Ghost

“Life after death, ashes to ashes dust to dust”

The moment when you look in the mirror and you don’t see the same image. You instead see a fuzzy part of you the “ghost” of what you once where and the person looking back at you is the person this illness is taking over your presence.

When you go through with the a low point in your life and you see the part of you is lost and is separating away from that shell was you staying behind and staring back at you is the person you don’t know. Very solid and very much different from who you would have been before the illness took control. You would have seen the signs the more and more there is two versions of you forming the true you and the imposter that is forming before your eyes even when you think you aren’t changing into this different person who no one would recognise as you.

Have you ever been in a room full of people and you put on the image that you are happy and content laughing and smiling. But within 2 seconds of laughing you can’t remember why you are laughing or what others are smiling and doing talking to you. Over the 5 seconds you will go through a multitude of emotions, that make you just wish you could curl up and hide and no one would see you. That fake smile that is plastered on your face is slowly cracking and it feels like no one can see beyond the cracks that you just need someone to be there. Who can help you to truly smile and also help get you through those 5 seconds.

The past has a way of coming back and reminding you what has happened and the steps and what you have been through. From time to time you hold on to the scars and wounds and try to fight against the past re awakening out of the blue it will show up and make you wonder “What if” and how life could have been very different. Sometimes for the good and the bad but also that sliding doors moment. What if you did follow the ghost path and changed beyond any recognition what then? For ever set back there is the possibility it can awaken the dormant part of you who fights back from being pushed to the side and takes back what is making you hang on in there. Nothing will be able to replace those memories and no miracle will be able to fix the cracks that are appearing within your life without your own fight.

For me this week has been a hard week with 2 big anniversaries with my past being re awoken, the ghosts of those moments where my dad turned from being a fully capable of doing day to day activities to paralysed and not being able to do anything significant for himself. To my grandads passing. I was very young when I lost my grandad, and I only got to experience small portions of time with him. For my grandad I couldn’t say his name due to a speech impediment but instead of saying his name I called him grandad pops, he has always been grandad pops ever since. I got to draw at my grandads and spend time with him. He passed away 22 years ago from cancer.

Some of the wounds from my dad’s accident and the isolation I suffered by my own hands but also by some other factors. Never being able to turn to people because I didn’t want to be a hindrances or for people to worry about me. When they have so much going on within their own lives, and create this “ghost” version of me, never really know who I am or what I really am into. For people my age finding their identity comes over a course of time, finding those pieces that make them whole. But every time you have a low the pieces shatter and you have to rebuild who you are.

From the big event of August I have been healing repairing the true me, and breaking the ghost version of me down and standing tall over the adversity that is Depression and mental health! Even when people forget their involvement and the factors I swore to myself I wouldn’t give up, and I would fight through the darkness and fight to get back to the light that is life. I will and am going to win. I am going to remember parts of me I want to remember and the one big part of me is I have manners, always have and always will. I won’t isolate others and I will always be there for people even when my world is so fragile. That will never change.

The strength to get out of bed every single day and say no I will not submit I will be me and I will beat this, no matter how much you wish you could just stay in bed and watch the world fly by. The people your hurting isn’t just you it is also everyone that cares about you. I’m not proud of what nearly happened where the darkness nearly took me, but I am not embarrassed by it instead I have spoken freely about it and admitted and confronted the darkness.

“It takes courage not to act on the darkness, not to act on the darkness.”

One person can save you from the isolation that has been created and the distance and damage that could have been created, and that is YOU!

I am ONE and I am not a GHOST I am a SURVIV ( ; ) R and I will get back on my feet.