Last Year I felt More Than Sad
*Trigger Warning
I wrote this following the news of Caroline Flack’s tragic and heartbreaking death. I’ve sat on this for the past week, out of respect and also being petrified to tell my story. It’s been a long time coming but it seems even more poignant now.
2019 sent me into a dark place. I lost my job. My planned future. My career. My money. My stability. I came to terms with losing friendships from people that I thought would be stood by my side forever. And I didn’t realise how lonely I could feel. I made the ridiculous (and brilliant) decision to start a fresh. I changed my career path, delving into an industry where I was starting from the bottom again, I knew no one, I had no contacts and with that came countless rejections. An unbelievable amount of ‘No’s’, ignored emails and days where I felt like I was terrible at everything. My debt was racking higher, I had bills to pay and I was earning a 10th of what I was earning before. And the cherry on top of the 2019 sh*t show was that, I had a man follow me into my flat when I was alone. Thankfully my adrenaline kicked in so hard that I never found out his motive but it was something that rattled me, as my home had always been my safe place. I felt I had appearances to uphold and I was crumbling under pressure.
If it weren’t for the friends and family that shone a torch in my time of darkness then I don’t know where I’d be. Receiving a text or phone call out of the blue, checking in on me, it made me feel loved, like it was all going to get better. And to those people I will be eternally grateful.
Also, spoiler alert. It did and always will get better.
I was lucky to find peace in running. It gave me a focus a structure to my week. I should have gone to therapy, but this has ended up being my therapy.
This community I've met online kept me smiling. I’ve been lucky enough to never experience trolling to the extremes that others have. I’ve always wanted to build a safe place on my account and that is something I want to continue into the future. Anyone that’s unsavoury is unwelcome around here. A death in these circumstances makes it even more important that people have safe places to go to both on and offline.
What does the future hold for trolls? We don't know. But I sincerely hope that some laws are put in place to police it. It's a mammoth task, but a task that has to be dealt with. And fast.
Caroline couldn’t find the light out of the darkness. And it’s utterly heartbreaking. She was hounded by all aspects of the media. The faceless bullies critiquing her every move all hours of the day and night. I hope she’s in a safe and happy place now.
The takeaway from this is that you never really know what’s going on behind the smiley ‘perfect’ squares of Instagram, the Tik Tok dances and the YouTube Make-Up Tutorials.
The abundance of kind words can often get pushed aside by the negative ones. So if you're supporting a friend, family member or colleague through a rough time, then keep telling them the positive things. Even if it feels like you're shovelling snow while it's still snowing.
Be kind. Always.
For anyone struggling please speak out.
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