I went to a
horror movie convention the other weekend in Birmingham. It was brilliant, met up with friends and
made some new ones, including Michael Myers himself, the actor Tony Moran. It’s true, we’re FB pals, HE friend requested me. I taught him the
word minge. Fairly proud of that.
Anyway, I
got some photos with some Nightmare on Elm Street stars, Rod Lane from NOES 1 (Jsu Garcia)
and Roland Kincaid from NOES 3 (Ken Sagoes) (paid for) and some pals took some snaps of us
too. And then I saw the photos, and I
could have wept. I look utterly horrendous
in every single one. I’m the size of a
juvenile elephant, my face looks utterly ridiculous, I have about five chins
and that weird top lip disappearing smile that always makes my teeth look more
prominent than they are. This is why I
haven’t posted any of the pics up. Even
the ones I’ve paid for. Even the one of
me with Jsu Garcia AND Ken Sagoes (a photo op I’ll never get again) because of
how I look.
Regular
readers of this blog will know that I have major hang ups about my appearance,
most noticeably my weight and then my actual
physical appearance. I thought I’d come
to terms with the fact that I could look pretty at times, and hell, I even wore
a bikini and posted it on the internet…I think that was more the prosecco
though than me. These photos from the
horror con kicked off something in my brain which, coupled with a few other
things, caused me to have a bit of a meltdown over the last weekend.
Anxiety had
kicked me around on Friday and Saturday, culminating in me dropping out of a
well overdue night out with my gal pals.
I couldn’t have coped with all the photos, the trying to make myself
look presentable enough to be seen out with these women, my best friends, who
are all goddesses in their own way. In
my brain, sometimes, I feel I don’t fit in with them. And it’s something I can’t quite put my
finger on. It’s nothing they’ve ever
said or done, it’s purely me and my own stupid brain. So I ducked out of our night out because I
knew I wouldn’t be able to cope with me ruining every photograph. And I stayed in, with the cats for
company. Weirdly, as the time passed,
and I knew I didn’t have to go out, my anxiety eased off a little. Just a little though, it’s still here,
kicking the crap out of me.
Writing
about how I’m feeling is one of my main coping mechanisms. It’s cathartic. And I might overshare at times, but I’d
rather do that than have all my feelings and emotions bottled up, ready to
unexpectedly spill. Folk call me brave
for writing, I’m not. I’m just sharing
experiences I’ve had, that others might have had, so that maybe one other
person can read it and know that other people get anxiety and depression.
I’ve always
been an advocate for speaking about my mental health; and I will continue to
be. I’m aware that others feel they
can’t speak about it which is sad. This
is a conversation that we need to have, we need it to grow above just a hubbub;
it needs to be a loud and angry conversation.
Mental health services are getting slashed by the government (and
previous governments). Mental health
charities and other charity helplines are getting inundated with referrals,
letters, emails, telephone calls from people suffering because there’s no
mental health service near them, or that it’s been so slashed to the bone, they
can’t get an appointment.
It’s not
shameful to have a mental health issue.
We need to feel comfortable to speak about it.
