Let me introduce myself...

I started this blog a while back and had yet to have a time to share it; I'm posting the old entries day by day to start this site again here as I lead into my purpose.

I have to admit I haven’t exactly known where to begin. For the past couple years, I’ve been telling myself I’m going to start a new blog. Since I learned mental health awareness month is every May, I keep telling myself (I think for two years now) that I’ll start it in May in honor of it. However, I keep pushing it off. Today when I found time on my hands I opened my laptop and finally decided to start it up!

I changed the name to my blog a few times before I started my first entry. However, every time I procrastinated the start, I never really looked into why I was holding back like I was. Then I realized there was a bit of shame in me. My purpose here is not to put my whole life on blast, but to offer and give support from deep experience. That being said, I deemed it appropriate to name the blog #notashamed. Given the world we’re all living right now, I think we need to focus on the primary person we should care for: ourselves. We all have skeletons in our closet, masks we wear to hide truths or flaws, and absolutely none of us our perfect. That’s a beautiful thing!

My name is Kimberlee, I was diagnosed type 1 Bipolar when I was 27 years old. I suffered untreated many years prior to my diagnosis. Before treatment began, I circled my life in endless lies, hurt and destroyed lives, ended up hospitalized, incarcerated, sometimes in downright danger, and worst of all incredibly lonely. I stay awake for days on top of the world then spend days where all I wanted to do was lay in bed and sleep. I’d cry for no reason, break into horrific fits of rage, then feel utterly claustrophobic in an empty room. I’m still trying to navigate a full understanding of my diagnosis, but I accept it as a part of me, and I’m not ashamed of it. I’ve forgiven myself for the horrid things my manic personality did to myself and others and I’m proud as hell with how far I’ve come over the past few years. I’m 34 years old now, I have wonderful friends and family who know my story and love me for it. I have skeletons in my closet that have meat on their bones, and I’m not ashamed of my past anymore; I’m stoked for my future.

Whatever it is in you that you may hide, speak in reservation about, whatever scares you, I can’t sit here and say I’m a person who can empathize with each detail, but I can tell you this, you have things to be proud of and you have steps to take forward. You have NOTHING to be ashamed of.

My name is Kimberlee; I’m a felon, I’m bipolar, those pieces will always be in my puzzle, and I am #notashamed.