniques. Loving me is an important part of staying in recovery. Practicing self-love taught me how to not only love myself, but how to take care of myself, and this helps me stand tall within the light.

I’m still struggling with sickness so here is another older post and perfect for the holiday. Have a Happy Thanksgiving!!

 

Many times while we’re depressed, we forget to be grateful for the things we do have in our life. We often think we have nothing good in our lives. We see the worst side of everything and we believe there isn’t anything to be thankful for. How can we be thankful for the darkness that blankets our souls?

There is more to our lives than the illness that plagues our minds. We need to open our eyes and look at what we do have, and I don’t mean just material things. God placed many people in our life to help us survive.

When I was depressed, I felt as if I was being tortured. How could I thank God for that? My mom often said I saw the glass half empty. I did. I saw the negative side to the world about me, and when Thanksgiving came around I felt more depressed. What did I have to be grateful for? I was sick with anxiety, I was depressed, my emotions were out of control, I couldn’t sleep and my existence seemed hopeless.

What I couldn’t see was I had a lot to be thankful for. I had and still have loving parents, wonderful

grandparents, caring siblings, a home, friends, food to eat, and much more. Most importantly I had lots of love surrounding me.

My grandpa always said the richest people in the world  are people who have family, friends, and love. It took me a while to let those words sink into my dark soul and see he was right. In the process of recovery, I had to learn to see the glass full. I became very grateful for just being alive. If I actually had taken my life, there is so much I would have missed out on, like my nieces and nephews, finding my true love, and finding happiness.

This Thanksgiving I am thankful I am still in recovery, I have a aunt and uncle and cousins on my husband’s side who have opened there hearts to me, I have my parents, my grandma, a wonderful husband, my many nieces and nephews, my dog, my sibling, my happiness, friends, love and much more. With all I have, I believe I am one of the richest persons in the world. I might not have much money, but I’m rich in love.

So this Thanksgiving season stop looking at all the bad things you have in your life and look at the precious gifts God has given you.  Write a list of the things you are thankful for. Tell the people around you how grateful you are for them. Remember, family isn’t always the one you were born into. Family can be really good friends who love and support you.

This Thanksgiving and all year long, I thank God for all I have. Being thankful helps me remember what I could have missed out on if I had taken my life or never reached recovery. I thank everyone who supports me, who loves me, and who care for me. Being thankful helps me stand within the light.

 

We all think bad things at one time or another. Sometimes we scold ourselves for them and sometimes we just ignore them. What if the thoughts become constant and out of control?  With mental illness, the mind becomes plagued with bad thoughts, thoughts you can’t seem to stop. You start questioning yourself. Do I cause myself to think such things? Do they mean I’m going crazy? Do they mean I’m a bad person? Why do I think such things?

When I was sick, thoughts raced through my head. They tore at me and haunted me. They confused me. They were not thoughts that usually popped up in my head. They were bad thoughts, angry ones, hateful ones, and hopeless ones. Thoughts like I am evil, God hates me, I hate God, I have the devil in me, I hate everyone, everyone can go to hell, my life is doomed, and so on. I didn’t know if my thoughts were real or not. I thought maybe I was putting them in my own head.

I started to think I was creating these thoughts. I made myself think bad things. I had to be truly crazy to do such a thing to myself. If I could do this, then what kind of person am I? Am I an awful person? God must hate me. I hated myself for my thoughts, and I punished myself for them. I’d curse myself and get mad at myself. I believed I deserved to suffer. If anyone could think like that, then he or she deserved to be punished or to go down instead of to heaven.

I struggled with my negative thinking and then I added to it with self-hate and anger. I was in a battle with myself. It was a full blown war and I felt like I was losing. It was hopeless. There was no way I could win. There was no room for anything good to enter my head, and when it did sneak in, my mind seemed to squash it like a fly.

I started losing sleep and getting sick. I could barely keep food down. The thoughts hurt like someone was squeezing my insides into a vice. How could I stop this? I wanted it to end, but it was impossible. God was punishing me, but for what? The pain became unbearable and I tore at my skin. I wanted to curl up in a ball and pretend I didn’t exist. For some reason the nights seemed to bring the worse thoughts out. They sped through my mind like a motor-cycle racing down the back roads. My chest tightened. I rolled from side to side. I placed a pillow over my head, but nothing turned them off.

When I was stressed out, the negativity increased and so did my anxiety. Lack of sleep stirred them up, too. Nothing seemed to make them better.

In therapy I learned that my mind was sick, and my bad thoughts were caused by my illness and by the repetition of negative things my classmates and teachers told me in my school years. My therapist taught me ways to combat my thoughts like journaling about them, turning them into positive thoughts, and each day repeating something good. I took index cards and wrote something good on them. Then I placed the cards around my house like on the bathroom mirror, by my place at the table, on my computer, and other places where I’d see them. Each day I read them aloud.

If you have thoughts that are bad and out of control, don’t think you are the cause. You have a mental illness and it likes to play games with you. It taunts you and steals the best parts of you if you let it. You did not make up your illness, and you didn’t do anything to cause it. No one knows why some people suffer with mental illness and others don’t, but you can fight it. Instead of your mind declaring war on you, you declare war on it. Fight it with all your strength. You can stop negative thoughts. Get help, practice positive thinking, change your thoughts around from negative to positive, and stand up to your illness.

Instead of my mind declaring war on me, I declared war on it and I declared war on my illness. I fought with everything in me and I stood up to those thoughts. The bad thoughts became less and less. I can’t say I never have those thoughts, but they no longer control my mind. Because I decided to fight them and get help, I bathe within the light.

Due to illness I am re-posting one of my old post. Hopefully by next week I will be well enough to post a new one. Enjoy!!

When the pain within me became unbearable I looked for ways to find relief. Emotions ripped at my insides, they weakened me and I needed a way to ease them for even just a few moments. I felt this way in college and years later as an adult. I turned to cutting myself in order to find  relief. It was temporary, but it gave me an escape from my inner hell.

When self-hate, anger, frustration and anguish burned within me I tore at my flesh. Just one cut and I was free. I couldn’t feel anything, not even the sting of my wound. I floated above my body, staring down at the sad mess. Then I plummeted back into my body. Tears streamed down my face, the pain returned. I felt the sting of my wound and I began to regret it.

Thoughts flooded my mind. What have I done? How can I hide the cut? How would I explain my wound if someone saw it? I sat alone in my room, where I always injured, once again overwhelmed by emotions.

Injuring became an addiction just like drugs.

I needed to hurt myself to ease my pain. I tried different methods such as burning myself and punching a wall till my fist turned black and blue. Cutting gave me the most relief.

It became a craving. When the negative thoughts rushed into my mind and my feelings burned within me I suddenly needed physical pain and I had to cut. I fixated on it and planned to cut when I was alone. I never hurt myself in public places. I couldn’t let anyone find out what I was doing. No one would understand. It had to be my secret.

I started therapy and began to discuss my addiction. A friend told me about the book The Scarred Soul by Tracy Alderman, Ph.D. I stared doing the exercises in the book. The book and therapy gave me alternatives to self-injuring such as journaling, developing a support system, not spending a lot of time in the place I hurt myself and reminding myself of the negative effects injuring had on my life.

A friend gave me a goal of going a year without cutting. Having a goal gave me the willpower to fight my urges.

Now I have gone 12 years without injuring. At times It crosses my mind, but I remind myself I am much stronger than the urges and have other alternatives.

There are no bandages for emotional pain. You can’t put a cast on a broken heart, and bandaids cannot cover a cut on the soul. When you break up with someone, you lose a loved one, you lose a friend, or someone says something mean, you hurt inside. It’s hard to explain internal pain, and it’s not easy to patch up wounds you can’t see. When you suffer with depression and other mental illnesses, living becomes painful. It hurts all through your soul, heart, and very being to face another day. It’s nearly impossible to explain to others how bad you hurt inside.

When I was sick, I was filled with many awful feelings that I couldn’t explain. They tore and sliced at my heart and soul. Nothing seemed to ease my agony. I wanted to tell my family how I felt, but I feared they wouldn’t understand. Each day I ached inside. Just waking up in the morning was a struggle and I had to push myself through the day. How could I tell anyone that living each day hurt?

It’s like mental illness declared war on not only my mind, but also on everything within me. My emotions were out of control and they hurt. Each day I struggled with anguish, deep sadness, hopelessness, anxiety, and helplessness. At night those feelings, mixed with racing thoughts, kept me up. I thought I was also causing my family grief. I just wanted to end my pain and everyone else’s. I injured myself because physical wounds felt better than what was happening within me. Then I planned out my death. If I were dead, my agony would be all gone and I wouldn’t harm my family anymore.

Having Borderline Personality Disorder intensified my inner pain. Often I burst out into episodes. I screamed, I cried, I broke things, and I injured. Living hurt, and during my episode my emotional pain burned through me like an inferno. I lost control of myself and my actions. The feeling of having no control scared me, and knowing I hurt others during my episodes cut through me like a knife. I hated myself for my actions and for not being able to handle them. I hated hurting the people I loved. I hated being in such pain.

I believe my mental illness was a chemical imbalance in my brain and also brought on by bullying in school. My classmates’ and teachers’ insults cut my heart and soul deeply. There were no bandages to fix up my wounds, and there were no casts to hold my broken heart together. What were left were open sores that created Borderline Personality Disorder, depression, and anxiety. Instead I was left to struggle many years with the hurt of living with a mental illness.

In time I found ways to ease the hurt. I started journaling about my feelings. I also found healthy ways to release my pain instead of self-injuring, and I started going to therapy and learning coping techniques. Some techniques were turning my bad thoughts into positive, taking care of myself, taking medication, going to therapy, using a punching bag or pillow to release my anger, building a support system to turn to when the pain got too much, and doing crafts and activities to keep my mind busy.

When living starts hurting and you feel like there is no way out, turn to someone you can trust like family or a close friend. Get help. Instead of giving up on living, find coping techniques and healthy ways to ease your aching soul. Find a way that works for you to express your feelings. Build up a support system you can turn to whenever you need to. I had a friend I called night and day when I need someone to help me through the darkness. I even called her at two in the morning when my emotions were so painful I couldn’t handle existing. Not every friend will be there for you at that time, but be respectful of the times he or she is available.

Living no longer hurts for me. I now have my illness under control. I’m not cured and there are bad days, but with coping techniques, my support system and my husband, I get through them without hurting myself, going into an episode, or contemplating taking my life. Life hurts at one time or another and there is nothing we can do to stop it, but when life hurts, I cope and I go forward. Because I can cope with my pain I can stand in the light of recovery.

We all have a light inside of us, a light that engulfs our souls and shines through us by the grace of God. The light in us is what puts a smile on our lips and keeps us going each day. It’s a part of who we are, the special qualities that make us unique. When you become depressed or struggle with mental illness, the light becomes hidden behind a dark cloud. A person who is ill is so blinded by his or her sadness that he or she feels like the light has gone out and forgets who and what it is that makes him or her special.

When I was depressed, I thought the person I was had died and all that was left was a dark, lonely, and hopeless shell. I thought God had abandoned me. Whatever it was that made me smile, laugh, feel joy, and made me who I am was blanketed by my deep anguish and sadness. There was no more light left in me to shine. Nothing could shine through the pitch black that encompassed my inner being. I thought it was useless to try to look for the light that once was within me. It was gone. I was gone. I was no longer myself.

I couldn’t see beyond my illness. I couldn’t even remember what it felt like to be happy. What did a smile feel like? What special qualities made me who I am? Who was I? I had nothing to look forward to but more days and nights stuck at the bottom of my hole. How could God make me a person and take away everything that made me who I am? How could he turn the light of my being out?

Blaming God was easy. I had to have someone to blame. He gave me this sickness, didn’t he? He put the light in me and he just as easily took it away. What did I do wrong for him to punish me with total darkness?

What I later learned was that the light within me never went out. It was there the whole time. I just couldn’t see it or feel it. God never allowed it to fade. He kept it shining, because he knew in time I would find it again and it would glow brighter and stronger than before.

In my recovery process God whispered to me, “Let your light shine.”

I turned to him and asked, “How Lord? How do I let it shine when you turned it off?”

“It’s still in you. Look deep and hard and you’ll find it. Let it shine for everyone to see,” God replied.

So I went on a search for my light. In the hospital I read the Bible, I started journaling, and I participated in therapy. I soon realized that God may not always work miracles, but he gives us tools to help ourselves. So I found those tools. I started therapy, got on medication, and prayed for guidance.

I looked deep inside me. I did some serious soul searching. I found that I was still me. I had never died. I was just hidden behind my illness. I had to look beyond my illness and find my light. How could I let my light shine beyond my illness? I listed the special qualities that made me who I am such as I’m kind hearted, I’m a good listener, I’m a fighter, I’m loving, and I’m a dreamer. So how could I let those qualities shimmer? How could I let my light shine once again?

First, I worked on changing my negative thoughts, I asked God into my life, I began to fight my illness, and I began to rediscover myself. In time I found not only my light, but a whole new me.

If you feel as if your light has gone out, look beyond your illness and you’ll find it’s still there. Use the tools God has given you to reach recovery and let your light shine. Turn to friends and family for help. Get therapy and, if needed, take your medication. Rediscover yourself, find the positive in your life, and do something kind for yourself or for someone else. In time your light will shine brighter than ever.

Now that I have reached recovery, my light shines brighter. My light still sometimes gets pushed aside by my illness, but with God’s help and determination, I find it and I let it shine. Because I allow the light to shine within me, I stand within the light of recovery and within God’s light.

Many illnesses can be passed down the bloodline of a family, like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, and so on. When we go to a doctor, we often have to fill out questionnaires of illness that members of our family have or had, but there is no questionnaire for mental illness. Some types of mental illness are caused by environment and can’t be passed on, while others can be inherited. An important question you might want to ask your psychiatrist before having a child is, “Can my illness be inherited?” It is something you must consider when you decide to start a family.

I always thought I would have children someday. I thought about having a couple of children if I found the right man, but when I was diagnosed with depression, I started questioning whether or not I should have children. What if my child inherits my illness? Could I allow my own offspring to suffer like I have? Could I handle a kid who is also suffering with mental illness? Would it be selfish of me to have a child knowing he or she may struggle like I have? The questions swam in my head.

I started seeing a man who wanted children and had plans for a big family, but I had my doubts. I wanted to give him children if we were married, yet I didn’t want to pass my illness on. He thought up all kinds of possible ways we could make sure the child wouldn’t receive the gene that caused mental illness.

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t allow a child to suffer with a deep sadness that ate at her or his insides, feel so hopeless that he or she wants to die, suffer with an internal pain that nothing could relieve, or feel alone at the bottom of a dark hole. I also considered my ability to handle a sick child while struggling with my own illness. Could I handle the stress of being a mom to a kid who was suffering? Would I be able to help him or her through the darkest days of his or her life? I talked over these and other questions with my therapist and I decided motherhood was not for me.

My mom has felt some regret for my illness because her own mother had mental illness. She thought it was her fault I was sick. I never once blamed her or even considered it being inherited from my grandmother. It took my mom some soul searching to accept that no one was to blame for my illness. While my mom struggled with her guilt, I put myself in her shoes. What if I were the mother with a child who was deeply depressed? I probably would also struggle with guilt.

So if you have mental illness, find out if your illness can be inherited. If it can, then ask yourself, “Do I want to pass my illness on to my child? Can I handle a child with a similar illness? Can I live with myself if my child suffers?” Discuss it with your therapist, and if you say yes to these questions, then by all means have children, but if you say no, then maybe children are not for you. This is something you cannot jump into. You have to consider it carefully.

There are also other reasons that may make being a parent difficult, like handling the stress of parenthood, postpartum depression, the status of your own illness, and your limitations due to your illness. These are all things you must think over carefully and discuss with your therapist and partner. Not everyone is strong enough to be a parent, and for those who are, I applaud you.

I found a husband who doesn’t care if we have children or not. All he cares about is having me in his life. Sometimes I wonder what kind of mother would I have been, but I enjoy the freedom of not having children. My nieces and nephews have given me the joy a child can give you. They are the children I’ll never have, and our dog is our baby. I’m happy with my decision. My family is my husband and our dog. They keep me standing within the light.

  We are all human. We make mistakes. Sometimes we get mad at ourselves over a mistake that we should have known better. It happens. We get mad at ourselves and then we let it go, but when you have mental illness you can’t just let it go. Those endless thoughts go on a rampage. They turn evil and they start ripping you apart. In the end you drive yourself into an anxiety attack, a break down, or into depression. Like they say, there is no worse critic then yourself, and this is so true. No one can beat you up internally as bad as you do to yourself.

   I recently made a purchase on Ebay that didn’t turn out to be what I thought it was. I misread the description and ended up spending a lot of money on something I can’t use. My stomach plummeted when I realized my mistake and my shoulders tensed. My thoughts went wild. I thought: I’m such a screw up. I am so stupid: I should have known better. I can’t believe I made such a dumb mistake, I’m an idiot. I can’t do anything right. I wasted our money; I’m such a brainless wonder. My thoughts went on and on.

  I watched a movie with a friend, but my mind kept obsessing on my mistake. Internally I beat myself up, over and over again. I felt my stomach twist and my anxiety build. My shoulders tightened and began to ache. I struggled to sit still. I couldn’t just let it go. I felt like my mistake defined me and my ability to make logical decisions. I hated myself for a simple human error. To me it was more than a mistake. It was a definition of my lack of intelligence. I was stupid. I should have known better and made a better decision.

   I told my husband, “I’m sorry; I screwed everything up and wasted our money. I’m a stupid loser.”

   My husband looked me in the eyes. “I don’t ever want to hear you call yourself stupid and it was just a mistake. We all make mistakes. Contact the seller and see if you can return it. Everyone makes mistakes.”

   I still felt sick to my stomach. “It was a stupid mistake. I should have been smarter. I shouldn’t be allowed to make decisions or buy things. I screw everything up.”

   Lou put his arm around me. “You only made a simple mistake. You’re human. We all make mistakes and you don’t screw everything up. Let it go. Stop putting yourself down or you’ll get sick. Focus on something positive.”

   When I sat down to think about it, I realized Lou was right. I made an error just like every human on this earth does from time to time. My mistake doesn’t define me or is not a sign of my lack of intelligence. Beating myself up over it was only making me sick, on edge; and sad. It wasn’t solving anything. The only person I was hurting was myself. So I contacted the seller about my mistake and he refunded my money. I decided to just let my mistake roll off my shoulders.

   Instead of beating myself up, I decided to list all the things I have done in my life. Like publishing stories, making the honor roll in high school, making the National Honor Society is high school, keeping a job for 22 years, keeping track of our checking; and so on. I looked at my list and asked myself, “Is this a sign of someone who is stupid? Does a dumb person accomplish so much?” My answer was, “No, this is what a smart person accomplishes.”

   If you make a mistake, don’t beat yourself up and obsess over it. Tell yourself you are only human and like every other human you’re not perfect. Stop those nasty thoughts before they tear you apart. Fight them with positives. Get mad at yourself for a few minutes and then let it go. Sometimes it’s not easy to let go, but do it for your own wellbeing. You’ll feel better when you do.

   I’m working on handling my mistakes better. Learning to stop beating up on myself will allow my soul to dance within the light.

Bejon W. Frank

  Today I have a guess blog post. My guess blogger is Bejon W. Frank. I hope you enjoy her post and leave a comment to let her know what you think or a like.

   Thoughts from a mind that is full of menacing voices can be damaging to your soul. There is the monster that tells you that you are stupid, you can’t do this or that, or worse yet that damn voice asks that one questions which stops you in your tracks, “who do you think you are that you would even deserve to breathe in this world?” Then the dark laughter vibrates through your entire being.

You can deny it all you want, but these thoughts can bring you to your knees. You find yourself in a fetal position in your bed, tears pouring out your eyes, nose leaking snot, with the top sheet covering your head, as if that would somehow shield you from those demon thoughts that refuse to just shut the hell up.

In desperation you silently scream out, “God help me. Why did you make such an unworthy slug like me? Are you laughing at this joke of a person?” You finally fall into a deep, restless sleep. It’s an uneasy reprieve from reality.

Hours later you wake up. There is lightness in the atmosphere that you can feel even if it doesn’t make sense. Lying in bed, afraid to break this fragile feeling of sparkling energy, you test the emotions covering you like a soft, warm blanket. Stretching your legs out, the movement doesn’t break the spell. Still in fear of losing this moment you close your eyes. Try to go back to sleep.

   That is when you hear the voice. But there is a difference. This is a deep rich tone, but not one that seems to come from the dark damp caverns of doubt, fear, and insecurities. The voice reaches into your soul, lifts you up, and allows you to believe in yourself. Do you dare? “Are you God you ask?”

The beautiful baritone voice ignores that question by simply stating, “I will not let you fall. You have the potential to be whatever you want to be, I will be by your side, as will your guardians and guides.”

Your breath catches in your chest, eyes open. Throwing back the covers, you sit up and look around. Does the room look a little brighter? You wait to hear the monster voice—it is silent. Your heart beats a bit faster and somehow you know you have connected with the Source of Life. You realize you are not alone and drowning in misery.

Miracles happen throughout your day, all the little ones that you have previously missed. You now hear the birds sing, notice the trees outside your windows with leaves waving in the gentle breeze. The thoughts that once were mudded with negativity are now shining with possibilities.

Yes, you can deny it all you want. But when you receive unexpected money in the mail, your physical and mental pains have miraculously stopped hurting, your inner voices give you positive input about, well, about everything, you know there is magic in this world, that there is hope. All you need to do is dream. From those dreams comes reality.

       Bejon W. Frank is an award-winning writer. She majored in Humanities at Northern Arizona University. At that time she was inducted to the Golden Key International Honor Society. She is a member of Pennwriters – Area 1. Bejon has won several writing contests with her fictional short stories. She won an award at the 2017 Pennwriters Conference for her non-fiction article. Currently, she is working on her first novel. She lived the majority of her life in Arizona but now resides in Pennsylvania with her husband, Chris, and their rescue dog, Jake, a Beagle/Lab mix who thinks he is a lap dog.