I've been meaning to do a "who am I" series of posts since I started this thing... but it seems life's little ups & downs keep dragging me from my plans.
Tonight is the night tho. At least for part of my story... Here I go.
I'll start back in 1999. I graduated from high school a year early (in Ontario we used to have 13 grades, I "fast-tracked" to get out early). I hadn't planned on doing this throughout the course of my high school education, but a summer trip to Oxford, England made me realize that I really needed to get out on my own. ASAP. So as soon as I returned to Toronto I high-tailed it to my high school and changed around my whole schedule so that I could finish a year ahead.
As brilliant as that plan had been (to get out of my parents' stifling home), I pretty much lost my mind that final year of high school. Too much stress I suppose - my school was a high-pressure, fancy-shmancy all girls private school, and I was taking a more than full course load, all while doing an insane amount of extra-curriculars. I officially burnt out in March 1999, started cutting, and wound up in the psych ward at the hospital.
Before that, I had always felt that there was 'something' in me that kept me from acheiving happiness. I was always melancholy, a bit dark, introspective (though not shy) and had brief bouts of depression/eating problems from the age of 13+. They came to a peak in 1999 and I started my journey into the world of psychiatric medicine.
I'm not going to bore you with all the details, but basically I have been on almost every anti-depressant there is, have had 4 different diagnosis', and in the end... I really don't think there was a need for any of it. In fact, I think some of my problems have stemmed from being put on the wrong medications at too young an age. More about that in another post...
Those trials & tribulations lasted from 1999 to about 2004. During that span of time I went through 2 extremely abusive relationships, was kicked out of my parents' home (after having to come back from residence life at University due to mental health issues), and basically did a whole shit load of stuff that I either can't remember or am totally ashamed of.(I may write more candidly about this part of my life in a later post as well, theraputic reasons mostly, I think it would be good to finally owe up to some stuff and just move on)
But for now... Lets skip to the part where things start getting better.
I wound up living in Government Housing (ok, so that's not the getting better part, but it's coming I promise!) in a really crappy & dangerous neighbourhood with a really abusive guy. That was not a good time in my life, but I have to mention it in the "getting better" chapter because that's where I met & fell for my hubby. We were roomies while I was with "the looseball" (that's what we both call him now) and we became close friends really quick due to our common love of all things animal. We also had so many other things in common, and he made me laugh, and laughter was so foreign to me at the time. I had pretty much been living through 5 years of total hell up until then.
Being friends with him gave me the confidence to move out of that hell hole, and in 2005 I got my first real apartment, and my first real home as an independant person.
I lived in my pretty pink & white girly space for a year before I decided that I just HAD to tell future-hubby what my feelings were....
And luckily he reciprocated!
After that it was a pretty quick turn-around from my one and only year as a single woman, to being in a wifey roll. He moved in, bringing his various reptiles, giant fish tanks and 2 big dogs with him ( much to the dismay of my only kitty at the time, Sessie, who lived in my walk in closet for a month before re-staking her territory from the dogs). Did I mention I had been living in a bachelor apartment?? It was... cozy!
After about 4 months of tripping over fish tanks & animals we realized we really really needed to get a bigger place and so we moved away from my beautiful apartment (which was in a GREAT part of town) and got the 2 bedroom apartment we live in now, which is in a part of town I really don't like. Now it's just about saving that dough so we can get a house.
Things are pretty calm now in my life, other than the medical aspect of things (infertility, fibromyalgia, endometriosis) And for that I am grateful. It gives me time to think about the things that I want to improve, instead of just being in emotional crisis mode all the time.
I am getting better at facing my past - hopefully blogging about it will help to make it truly my PAST, and not just baggage that I carry around in the present.
'till next time!
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