MHM Magazine

28 | MENTAL HEALTH MATTERS | 2025 | Issue 2 MHM to my ideas. She read between the lines and connected the dots. She was open to my self-diagnosis of borderline personality disorder after I presented my own updated psychiatric profile and evidence of childhood trauma. I had to do the work if I wanted to be taken seriously. She referred me to Tara H Moross hospital where everything felt right and things started to add up – this is what I needed all along and it was clear I was a fit for the dialectical behaviour programme. As with anything good that ever happens to someone like me, I was kicked out of the programme a week before finishing because of my intense and natural urge to self-sabotage anything that could potentially be good for me. I self- harmed twice which was enough to get me kicked out of the only programme that could save me in the province and that didn’t put me in any debt. My experience at this facility put me on a path that I haven’t stopped travelling. I want to find all the answers about my mental illness. Like a self- fulfilling prophecy, this very same psychiatrist who did everything to help me, too soon could do nothing at all. In the beginning, it was all guns blazing and we were going to battle for the same army, then the psychiatrist walks out in the middle of the fight. I can’t be treated. I can’t be helped. I can’t be saved. My mental illness even pushes the experts away. In the middle of 2023, one day blood rushed to my head and I just couldn’t suppress this wave that kept crashing over me. Maybe I should give someone else a chance. Try one more time. The words played over and over in my head like a record stuck on repeat. Something deep in my soul knew that I had to fight to stay alive, and that by painting everyone in mental healthcare services with the same brush was like putting a full stop at the beginning of a sentence; ending the story before it even began. Fast forward again and the angel of an educational psychologist at the school where I taught put me on to her colleague and friend who was a psychiatrist in the area. She diagnosed me with bipolar disorder schizoaffective subtype. After my initial diagnosis in 2009, I’d spiralled, going down a rabbit hole. From there it was at least one hospital admission a year until my late twenties. Always starting with a sudden, unsuspecting attack of extreme and intense emotional dysregulation going unchecked before the failed suicide attempt. My twenties were plagued with the burning desire, the persistent nagging urge to break free! It’s absurd how chaotic I needed my life to be to feel alive. When things were ‘healthy, ‘normal’ and ‘stable’, I’d get restless, and it felt like I couldn’t breathe. I felt caged and desperate like my wings were clipped. I have a long history of suicidal ideation and that’s been an active go-to for more than twenty years. The idea of dying has always been easier than the idea of living. In my last year of university, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. My brain couldn’t find the words to write full sentences, and I was losing my balance. Isn’t it ironic how one disorder was diagnosed in my first year of university and the second in my last year. Getting a good education was very important to me and what was really only a 4 year degree took me 10 years. Tragically, because of an overdose I was not released from hospital to attend my graduation. Graduating had been my childhood dream, a dream my single mom had for me. What took me ten long, hard years to get, I lost in a matter of seconds. My mental and physical health have cost me a lot. Living with bipolar schizoaffective disorder is a daily struggle that requires me to be intentional about staying stable and being compliant on my medication, even when I’m feeling ‘fine’. I only accepted my diagnosis in 2024 because for years I was grieving the loss of me, me before the bipolar showed its face. My source of strength was the incredible people I met through shared mental health services, ordinary people who were service users just like me. People who truly understood what it meant to live with and experience mental ill-health. Being able to share my experiences in safe spaces that were non-judgemental is where I felt most connected and understood. I´ve written for pleasure and release since I was 12 years old and journaling experiences when my symptoms started was a big part of my healing. Through writing honestly I was able to articulate my childhood trauma, make sense of my adult life post-trauma and navigate the reality of living with a diagnosis. I have had more than ten inpatient psychiatric admissions to psychiatric hospitals, each stay undoubtedly taught me something meaningful, there was always a takeaway that left a lasting impression. Every time I was discharged, I walked out of the hospital with a new self-acceptance and a will in me to fight to stay alive. One of the most beautiful things that could have happened in a psychiatric hospital did - I met my best friend of ten years. In those spaces, with those people who choose to be raw, real and vulnerable in ways that the world isn´t, I began embracing all parts of myself - even the parts that fight every day to stay alive. I am blessed to be part of two support groups and feel connected to a part of my identity that I have suppressed for two decades. Support groups are big on education and relationships, and I advocate for support groups in maintaining good and positive mental health in communities. Having attempted suicide twice and still suffering with suicidal ideation as a go-to for more than 20 years as a result of childhood trauma, starting a support group for suicide survivors was always a dream of mine. There is so much shame and guilt that comes with a failed suicide attempt, and no non-judgmental space to recover from it exists. I want to dedicate my life to advocating for better mental healthcare practices in South Africa, and sharing my story is the first step. I have finished the SADAG support group leader training to start my own support group for suicide survivors. This is just the beginning of me taking back all the years that I’ve lost. References available on request. MHM | 2025 | Volume 12 | Issue 2 | Living With H