Do Not Knock It Until You Try It

 I have been accused of over sharing on social media. Sharing lots of personal information that shouldn’t be shared on social media. 

The answer is yes and no. I do over share at times and no I do not share any real personal information. I am not telling people my passwords. I am not sharing addresses or phone numbers. Or other sensitive information. What I do share is about myself, my thoughts feelings emotions. My up and downs. I am a mental health advocate. I live and deal with depression and anxiety everyday. 

By sharing my journey, hopefully the stigma is just a little bit less. Hopefully people will be more compassionate, more respectful and kinder towards others. Maybe, it helps one person feel better about themselves even if that person is me.

This past weekend I was having a a couple of bad days. When this happens I refer to it as not feeling the love. It is time for me to think of myself, practice self care and be with myself. I shared this on social media and got lots of positive words of encouragement and only one negative response. I considered the source and moved on. 

The beauty and curse of living with depression and anxiety is that it can come out of the blue like it did on Saturday morning. I was reading up on my routine medical procedure I am having at the end of the week. My subconscious mind took over and than I started having doubts and running through every negative scenario my mind could think of.  I know it was wrong, however how do you tell your mind to shut out the negative thoughts? 

I am buoyed and comforted by my amazing network. They have always come through for me. It is now 4 days out from my procedure and I am confident that everything will go well and the result will come back in a favourable way for me. Maybe I had to have all those irrational fears and thoughts. 

One thing I know is that I am going to continue to share my journey with depression and anxiety on social media. If you don’t like it you can unfollow me. I will not be hurt or offended. I have become an open book with many chapters still to write and share.