Stuck

Before you start reading this, just a warning there will be sensitive stuff in regards to mental health. 

It’s been far too long since I last wrote a post. Feeling like I’m in a rut. During the pandemic my mental health has been a rollercoaster, it’s been up and down. Most times I’m feeling so good about myself and then later on I remember how there’s nothing else to do, you’re trapped in a box and you have to constantly stay in there. It’s definitely a fight with your inner thoughts.

I know since last year there has been rise of mental health issues, there can be many reasons why people are feeling this way.

Here are the many reasons for you to continue on living:

1.)  Who knows what the next day will be like? The future is always full of surprises (it won’t be bad news this time)

2.)  The call you’ve been waiting for

3.) A new door that will open

4.) Will meet new group of friends

5.) The sunshine 

6.) That place you’ve wanted to visit and you’ve put that on your bucket list

7.) The money you’ve saved for your dream house or apartment

8.) Just waking up to a new day 

9.) The sunshine

10.) Fresh air you breathe and just walking outside

11.) The family (doesn’t have to be biological) who love you and will miss you like crazy.

12.) The love of your life

13.) Job opportunity

14.) That dress you’ve been wanting to buy for so long but it’s now the time to show how amazing you look in it

15.) The book you’ve been wanting to read for so long

16.) The language you’ve been wanting to learn 

17.) The guy or girl you’ve been wanting to date

18.) The plants you want to buy

19.) The dog who will miss you and wonder where his owner is

20.) The new restaurant you want to try

21.) The recipe you’ve been wanting to follow

22.) A new dance move 

23.) You miss out on your child’s journey 

24.) The movies you’ve been waiting to come out

25.)  The shoes you’ve been wanting to buy for a long time 

26.) If you wanted to make that drastic move to shave your head do it!

27.) The new COD game 

28.)  Learning to drive

29.) Your first car

30.) Learning karate or trying new sports

I can understand for a few days or weeks there’ll be one of the lowest points you’ll be in, and once coming out of this you’ll feel better again. If you feel like you need help the organisations below are great help, or writing out how you feel can be great therapy, if it’s not helpful for you try to speak to someone you trust. Separating yourself is not going to help you however much you think it will. 

For more information check: https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/your-mental-health/getting-help

https://www.mind.org.uk/

https://youngminds.org.uk/

Me, myself and God

 I really want to say I've taken a big break from blogging, but this whole year I'm sure many can understand this year has been tough. My mental health has been hit the hardest, and I haven't had the motivation to write at all.

I don't write or speak much about my faith, that's why I wanted to write about it. The older I get the less I start to believe. I do have faith, but as I get older I start to question my belief. 

Since I was born my mum and grandma have been avid churchgoers, I remember in the evenings my mum or grandma would place scarves on their heads- meaning "I'm praying, don't disturb me." Another time was during evening mass I did not like, I would end up falling asleep and my mum would nudge me to wake up. Whenever mass (service) ended, we would have to go to each statue of Mother Mary and Jesus to pray each time, it became a routine for me, but I did enjoy Sunday school that was after 10 o'clock mass, I loved it because of the snacks they offered. 

Religion has been in my life since birth, I couldn't think of a time where I wasn't surrounded in a religious setting. I remember when I was 10 years old and my aunt had taken all of us to a different church, it wasn't a catholic church but pentecostal-  however, church is church, to me everyone has the same faith. This type of church was very different and everyone was very welcoming at the start, at that time I felt like I did fit in, and it ended up with me comparing the catholic church and pentecostal church. I did find myself in this pentecostal church, it helped me because there were loads more people my age going there. To this day I'm still friends with some of them, however, I stopped going to that church, and church overall.

My time at the pentecostal church was on and off, I used to hang out with all the kids my age but then I started to become more focused on who's been there the longest and how many people you know. I became so fixated, that I wasn't going to church because of God I was going there because of the people I knew who were going to this specific service time, it was all about popularity. I remember bringing my friends to church and introducing them to everyone, I became too proud of which church I went to and who went to it. I remember the leaders in my group "suggesting" kids to raise money to go to a church concert. I didn't want to go to church for the wrong reasons, at that point I decided to go to church less and pray indoors.

Being an adult and having faith in God is difficult, I feel that I am constantly questioning my faith. 

Food for thought

You’ll come to different peaks in your life and suddenly you realise you are on your own journey.

Being on my own path has been hard. I cannot guarantee that everyday is great but I can say this, some days you’ll miss everything from your past you’ll feel scared and lonely. This is my mind and heart feeling too comfortable in a place where I know I need to move on from. Fear is an obstacle it perpetuates resistance and presents to me never ending long number of excuses to stop me leaving. If I’m stuck in a routine it means I’m too comfortable and not fulfilling what God has planned for me. 

The downside of rushing myself to heal too quickly can feel as if some days I want to bury myself  under my pillows and duvet and allow this negative emotion to ruin my whole day. 10 mins later I realise I’m being too hard on myself, I’m pressuring myself to get to where my friends are. It is exhausting to catch up with where my friends are in their life, I do struggle to remind myself to slow down I’m going through my own storm and so are they.  I may not be going in the same life path as them. 

Loving yourself is one of the difficult things to do, I had allowed myself to be at a place where my mental health was deteriorating. Whoever is reading this I understand some of you may be feeling but remember to put yourself first, we sacrifice our souls for temporary things. No matter how much comfort or happiness you believe you have, you are the one that owns this soul and mind. 

Let us think of ourselves as plants that need to be watered constantly, so what happens if we don’t water it for weeks? If you and I are thinking the same thing, yes the plant is dead. Remember to put yourself first, the constant negative energy that you have absorbed will ruin you, that was me at some points in my life. I fed myself from different energies where I realised I was lost. I’m not perfect I admit that, but I knew I stopped loving myself. Instead of spending time with myself, I looked for happiness everywhere I could get, most times it was all temporary and I did get lost in the moment.

Now I know I’m still healing and learning but I am happier than I’ve ever been. I can say this, time is one of the biggest factors, things didn’t happen instantly for me but I can already see there is a difference in me. 

Love letter series

This is a new type of blog I’m going to be doing, and I love writing. Writing is my therapy, and it makes me feel better.

I’ll be honest...

I like to write about mental health, and I’ve always liked to inform or try to help others understand what most individuals are going through.
A lot of parents or relatives may not understand what some of us are feeling, if no one has realised by now through my previous posts, I admit I have anxiety and depression. It’s been a struggle, I know people who are going through it themselves, I’m not going to make it sound sweet or light, it is a mental battle you are going through constantly, for others depression sometimes just pops up, and you have no reason why you’re feeling this way.

I’m aware there are other people who respond to individuals with depression “to get over it” or “it’ll just pass”, “there are far more important issues than to feel this way,” or “other people have it worse than you.”  Let me tell you, it makes it us all feel like crap, wow we feel so much better. Sometimes just listening and being there for someone helps a lot.

Parents or any relatives reading this I know all of you want to understand what your child/niece/nephew or grandchildren are going through, the best thing is to let them know you’re there for them, when they’re ready to talk you’ll still be there to listen and help them.

To those that are suffering and going through this, you matter! Just remember that there are people who care and love you, even when you believe that there isn’t anyone. For the sake of privacy I’m not going to reveal who this person is but I remember telling an individual what was going on, and they not understanding me. The result of my mental health led to me getting horrible migraines which I had nearly everyday, it led to me being bedridden and wanting to vomit, when they asked what was going on and I explained to them this was what was happening, their response was to take loads of pills. At that moment I didn’t know how to respond that, they aren’t educated enough to understand mental health.

Telling a person who has depression to take lots of pills isn’t the best response, it made me mad but I also realised that your ignorance can destroy an individual, “sticks and stones may broke my bones but words WILL effect me.” So be it at home or at work or anywhere, just empathise what someone is going through, we need more empathy than apathy.

Untitled Series

When you know who you are, you feel complete. 

Knowing you’re born in a country and have been encouraged to immerse in a culture, but then you’ve been brought up somewhere else. 

You’re surrounded by people of culture, you’re the only one from your country, you try to fit in. No one understands anything about your culture, so you decide to change. 

You feel like there’s no one who can speak your language, you don’t bump into anyone who you can feel familiar with in school, at home you’re someone from Nepal but at school you’re eating sandwiches and crisps.
You’re now 18 you think you fit in with these groups of girls, you can feel a little bit of your culture, they’re not from your country but you’re happy nonetheless about the same understanding you feel connected with. You’ve even gone back to visit your country, but you don’t feel connected, your mother tongue doesn’t naturally flow, and you’re stuck there smiling because that’s all you can do. Your cousins have become close with one another, and you feel out of the loop, you love your culture but you also disagree with the views or opinions held.

You come back from your holiday, you feel like you’ve taken a bit of your culture back with you, you feel like your part of a group but after a few months, you still don’t feel like you fit in anywhere. You’re forever trying to find a sense of identity, who are you?

My mother tongue

So what do you consider yourself as?  That's a good question. Growing up in England was different, as I recalled in my previous post I was brought up in a white neighborhood, I know I was different, I didn't look like any of my classmates.

I remember when I wanted to have the same lunch as the rest of the class, when you're a young kid, you want to fit in and not stand out. 

Because I was not from the same country as them I was made fun of by the teachers and classmates, as quoted by the teachers that “I smelt like curry”, or for being blamed for something I didn't do. I was the black sheep that stood out, I still spoke my mother tongue at home, but the peers I hung out with didn't speak my language, so I stopped caring to learn. 

Instead, I embraced my Britney, Destiny's child, and Christina, it became better but I still shielded away my culture, I remember wearing one of my cultural dresses for international evening, and I did not want to wear it. I wanted to wear jeans and a top, I was the only kid from Nepal, and I didn't want to stand out. However, because of my mother's persistence I had to wear it, I felt uncomfortable all evening and just wanted to go home.

Fast forward to secondary school, I saw how much everyone was celebrating their own culture, I wanted to fit in and have the same values they had, but there was no one to celebrate a Nepalese culture. 

Whilst still in school I was happy that I had my own thing, I could (partly) speak a language that no one could figure out where from, but also at the same time it was frustrating. Majority of the people in my school had no clue where I was from, of course, you had the few who knew where it exactly it was, and knew more about my culture than me, I did regret not knowing more about my country. 

By the time I got to my late teens I felt left out unable to feel like my whole identity and value was in Nepal or in England. I couldn't fit in any of those boxes, I was in between both, and wanted to feel like I could fit into one at least.
When I went back to visit my country, I felt like a stranger, I was only four years old when I left, and I was 20 years old when I returned and it didn't feel like home when visiting Nepal (which was only for four months).

I remember doing an internship for a TV channel, and I was asked if I was fluent in Nepali, with confidence I had said yes and when it was my time to interview these employees I was a horse in a room full of cows, I could only speak the basics, and they couldn't even understand what I was saying to them, it was very difficult and I felt like I could not fit in. 

There were positives because I made friends and I had my cousins, I felt like I could finally connect with my culture, although I missed out on learning more, I was beginning to feel more proud of where I came from- in the beginning I decided to step away from my culture and tried to fit in with everyone else, but this time I was welcoming it back.

So whilst being in Nepal, I started to feel comfortable and quite peaceful with myself, I felt these two identities merging together, Nepal and England, I thought I could only welcome one and hide the other- only bringing it out when I'm mostly with my family.

Now that I'm much older, I want my generation and the newer generations to embrace their culture if we stop following our own traditions it will all be forgotten, and the culture is a part of me that presents what individuality really is. Even though sometimes I still question my identity, I'm learning to love it, even if I listen to Beyonce, or Ariana Grande, I'll still be watching 'Main Hoon Na' or 'Kuch Kuch Hota Hai' (A classic! You should all watch it!).