May is Mental Health Awareness Month. I never thought I would be a person to talk to about this but here I am and I am so glad I get to talk about it.
I remember when I had my first panic attack. I genuinely thought I was dying. My chest got so tight and suddenly I couldn’t breath and was gasping for air. I had no idea what was happening. Something was happening with my body and it’s like I had no control over it. I also remember when I realized I had anxiety. I remember hearing the word “anxiety” within the same sentence as my name and I was silent. I felt like I was broken. I had heard other people deal with things like that but I never thought I would be one of them. I always thought to myself that I am totally okay and there will never be a time where I have to deal with anything like that. I’ve experienced it. We all deal with mental health. Whether we want to admit it to ourselves or not, we do. It can come in various forms and we don’t even realize it. Do you overthink about things a lot? Get into your head too much? Do you struggle with self image and comparing yourself to others? Do you get anxious over things you can’t control? Do you find yourself sad and down in the dumps for no reason but no matter what you do you can’t seem to get out of it? Yeah, me too. More than I would like to admit but one thing I had to come to terms with was, it’s okay. I promise you it’s okay. You are not broken, you are human. I always say that we can be our own worst enemies. We can cause imaginary problems for ourselves. Sometimes there are actual things happening but I know that I for one make up situations in my head all the time that then puts me in a spiral.
The time I struggled with mental health the most in my entire life was senior year of college. Not too long ago from the time I am writing this. I got into this dark place, a place I never thought I was capable of being in but there I found myself. I can’t even explain to you how I got there because that’s just the thing, I don’t know. I even had people to help me through it, which I was so grateful for but when people would ask how they could help, I sat there in tears and said “I don’t know.” I didn’t. I had no idea what to do to help me get through it; that feeling lasted months. I had night after night of me sitting in my bed crying out to God asking him to make it stop, asking him to take the pain away, asking him to make it all go away. After a while it got exhausting. I was so tired because I was emotionally drained. I am shocked my body still was able to produce tears. One of the hardest things ever is wanting help so bad from people but not knowing how to ask for it. There was this one night where I went on a drive because I needed to go. I needed to leave. I was up at college at this time and my parents had just learned about the struggle I had been going through. They knew a little bit about it but I had just been home the previous weekend and they got a look first-hand at how bad it was. How dark of a place I was in. Very few people knew. It’s always when we are going through the darkest times where so many others think we are smiley and happy when in reality we are hurting and breaking. My mom had called me and asked what I was doing and I said I was going on a drive. She immediately told me she didn’t think that was the best idea since I was crying and I was alone. I said I was fine and I just needed to leave. I could tell she was scared, she was scared for me. She asked me in the fluffiest way and said “Ansley, do you ever have the mindset or thoughts to, you know, do anything?” I knew exactly what she was asking. I told her, “Mom I don’t want to die, I don’t want to leave this earth, I just want to leave this life for a little bit. I want to go somewhere away from everyone and just be. I just don’t want to bother anyone anymore.” There was a tiny bit of relief in her voice but not a whole lot. She didn’t know what to say next, it was silent for a little bit. She asked if I was okay and for me to continue driving if that is what I needed and for me to call her when I got back to my apartment. When I got back, my roommates ran up to me wondering where I had gone. I then realized I didn’t tell anyone where I was going and had just left. Granted all of my roommates and I had each other's locations but the receptions up in the mountains can screw that up sometimes. Now I am not telling this story to be all like “boo hoo listen to my sad time,” but more of a realization. Even the people in your life who seem like they have it all together and are happy all the time, you have no idea what silent battles they might be fighting. Sometimes it’s more of a war than a battle. I, at the time, felt like I was fighting World War III. I fought this battle for months. There were multiple times where I didn’t think I would get out of it. I remember thinking one night in bed, “God how long is this going to last? A couple more weeks or months? Please don’t make it years.” The mere thought of that terrified me. Like I said before, I spent hours upon hours crying asking God to make it all stop. It got to the point where my parents asked if I needed to go to therapy. That was another thing I never thought I would hear for myself. Therapy? For me? No, I'm fine. The reality of it though, was I was so far from fine. I ended up not going to therapy but that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have been good for me. During this time, God was my therapy. I talked to him everyday, multiple times. Most of the time it was through tears and wailing but still just talked to him.
I then realized that I was not happy up at my school. I was torn. I knew being at college was becoming really toxic for me but then again I only had about 2 months left of school before I graduated. I wanted to spend that time in my little mountain town while I still could but then I wanted to be home so badly. Every weekend that I had gone home was so good. It was for just 2 days that I didn’t cry. I cried everyday at school but when I went home I wouldn't. Since it was my last semester of school I had a pretty easy schedule only having classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. My hometown was about 1.5 hours away from school so not a bad drive at all. After a lot of debate and thought about it, I decided that after spring break I would move back home and commute to school for the days I had class but I wouldn’t be living there. Although this was hard, I knew deep down that it is what I needed to do to help my mental state and my heart. Now of course God had a different plan in mind and the week of spring break, when I had everything planned out with school and home, COVID hit. I went out of the country on a mission trip for spring break and when I returned to the States, we learned school had been canceled for another couple weeks. I was honestly stoked. I now got to spend time at home and have a second spring break. Then 2 weeks turned into a month and then it turned into, we weren’t going back to school at all, nor were we having a graduation ceremony. Now THAT was hard. For those who don’t know, college was only about 50% good for me. I had a lot of rough times at school and graduating and having that graduation ceremony to me meant “I did it, I pushed through the hard times and I came out in the end.” When I didn’t get to have that, it hit hard. I struggled with that fact for a really long time. Knowing for the rest of my life I could never say that I had a college graduation. I could never tell my kids about me walking across the stage and wearing my cap and gown in front of all my friends and family. The beginning of summer 2020 was hard. Covid, graduating, losing jobs and not knowing where I was heading, all of it was difficult. I tried daily to change my mindset on things. Some days it would be so good and others not so much. I was out of the super dark place I was in a few months prior but I could feel myself slowly crawling back there and I knew I couldn’t. It was like I was being dragged and I was holding on for dear life. My mind was a constant cloud. Fog filled my daily thoughts and I didn’t even know what it felt like to think clearly anymore.
There are 171,146 words in the english dictionary. There are 26 letters in the American Alphabet. If you took all those letters, there are 67,108,863 possible combinations that you can make. Out of all of those combination possibilities, there is ONE- 3-word combination that is more special and powerful than that whole number. God. That 3 word combination is what helps me get through everything. He was the one who got me through that dark time and every other dark time before and after. The reason is, He is so much more than a word. He is so much more than just one combination out of the millions. What if someone just said, “oh you are just your name, nothing more.” You would probably look at them and say “I am so much more than just my name, I’m a person with feelings, thoughts, problems, celebrations, etc.” Who are we to hold the name of God back in our own lives? We are no one. During that time I cried out to God. More than ever. I could have gone to so many other things to give me temporary happiness at the time and temporary things to help pull me out of the darkness for just a little bit. But what would have been the point? It would have been temporary happiness. I wanted to be happy forever. I didn’t want to be sad anymore. The only thing that was going to give me that eternal happiness was and is God. The amount of people who don’t know that is heartbreaking. That HE is the ONLY thing that will bring that into your life. He blesses us in so many ways and to be blessed means to be permanently happy. Doesn’t that sound awesome? Well, He is the answer. Now I will be the first one to say I have had my fair share of anger towards God. Wondering why he makes things happen. Why he brings bad things into my life. Just why. I question him a lot. Recently I have learned the gift of surrendering. Surrendering to him with everything. Breaking those chains that I put on myself and allowing him to take it and hold it in his hands because it is safer there than it ever was in my own. Lean on him. Pour into him. He is the greatest creator and father and he has the immense power to make anyone’s mess into a message. I know he did mine.
I am even struggling with mental health right now in a different way than ever before. My friend was checking up on me the other day and asked how I was doing and my exact answer was "oh I'm SO bad but I'm SO DANG GOOD." Confusing? Maybe. There are no other words to describe it though. I am going through a really tough time right now but also the sweetest and most soul-fulfilling time ever. Truly. I have never felt God's presence more in my entire life. It's like for so long I had my heart closed off more than I thought but then I decided to open it to Him and He stood there and said "Finally Ansley, now let me make that sweet heart of yours my home." And he has and it has been amazing. He is moving and I am just along for the ride. The ride of a lifetime. The goodness in Him is insane, literally no words can describe it. He makes the rough waters that I am in right now okay. Instead of me drowning in them like before and feeling like I can't come up for air, he is in the waters with me holding onto my hand making sure I keep my head above. I am pouring into Him more than ever before and let me tell you guys, HE IS SO DANG GOOD. (hence why I said I was SO dang good.)
Mental health is something that should be talked about but something else that should be talked about is how to work through it. We live in a world where the idea of mental health is becoming much more prominent now than ever. I have noticed people talking about it but that's just it. That’s all they do is talk about it and what they might have gone through. That is great don’t get me wrong but what to do after you share? What is the next step? Hear about someone’s problems and then go on about your day? I see so many posts of people sharing their own personal stories about their mental health and then they finish it with “reach out to someone, there are ways to get help. You are not alone.” Well who do I reach out to? Where do I find help? Am I really not alone? There are so many outlets. Whether you want to talk about it to someone else or do it alone, you should always go to the Lord with it. He is reaching out a hand to you and all he wants you to do is take it. I want to share the answer to all three of those questions if you are wondering….Christ. He is the person you reach out to. He is the one to help you through the storm. He is the one beside you because you are NEVER alone.
So here is my mess. My one of many. I still have messes. All of them are very different and they all come at different stages of my life and looking back, yes they were hard but I have learned from every single one and I continue to learn. Here is just one of the many messes in my life that God is telling me to turn it into a message. We will never stop having messes, ever, hate to break it to you. It’s the way we go about them that we can change. Make the change today because from personal experience, God makes the mess SO worth it even in the midst of the storm.
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