In hospital I thought I had no excuse to be in there. There where people in there who’d experienced horrible, terrible things. They had every right to sit in group therapy and cry. I always went to group therapy, mainly because there wasn’t a lot else to do, and I got the reputation for talking a lot. I’ve never been embarrassed about public speaking, in fact I really enjoy it. But I always felt a huge amount of guilt taking up the time of other people in those therapy sessions. I thought that I didn’t have any trauma, my life had been pretty idyllic. It’s very easy to look back on the past with rose tinted glasses.
But everyone has trauma and its something personal. I thought that the only reason I suffer with mental health problems is because my Grandmother died of cancer when I was 19. It was pretty horrific and I found it very difficult to deal with. Around that time I went on Citalopram for the first time, went through a course of NHS CBT and experienced suicidal idealisations for the first time. I was diagnosed with moderate to severe depression and moderate anxiety. It all made sense at the time. I was dealing with death for the first time in my life.
After a pretty intense year and dropping out of uni, I packed myself off on to my second season, my first season in Canada qualifying as a ski instructor. There was me and 5 other boys. I liked male dominated environments, I still do, but sharing a room with three other boys was tough. My roommate was fine, he liked to party but he was relatively respectful. He would try not to wake me up when he came in drunk. In all honesty he’s probably one of the better roommates I’ve ever had. The other two were not. I would frequently wake up with one of them in my bed, uninvited. I would get woken up in the night with them coming in drunk followed by gangs of equally drunk people that they’ve picked up in the bars. The room would hold after parties all through the week. Joints have been rolled on the pillow I was trying to sleep on and lines of cocaine snorted off my bedside table, if this was once I week I could’ve let it slide but it was every night. At the time I just thought it was normal. This was their room too. Who am I to kick off about it. Right at the beginning I had expressed that I was less than enthusiastic about them smoking weed in the room. To which I was ostracised. It was lonely. I was lonely and down, but I felt like I couldn’t complain. They had paid just as much money as I had and it was my fault that I didn’t want to party. There was something wrong with me.
It wasn’t until I woke up with a 200lb man on all fours on top of me at 2am on a Tuesday morning did I realise that maybe there was something wrong. He was the local drug dealer. The night before I’d been woken up by him having sex in the bed opposite and the boys whose bed it was, was sleeping next to me. Obviously uninvited. The room was full of people that I didn’t know, but that was the norm. This bloke was on top of me. Completely off his tits on god knows what. The whole room seemed oblivious to what was going on. It was normal, I was the one in the wrong. I can’t really remember what happened next, I think I managed to slip out and run down the corridor to a friend who’d forked out the extra to have his own room. He was sympathetic and we watched south park and ate kit kats while listening to the drug dealer run up and down the halls, thumping on doors looking for me.
I told some people I knew in the Snow school about this the next day. They where totally horrified. I just brushed it off. Thinking they where being dramatic. It’s only recently that I have started to value myself. I always thought there where ‘real girls’, taller prettier, ones than me that where allowed to complain about things because they where desirable and then there was me, a self proclaimed swamp monster who didn’t have opinion privileges because the only thing that would make me likeable would be a faux laid back attitude. I had numerous people offer for me to sleep on their floors of give up beds for me. I declined all of them. Deciding that I wasn’t going to let the boys win. I tried to stay out of the room as long as I could. The hotel had put a 11 o’clock curfew on the boys. I would try and stay away from the room till then, letting them party, before turning up like the bad smell to ruin the night that I thought I was. But when I did turn up that night the room was full, as per, there where some semi naked girls and someone in my bed, rolling a joint.
I kicked off, kicked everyone out and went and complained to the tour operator the next morning. Me and my roommate got moved and it was all handled brilliantly. At the time I felt guilty. I thought I’d ruined everything. I thought there was something wrong with me, and it’s haunted me for the past couple of seasons. I suppose it’s why in some ways I’ve struggled with a lot of things.
I don’t blame how I was treated for my self-esteem issues, but it definitely enforced then. Even now, after the summer I’ve had, I wonder if I have any value. I’m not sure where it comes from, but I’ve always thought I would be alone, my whole life, I would never get married, I would never have kids, I will probably die alone. I don’t want that. I really don’t. But I just think that people like me don’t deserve to be loved by other humans. I don’t know. I don’t know what I mean by people like me. Theres nothing unusual or special about me, theres nothing about me that makes me a social out cast, apart from my mental health. But then thats a self perpetuating cycle.
I always thought self help was for self absorbed narcissists. It’s boring and ignorant to talk about yourself. You should never give yourself credit for things that you are good at.
I Hate Skiing 