We’ve all heard the flippantly flung phrases to sum up difficult situations. For most of our lives we’ve been told things like “No pain, no gain” or “Blood, Sweat and Tears lead to success” but how often do we stop to question these statements. Until recently, I was one of those people who had been indoctrinated to believe that the only way one would be considered successful was to kill myself trying to do inhuman feats and drowning in toxic stress.

After all, long before I ever got to varsity, I’d seen those cutie pie charts that tell you varsity is either sleep and work or sleep and social or work and social. Balance is a myth. At first, I waved it off with a laugh but slowly I’d slipped into a completely unhealthy imbalance that probably would have gone on for years as I slaved towards a goal I had long since lost sight off but we all have a turning point.

Mine came as a slap in the face.

All of a sudden my dominant right hand was frozen in a cramp that turned it into Frankenstein’s arm and there was absolutely no way I was going to quick fix it. While we found the problem, the chances of it being a small issue slipped further and further away from my shaky grasp. And with it, the dreams I  had for myself. I was presented with a condition in a pretty package. No reasons or explanations accompanied it. I was simply told I had a pain syndrome but left with nothing to blame it on. No previous injury or operation. Just a strange coincidence.

Suddenly everything from eating to studying became a mission. Slowly, I slipped closer and closer to the edge. Days grew dark. I would love to say my depression and snippy attitude came solely as a result of the condition but I’d be lying to everyone including myself. The truth is that I was completely dissatisfied by my career choice. As the two years of my campus life had unfolded, I’d slowly become disillusioned and lost. I yearned for more than the course content offered. The reasons I had chosen the course were out weighed by the negativity I now perceived as part of the course.

My heart demanded the change much earlier than my body but as any career driven individual I figured it was a sign of weakness until eventually physical weakness left me no choice but to face the truth…

I needed a change.

Mentally, I was exhausted. Psychologically; I was broken. Physically… well physically there was absolutely no way my body would function without my mind forcing it to and even then it was so riddled with pain it would have needed more than one miracle to achieve a full day worth of work. 

Would you trust yourself to help others if you were silently begging for someone to help you?

I needed to man up and make the bold choices that were necessary to find solace. Both for my physical well being and my mental health which had spiraled out of control lately. While my parents were reluctant at first, they noticed that even when I was excelling I was not myself. So with the silent support of my parents and my best friends as my parachute, I took a giant leap off a cliff into the unknown.

I de-registered…

Where to from here?

I have no idea but I’m walking into this mystery with my eyes wide open.

For the first time, in what feels like years, I am looking forward to every tomorrow. I am ready to explore and find myself again. Pain and all, I’m walking into a whole new adventure…

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Finally Flying,

BrokeBella