thefittymindset

[thefittymindset]

Fitty's Little Guardian Saves the Day

For the last blog entry of this class, I'm going to be addressing one of my lowest lows -- when I ended up in the psychiatric ward of Binghamton General Hospital.

It was my freshman year of college, I was sad to not be home because my dad was battling cancer, specifically pancreatic cancer. This is important because it's a very aggressive form of cancer which most people don't survive.

Before going to Binghamton I had been talking to these two girls and when I got there we were inseparable. Quickly though they started to ghost me and not hang out with me. We normally would go out almost every day of the week and they stopped inviting me out. At this point I started to get nervous because all of a sudden I felt very isolated.

I was super depressed at this point and when I went to my social psychology class it just so happened that the topic of conversation was suicide. This sounded appealing to me at the time and I started to day dream about ways I could end my own life. By the end of that lecture, I had a full plan of how to do it that I was set on.

As I went to my room to end my life, I got a notification and I looked at my home screen which, at the time was a picture of my nephew Xander. Seeing that picture snapped me out of it a bit, I knew if I went back to my room that would be one of the last things I did so I went to the university counseling center.

Of course when I got there they were trying to tell me they couldn't give me an appointment. In a whisper, I told the receptionist, "If I leave this building now I will kill myself". This is what then made her take me seriously.

The next thing I knew, I was handcuffed in the back of a police squad car heading to the hospital. My mom met me there, they told me I had to be committed because I expressed having multiple plans to commit suicide.

Being in the hospital was one of the scariest things for me, I was 18 years old and the youngest one there. I was also the most sane one there, I had no one to socialize with. Eventually one of the older men tried to become my friend which ended up with him being super creepy and the nurses had to make sure he didn't go near me. He would wait outside of my room every morning which, by the way, doesn't have a door but instead a piece of foam connected to the doorframe by magnets.

This post is dedicated to my nephew, Xander. He's only 4, but little does he know that he single handedly saved my life. I genuinely don't know where I would be without him. I hope one day, when he's old enough, I can thank him for saving me. At the time I couldn't bare the thought of not being able to see him grow up. I will eternally be in debt to this little man and I wish that in the future I will be able to repay him.

#mental health awareness #mental health journey #nephew #savedpeople #depression #anxiety #mental hospital

[thefittymindset]

The Battle Within: Fitty's First Episode

In the seventh grade was when I had my first suicidal episode. At this point, I was friends with Clara again but was aware of how toxic she could be. At the beginning of the year, a new kid came to our school who for the sake of this story I will call Liam.

Liam was British, he had the accent and everything. When he first got to our school everyone was fangirling over him (at the time, One Direction was popular so everyone was making comparisons to him and the other members). Everyone and anyone wanted to date him, or at least hook up with him (which in this case, means make out).

I had a crush on him immediately and Clara knew this (this is important later in the story). I was trying to act cool, like I didn't give a single shit about him, and this is what drew him to me. I didn't know this at the time, but he asked my friend Clara about me. He was wondering what I was like, the type of stuff that I did, etc.

Clara decided to take it upon herself to tell him that I didn't like him, but she did and boom, they started dating. This was the beginning of a love triangle that lasted for over a year. At one point, he was dating Clara but decided to FaceTime me to confess his feelings. Since he was dating Clara, this was very inappropriate so I decided to tell her what he said.

At this point I had already been super depressed for years. Liam FaceTimed me after I told Clara and he went OFF on me. One of the things he decided to tell me was that I should "just go and kill [myself]". This was something he told me repeatedly until one day I thought to myself, honestly, killing myself would probably be for the best.

That day I went home and decided I was gonna end my life. I was so young at the time, the plan that I came up with was I was going to jump off the roof of my house. Obviously, I would survive this and just break a lot of my bones but I didn't realize that at the time.

I figured out how to get the screen out of my window and I started to head out onto the roof. When I put one leg outside I heard someone come into my room, it was my mom. She instantly started yelling at me, "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING?". When I told her my plan and that I wanted to die she ended up telling me she would send me to the looney bin.

Instead of actually listening to what was wrong with me and getting me help, she decided the better way to go would be to scare me out of doing it. This clearly did not work, as 6 years after this incident I ended up in the hospital for trying to end my life again.

At this point, although my mom still isn't the best when it comes to mental health, she is a lot better now. On FaceBook she is an outspoken advocate for those who struggle with their mental health and she's gotten better when it comes to discussing the actual matter of one's mental health.

This post is dedicated to my Mom. Our relationship--although rocky at points-- has grown into something beautiful for me. I will address this more in my next post, but she is my biggest advocate. She has told me many times that without me, she doesn't know where she would be now and I can very much say the same for her. Although using scare tactics when it comes to mental health is blatantly something that doesn't work, I now understand where she is coming from. When she talks about mental health now, you can tell that even though she has some ways to go, she is more educated on those matters now. I love you, Mom.

#mental health awareness #mental health journey #depression #attempt #anxiety #7th grade #one direction

[thefittymindset]

In Fitty's Footsteps: Navigating 6th Grade

The first time I ever had a direct encounter with suicidality was when I was in the 6th grade. For as long as I can remember, I have struggled with (at the very least) anxiety and depression. Leading into that school year, I had a friend who engaged in self-harm (for the sake of this post, let's call her Clara).

Clara was my best friend. One day at gymnastics, when we were washing our hands to get off the chalk after doing the uneven parallel bars, I caught a glimpse of her wrists. She had at least 3 cuts, running horizontally. When I went to say something about it she pulled me into a bathroom and swore me to secrecy, saying I could never tell anyone what was going on with her.

At the time I was 12 years old, but even then I knew that I had to tell someone, it was clear to me she needed help. The next day when I was at school, I decided to go to the guidance department about it. I told my counselor and shortly after she called Clara and her mom into a meeting.

When the meeting was over and it was time for lunch Clara cornered me and started yelling. "I told you not to fucking tell anyone," is the only snippet of this event that is still clear in my mind. Essentially, at first, Clara was super mad at me, she told me that she never wanted to talk to or see me ever again. I was super upset, at the time she was my best friend and without her I felt like I had no one.

Eventually she came around when she was in a better place mentally, and then she was thankful for me. But this quickly began to become problematic, as she was a terrible friend to me and whenever she sensed I was distancing myself she would tell me that the only reason she was alive was because of me... this made me feel like I couldn't stop being friends with her, I was scared of what she would do to herself. I did get out of that toxic friendship eventually, the last time we talked she accused me of bullying her (I asked all my friends if that was true, they all said it was the other way around) and I haven't talked to her since.

This post is dedicated to someone who has been there for me since I was 5 years old, my best friend Crissy. In the past, we've had some experiences where we are very hot and cold with each other but for my whole life, she has been the most consistent relationship I have had and for her I will be eternally grateful.

#mental health journey #mental health awareness #depression #anxiety

[thefittymindset]

Introduction: Blog #1

Hello and welcome, my name is Faith (fitty is my nickname coming from my last name, Fitzmaurice). I am 22 years old and I am currently in my last semester at Binghamton University. In my blog I will be exploring various stories that apply to my mental health and how I overcame them (or simply just stories that I find funny that others might relate to). Although I have been depressed and anxious for as long as I can remember, it wasn't until my junior year of high school my mother finally let me get help. She's a very big "pick yourself up by your own bootstraps" type of woman so she didn't understand my need for help. My initial diagnosis was persistent depression disorder and social anxiety. Once I turned 21, they added ADHD to my shopping list of disorders. For the first part of my life, it was only me, myself and I dealing with my mental health. Now I have an army of people supporting me, lightening the burden immensely.

For me, the biggest challenge I had to overcome was to get my mom to accept me, even given my mental health struggles. At first she thought I was insane, threatening to send me to the "loony bin". But upon my hospitalization, I think something snapped into place for her. She still doesn't understand when I have days of depression, she always thinks there must be something that caused it, but that's not the case. I'm clinically depressed, nothing has to happen for me to feel upset.

Technically, junior year was the beginning of my mental health journey, in terms of the fact that I finally had an official diagnosis that my therapist was able to work on with me. But for me, my mental health struggles have been around for as long as I can remember which is something I will start to address in my next post. I will start telling specific stories where with hindsight, it's blatantly obvious I had these disorders. But in a lot of these stories, at the time I didn't think there was anything wrong.

Each blog post I will end with a dedication to someone who helped me get through my struggles First up, my dad, Danny. Danny died my freshman year in Binghamton and this is something which immensely impacted me and shaped the person is today. I love and miss him every waking moment and he is my inspiration to keep fighting.

Catch y'all in my next post,

Fitty ❤️

#mental health #mental health awareness #depression #anxiety #adhd #selfcare #mental health journey #you are not alone #healing journey #mental health community