Trigger Warning: This blog contains topics or self harm, mental health, and suicide. Readers please be advised when reading the following post
Let me begin by saying if you're looking for a Self-help guide for a one way ticket back to social media fame, this is not the blog post for you.
When I say "surviving" I don't mean returning back to social media with the same popularity I had before, if at all. When I say surviving I mean what I had to do for myself to heal and move past what I thought was the end of my world at the time.
In my last post, I discussed briefly on the cancelation, things that happened, and tried to provide clarification on things to a lot of readers. That post was for you.
This post is for me.
Many people don't know my story. That's the thing about social media. People see what you want them to see and before all of this I was the unproblematic, ball of sunshine, Kylie who was always smiling, accepting to people, and making people laugh. People who don't talk to me now called me their friend, confided in me when they needed someone, and I was always there. Hell I even was told by someone I knew that I was "The sweetest and least problematic person they knew"
What a turn of events, right? *Cue laughter sound*
I feel, to myself, that I did make a mistake, a big mistake, and I don't know what I can ever do to fix that mistake or if I can, but what I do feel is that, that mistake should not define who I am. That is not my story.
There's a lot of historical trauma that I could talk about that might help people make sense of everything that I am about to talk about, but that conversation is for another time. This story is about how I found a way to heal.
In my time of healing, I have forced myself out of the shadows of other people. I know who I am now, and I am sure of who I am. It's the one quality my best friend tells me consistently that she admires about me. I know I am not that person that I was in January and I wish I would've had more time to handle things in a better way, I wish I was in a better mental state to not react on such impulse. I wish I didn't listen to people, or let them pressure me. I wish that what I know now, I knew then.
So here is my mental health journey in every bit of raw emotion I can fester.
I spoke how I was admitted to the hospital, boy was that a time. They had given me so many drugs I felt like a walking zombie, but it was the only thing that kept me from crying or panicking. I talk about it online, but I am not sure everyone knows.
I suffer from a condition call Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, this comes with many side effects such as depression, anxiety, joint and mobility issues, gastro problems, and my big one POTS or also known as Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome.
This was a big issue while I was going through these times. What this means is that I have a higher than normal resting heart rate and when I change positions, my heart rate raises and my blood pressure drops, causing me to faint. When I was consistently having panic attacks, my heart rate was too elevated keeping me in a constant state of fainting. To counter this, I had to be monitor 24/7 day and night and given medications on a regular cycle. So as a result, zombified.
After I got out of the hospital is when things really started to go south for me. I could barely walk in my house because of how terrified I was of it. I locked myself in my bedroom with the lights off for days while I cried, and cried, and cried.
I remember calling my mom telling her how I couldn't even pick up a book to read or step into my office because it would cause me to collapse on my floor in the fetal position having a full blown panic. I went on to then tear apartment my entire home office days later. I'm talking floorboards and all.
Everything that was safe for me became a method of torturous anxiety.
So I began therapy and I was not thrilled about it. I had known for a long time that I needed help, but I always felt like I was not allowed to have it, that I always had to be the strong one for everyone. I still think that at times. I didn't realize that therapy, in what ever form you choose, is not weak, but strong.
There is a strength in realizing that you can not carry the weight of the world on your own.
A lot of things happened after that event. I was actually diagnosed with a specific EDS type in that following April that lead me to find out that my average lifespan is about 48-50, which then put me into another spin out about dying young. Something I now have come to terms with. Then big changes were made that lead me to move across the country by myself and start a new job and that was a lot. Then there was things that started to unravel about people from my past that I use to call friends, and I began to realize I was never really their friend, I was a tool for them to use.
So, I had a lot to process. To recap, Lost my career, Lost both of my businesses, was hospitalized for suicidal ideation, found out I am gonna die at some point in the next 24-25 years, moved across the country to a place I had never been, and found out I was only good for followers and views.
Alright, let's take a breath now, In.... and out..
My therapy truly saved my life, my doctors saved my life. It was the help of these things that helped me get out of this continuous state of self-hatred. I found out I had been misdiagnosed for my entire life and had been continuously given medication for years that actually increased my symptoms instead of bettering them.
This is one of the first steps we took, I found out not only do I battle with PTSD and ADHD, what was diagnosed as depression, anxiety, and anger issues, turned out to be Bipolar Disorder and OCD.
No, not the OCD like I have to clean all the time, OCD like I have to turn my lock five times or I am going to choke to death in my sleep.
My doctors put me on the medications I was suppose, to be on and things started to change quickly for me. I had more self control, I was able to stop and think before I spoke instead of just spewing out the first thing that came to mind, I wasn't getting so sad or angry all the time, I'm not impulsive anymore. I continued working on these things in therapy and found ways that helped me better cope with everything.
Writing and sharing my story is one of the biggest things that has helped me.
That's why I make these posts.
I don't expect the whole world to read these, but even if one person can read this and relate in some way, then I feel like I have done my part. People feel so alone in this world when they go through things, no matter what it is and I feel that it is important to me that people know that there is someone out there that go through the same or similar things and that they are not alone.
So I will continue to write my story, continue to write about my journey in healing and falling in love with myself. I will continue to write books and publish them, even if I don't have a single reader. I will write poetry and share it with whoever will listen, because at the end of the day it isn't about how many people, its about that one person that your words impact, its about those people who want to love and support you no matter what, and its about doing what you love to do.
This is your world and you get to decide how you want to live in it.
XOXO
-Ky