I felt a great sense of relief being strapped down in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. The paramedic told me it was only a precautionary measure, and I totally understood. I had asked for the emergency services to be called after waking from a nervous breakdown, which escalated into a suicide attempt. Even though none of my many calls with the Australian mental health service ‘Beyond Blue’ throughout the evening had alluded to agitation or aggression, I understood the need for the restraints. I was broken, confused, and believed I had nothing left to lose. 

Even though I have experienced mental health difficulties throughout my whole life, it was my mentality towards them in the weeks leading up to my hospitalisation that finally broke me. I had always carried my feelings of melancholy and inadequacy without the gravity they deserved, and in more ignorant times, thought I was too tough for medication or talk therapy. The difference was that  I had begun hiding my pain, self-destruction, and anxiety through isolated rumination. Whilst spending my time with others wearing a brave face, which was slowly losing its durability. I’m no actor, nor liar, but still thought the idea of my quasi-stability would prevent the loss my partner’s love and our new shared rental home, this of course only worked for so long. My monster slowly grew in the dark, until it was big enough to swallow me whole, taking our relationship with it.  

Upon being strapped down in the ambulance at daybreak, with the smiling paramedic I was trying to make laugh and make life a little easier, rather than talk of the physical and mental pain I was in, or the gravity of what was happening and had happened to me, was that in my mind, at least it was over. Thankfully, my life would go on, and the compounding weight I was putting my brain and body under every day to save some fake face or preserve some beautiful mask was gone, and I never needed it, not if I was ever going to be truly happy. The idea of love and preserving the love of those closest to me had clouded my sense of self so much, that it ended up costing me my partner, my home, and almost my life. It was the relief that I now knew I had a chance to be safe. I knew I had created a catastrophe through my actions of self-harm, caused by my prior inaction of self-care, and not unlike those bleak hours where I wasn’t scared or sorry for the irreversible damage I was about to inflict upon myself and those around me, I was now no longer mentally ravaged by the fear of judgement and the craving of acceptance from others. For once, my life and my health became important, and the love I would soon fight to gain for myself could permeate onto others with a potency stronger than any fake smile ever could.  

Although the breakdown of my psyche was over, and one’s mental health journey is never ending, the story of my hospitalisation and subsequent psychiatric care had only just begun. It was with the help of some beautiful souls sharing their suffering and those in the facilities caring for us that I soon would start rebuilding myself into someone whose self-hatred was no longer hidden in shadow but in light, without dominion. My love for others would not be diluted, but no longer be burdened by self-hatred.  

Light upon an object will cast a shadow somewhere, and it is between the shade and the sun that we dance, being sure to neither ignore nor live entirely in either.

written By Thomas Hannah 

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