Understanding Life at 25

Understanding Life at 25

Chapter 1: Validation

Hello all, this is my first Vocal post of many. I want to use this platform to share the many, hard lessons I’ve learned with the hope that those who read my stories don’t have to learn the hard way like I did.

I woke up one morning feeling absolutely awful. Like the world was a shitty place, and everyone was shitty, and I was just so tired of all the bullshit that I simply didn’t want to participate in life anymore. Yes, I wasn’t necessarily suicidal, but at that moment all I could see was my failures, my mistakes, and my flaws. I have a beautiful 2 year old daughter that has always brought so much joy to my life, but at that moment I couldn’t even look at her. I wasn’t just sad...I was in the darkness. I tried to play with my daughter, but my energy was too low. I just wanted to lay down and cry all day. I know I needed help, but I didn’t know what I needed. Desperate ( don’t ever make decisions desperate), I sent out a group text to my immediate family trying to explain what I was feeling and that I needed help. My family panicked and ended up calling the police and having me sent to a rehab center for over a week. After being pumped full of random drugs and sleeping pills and being around a few dangerous and unpredictable individuals, I finally got to see a psychiatrist. Turns out I was suffering from a major anxiety attack/depression and needed a low dose of medication. After therapy and starting my meds, I felt a lot better, however my problems had just begun. Unfortunately, it looked really bad when the police came and saw my depressed, un-showered self so they referred me to CPS. My case opened while I was in the rehab facility (which was hell) and my daughter was staying with my Uncle and my Aunt.

So when I finally get out of rehab all I wanted to do was focus on spending time with my daughter and learning how to cope with my new diagnosis and also battling CPS because my AUNT AND MY UNCLE TOLD THEM I WAS AN UNFIT MOTHER and was probably going to need to be in rehab for the long-term. *Eyeroll*. After having my psychiatrist confirm that I didn’t need to be in rehab in the first place and that I wasn’t a danger to myself or anyone else. All I needed was a psychiatrist and some anxiety meds.

This particular lesson I call “Validation”

If you are like me, then you’ve probably had great ideas or plans that you were excited about and shared them with people then almost immediately doubted them, or maybe you’ve had issues and problems in life and sought advice from family or friends then felt 10x worse. Yeah, so, this is exactly where I went wrong...FOR YEARS. I’m not saying that it’s bad to share things with people that you trust, however it can be dangerous when you don’t have set boundaries in place to protect yourself from negativity. This is a fact! Family, friends, even significant others, even though you love them can be some of the worst people to share things with.

Validate yourself FIRST!

I feel like this is the most important step with anything that you’re dealing with. Whether you have a new idea for a project, new job, big move etc. If you want to do it, validate it within yourself first. Meditate on it, pray about it, write it down and conduct some research before you let anyone into your head! Dream killers are real and will have you straight up doubting yourself before your idea is off the ground.

This is also very important to do when dealing with negative or hard feelings. That is sooo very important for people dealing with mental health issues, relationship issues, career issues, etc.

You have to sit down with yourself first and ask yourself:

1) What am I feeling?

2) Why am I feeling this?

3) What do I need to help myself?

The truth is that everyone needs help every now and then, but you need to know what kind of help to look for before asking.

I want to share my experiences so that you guys can see just how important it is to validate yourself before seeking help and how my situation got 10x worse because I didn’t.

Moral of the story is, listen to yourself and validate your own feelings. No one else, no matter how close they are to you can understand you like you can. You have to understand yourself first before anyone else can. Protect yourself and love yourself guys.