It is okay to get help. Don’t ever let anyone tell you otherwise. There isn’t anything wrong with you wanting to reach out for professional help or even medication – especially when dealing with the loss of a loved one.
I’ve been told by people before that I can handle anything grief related on my own; if I sought out extra help or medication from a professional it would mean something was wrong with me. They made it seem like seeking help was an extremely negative thing.
It made me want to hide and curl up into a ball. Honestly, it made me extremely scared to go to therapy.
I tried seeking professional help via therapy when I first lost Matthew, but it was too hard to talk about it and I didn’t feel comfortable sharing such personal information with a complete stranger. I acquired some serious trust issues after what happened with Matt and felt it too difficult to open up to anyone so I hid in a dark corner in my mind.
After a while, I was taken to the doctor and was put on antidepressants, which helped in some ways but in other ways, made me feel like a bad person. The fact that I had to rely on a pill to get me through the day was too difficult of an adjustment that I shortly stopped taking them.
I used my closest friends as crutches. I would hand over a lot of my emotions for them to carry until I realized that what I was expecting from them may only be provided by a professional.
I tried therapy for a second time and although this time I felt more open to talk about Matthew, I was still having an extremely hard time trusting someone I didn’t know with my experience and my feelings. So again, I stopped.
After Matt passed my other relationships were also changed. For a long time, I brought people down and restricted their lives in ways I shouldn’t have. I feared losing my loved ones so much that I would ask them to not do certain things. All of these factors added up to me realizing that I was not only stressing myself out, but adding unnecessary stress to my existing relationships.
I recently decided to seek help once more and this time things felt different.
From the first session, I broke down completely and let everything out. My therapist and therapy group have slowly helped cleanse my mind of negativity. I’ve been able to learn about myself: how to handle my negative feelings, how to learn from my experiences and how to forgive myself. I’ve apologized to those I hurt and have moved away from thinking that I am a bad person.
I’m back on anti-depressants and looking into anxiety medication as well to further help my mind get back to normal. I’m doing this in hopes of becoming the person I truly am, instead of hiding behind my depressed, anxious demeanor which in the recent past I have portrayed to the world. I’ve been wanting to change for a long time but haven’t had the courage or knowledge to until recently.
My point is there is nothing to be ashamed of.
I am a person who has been shaped by traumatic life experiences and that alters the way I can go about my life. It molds how I think, act, and feel, but I’m not going to let that stop me anymore.
There’s nothing wrong with being unable to handle things all on our own. There’s nothing bad with needing for and asking for help.
Additional resources: Project UR Ok, It Gets Brighter, Crisis Textline
