This is what it’s like: My life, my story - Part 1
Why I’m writing this - Disclaimer: This story is in parts, as it’s going to take a while to explain everything, so stay tuned :)
I’ve gone back and forth for a little while about writing this. Part of me wants to explain everything neatly - to make sense of telling my story, but another part of me is clearly not ready to say anything! In reality am I ever going to be ready to tell my story? Well the answer to that would be no!
Healing in this journey, for me, is far from perfect. It has not been neat and it’s nowhere near finished.
This blog exists because I live at the intersection of mental health and physical health, and for a long time I didn’t know where to put my experience and to be quite honest I didn’t even think it was relevant. My mind and body have both asked more of me than I expected, and most days it feels like I’m learning how to be myself again and it’s like a never ending cycle. The question that I asked myself everyday was, who am I? Because it felt like I didn’t know who I was anymore. I was completely different and I had no clue on how to cope with this diagnosis. Honestly, I still don’t know how to cope and it has been almost 2 years since being diagnosed. But I’m on this journey for however long it takes, to become me again!
It all started about 3, almost 4 years ago. One morning I woke up with the most terrible pain in my right wrist. I can’t describe it properly, but I couldn’t move it as the pain was pretty bad. I waited the whole day to see if anything changed, but it stayed the same. So, later in the night, I went up to the hospital because I became concerned. I was working at a pizza shop at the time, and the doctor just put it down as repeated strain. As time went on, the pain used to come and go, so I wasn’t really too bothered by it and put it aside. Forward to a year later in 2023, I left that job after 3 years. Me and my family had a holiday booked in September that year and as it was a big trip, I just said that I’d start looking for work again once we got back. But during the lead up to the holiday, so the months June - September. The pain in my wrist, would over time become more intense and more frequent, as well as the pain now apparent in my left wrist. I slowly started losing the ability to do everyday things like; I would notice that getting up in the mornings would be dreadful, to the point where I’d worry every night before bed, about how much pain would I be in the next day. Another thing was not being able to tie my hair back, as simple as that sounds, it’s the little things, when they disappear and you can no longer do them, it’s upsetting.
I remember everyday, the swelling of my wrists gradually getting worse and the pain. I just had no clue what was wrong with me! Now on our way to Australia, in September. Trying to enjoy every minute of it, whilst I’m in the most immense pain, was a struggle. About a week after we arrived, I then noticed that the same pain would effect both my knees. I thought maybe it could be due to the amount of walking I was doing and that I wasn’t used to it. As the days of the holiday went on, every morning I could barely walk as I was in unbearable agony and that’s when I grew concerned. I said to myself, “my knees shouldn’t hurt this much at 20 years old.” Trying to stick it out until the end of the holiday, was difficult.
The biggest worry at the time for me, was the fact that no one believed me at how much pain I was actually in. I look back now and think, well that was quite traumatising, that whole experience traumatised me! But little did I know everything would just get a whole lot worse in time and that was only the start of my journey to being diagnosed.
End of Part 1 - Stay tuned!
Quote - There is a past version of you that is so proud of how far you have come.