Club lights, we fight every night. Baby, I don’t want to do that.
Getting help
Reaching out to people in my support network and letting them know that things were not okay was the first thing I had to do. Conversations with friends and family and opening up about what I was dealing with went hand in hand with starting to look after myself. I came clean about personal struggles and old situations I’d been struggling to overcome, and the impact it was having on me. The most interesting part of this process was how obvious it was to everyone else that I was abusing my lifestyle as a means of escapism. It dawned on me people had seen this coming for a long time, but couldn’t help me as I didn’t want it. If I’m honest, I saw it a long way off too; I distinctly remember conversations with people about leaving for a while, maybe going to Majorca where I used to holiday as a kid – I wanted to disconnect, and now I needed to.
When I fessed up to everything that was happening inside my head it was relieving, like a pressure had been taken off my chest. The anxiety, sleepless nights, and intrusive thoughts of suicidality that came with depression started to weigh on me less—and much faster than anyone could’ve expected. I think that was a result of and opening up to people, or medication, or both.
I think when you reach out to anyone who’s not been through what you have, or maybe aren’t as involved in whatever lifestyle you might have, they see things as a little less granular; it’s either a hundred percent awful or not a problem at all. I struggled with this for a while, trying to pinpoint exactly ‘how bad it was’. Trying to convince people you’re not, say, suicidal or an alcoholic is exactly what someone who is suicidal or an alcoholic would do, so any attempt to provide my perspective on that was futile, but it didn’t matter. The same help and mental re-alignment was needed regardless of if it was a full-blown addiction, depression, or just drowning sorrows.
Therapy, medication, and relocation is what was needed. After asking for help, all three happened within a day, if not hours. Friends and family were ready to help as soon as I gave in and admitted I needed it. Oddly, they had been waiting for me to ask for help. My state was more obvious to those around me than I thought.
