176 - 1 Year of MH blogging

Well, It has been 1 year to the day since I started this mental health blog. It was born from many factors, not the least of them a deep need to talk about my various mental illnesses and try to make sense out of them, in the midst of a quest for a proper CBT therapist. 

Indeed, if you are new to this blog, in the earliest stages of it, I had posted my chaotic path entry, shortly after the initial welcome & how to use this blog (first three posts). 

To avoid repetition, I invite you to read it and come back to continue this present entry. Go on. I'm not going anywhere. 


I have suffered in silence for the majority of my life ; I'm now middle-aged with a heavy load to carry,  and my battle with mental illnesses have taken a turn both for the worse, and for the best. 

Indeed, my overall physical and psychological health have declined over the past few years - I'd say about 7 total, but especially the last 3. I suffered an overload of all my various conditions, which had been either dormant or set aside because I didn't know how to deal with them, or just that my basic therapy hadn't helped enough to keep at bay. 

During that period, I also had major shifts in my life, ending toxic relationships, cutting ties with the paternal half of my family tree, finishing a job contract that had both its flaws but also rewards. All this contributed to my ongoing issues to burst into a new form of manifestation and finally to explode in my face, with a clear message that the time had come : I must deal with them all, and stop hiding from the core causes. 

In my aforementioned quest for a proper therapy, lost and confused, I started listening to vlogs and to read blogs - to discover, in very clear terms, that I wasn't alone to suffer from such anxieties and other issues. 

Before that, mental health was only an 'intellectual' topic for me ; I hadn't attached the words to convey my own on-going issues. Seeing and hearing others talk about mental illness/health, have put the truth, the reality of my condition.

I learned to reach out to some of those bloggers and vloggers - first by commenting on their posts, and eventually started to open up and share my story. 

Before that, only my wife, close friends and to some extent, my mother, were aware of my story and its effects. 

As I opened up to those others who also suffered, I met recognition and started to develop budding friendships, with mutual support. 

In 1 year of blogging, I had a major shift in my personality : not only was I sharing with others, including total strangers who also suffered from their own mental illnesses, but found out a supportive, thriving community, who gathers either in person, or online. 

Most of them are in the UK, and as I haven't found any similar groups here in France, I joined this community's chats on twitter, using hashtags, created by very generous people who have been very supportive and encouraging, never judging and always pushing me to improve my self-expression. 

In this past year, I have evolved as a person - from a mousy guy who suffered in silence and kept mostly to myself, having difficulties with regular journaling, also know as writing therapy, I transformed into an outspoken mental health activist (tho I always search how to improve that aspect), also becoming a twitter chatter, blogging very regularly - far more than I ever anticipated, whilst increasing my skype sessions with people met in the MH community. 

I owe a lot to the community in general, and to a few in particular ; for their support and availability, their encouragements and advice, their genuine offers of friendships in spite of distance and many differences in our experiences. They have been an anchor, sources of inspiration and I enjoy conversing with them, reading their articles, listening to their vlogs and developing these new friendships based on mutual understanding and support.