The emerging blogger series is aimed at community building through giving mental health bloggers who are early in their blogging evolution the opportunity to have their work seen by a wider audience. It’s also a way to introduce you as a reader to some newer members of our community.
This post is by Amy from Amy E. Russo
Tuesdays Mean Therapy
If you’re looking for me on Tuesday mornings, you can always find me rolling up to my therapist’s office, iced coffee in hand, 10 minutes early, always. Like clockwork, every week, that is where I’ll be.
I’ve been going to therapy for six years, consistently. I wanted to stop, there was one point when I first started, that my therapist angered me so much that I stopped going for about 4-6 weeks. When my psychiatrist found out, he made me promise that I would go back. Eventually I did, and it went for me going as much as possible, to once a week, to having a standing appointment.
When I first started therapy I had an extreme case of alexithymia, I wasn’t able to tell him how I felt or why I felt it, I would barely shrug or nod, mostly I would cry. As time went on though, I opened up, I started becoming myself. Yet, as much as he was helping me, the fall of 2015, I had stopped taking my medication. I ended up in the hospital because of a manic episode. We didn’t have the relationship we have now, but he was there when I got out. Things did get better from there, I started taking my meds like I should and we were able to work on the issues that landed me in the hospital the first time.
My therapist has been there for my lowest points, crying hysterically over nothing, hearing voices, being diagnosed and accepting that I have Bipolar 1. He has been there when I felt like no one else was, when I felt like I couldn’t confide in anyone. Things got really bad the summer of 2016, I was ready to die and if it wasn’t for him, I probably wouldn’t be here writing this. He watched me deteriorate, he helped as much as he could, but when it came time, he made the call to put me in the hospital. That was when I started my real evolution. So I truly owe my life to him.
Flash forward to this year, so much is different, including me. Instead of going to him with an emotional crisis, I went to him with a mini existential crisis. I was asking the questions like, why am I here? What is the meaning of life? He handled it in stride, as if I were coming to him asking those questions because I was depressed.
Therapy has truly changed my life, I would not have evolved into the person I am today without it. At this point, I’m fairly stable, I don’t contact my therapist outside of office hours as much, I don’t have to go more than once a week, it feels a lot more comfortable now. He was telling me the other day, saying how much he’s seen me grow, how far I’ve come in the past 6 years, it warmed my heart to know that I have someone like him in my support system.
So, every Tuesday, that is where I’ll be, I may not need therapy as much as I did years ago, but things happen, I don’t know where I’ll be next week, next month, or next year, but that’s the nature of the disorder. I know my therapist will be there though, and for that I am so thankful.
You can find Amy on her blog Amy E. Russo.
Thanks so much Amy for participating in the emerging blogger series!
You can find a listing of all of the posts in the series here.
Are you the next emerging blogger?
Do you blog primarily about mental health? Are you looking to connect with more of the mental health blogging community?
Once or twice a week I’ll publish Emerging Blogger mental health-related guest post(s) by bloggers who are early on in blogging evolution, with priority given to those whose blog has less than 100 WordPress followers. The focus is on community-building rather than just a one-off guest post, and I’m looking for personal rather than commercial blogs.
If you’re interested, email me at mentalhealthathome (at) gmail (dot) com and let me know the topic you’d like to write about and your blog name/URL.
