What I’ve Learned Since I Started Seeing a Therapist
Asking for help isn’t a sign of weakness
At 24 years old, I finally decided to start talking to a therapist. While I’ve struggled with depression and anxiety since junior high school, I figured that I’d always be strong enough to deal with my battles by myself. I prided myself on being mentally tough and independent.
In my eyes, mental toughness was the ability to suppress and beat back my fears, anxieties, and insecurities instead of dealing with them head-on. I’ve learned now that true strength is the ability to admit that I don’t have all the answers to my own problems and that that’s ok.
I spent my senior year of college focusing on myself. I meditated, journaled, lit incense, did all the self-care stuff I could think of. Honestly, it worked pretty great. I still had anxiety and insecurities but because of my mindfulness practice, I was able to watch those thoughts arise and just let them pass. I didn’t deal with them as much as I recited “Rain rain go away, come again some other day” to them.
It wasn’t until I moved and met my now fiancé that I realized the extent to which I hadn’t actually addressed my issues. I had just covered them with Grateful Dead t-shirts, tapestries, and Birkenstocks (all of which I still love btw).
