Recently, I got my blood levels tested for a schizoaffective disorder medication I’m taking. My levels were slightly low. Let me tell you why it’s important that I get my blood levels tested regularly for this particular medication for my schizoaffective disorder.

Living with mental illness doesn't make you weak. If anything, it requires immense strength to fight a war in your mind, one that nobody can see. It's stigma that reinforces the idea that mental illness makes you weak.

When I'm anxious, one of the hardest things to do is to stop overthinking. After all, this seems to be what anxiety is about, beyond, of course, the physical symptoms. Anxiety causes you to worry about what you are experiencing stress about. Therefore, you end up overthinking about the situation and about various scenarios. It's hard to stop overthinking.

Masking depression is something many people do. I tell people when I discuss living with major depressive disorder that I am the queen of masks. And it's true; I can smile when I need to. I became such a perfectionist at masking my depression that I could even fool my closest friends. Yet, when I am alone or turn around, my smile disappears from my face quicker than a scared jackrabbit. 

I've recently undergone a routine change with my bipolar disorder. This has been harder to adapt to than you might think. I find doing the same thing every day has a protective effect on bipolar disorder, so removing that rhythm can do the opposite. A change in my bipolar routine has officially thrown me off my game.

I used to think I was bad at meditation. I had poured myself into books, podcasts, and media that revolved around self-improvement and noticed a common theme: meditation. The problem was that I had already convinced myself that I was bad at meditation. After years of trying, I felt discouraged that I couldn't grasp this seemingly magic tool praised by many. I had almost given up, but instead, I turned to the question, "Is it possible to be bad at meditating?"

As I sit down to reflect on the therapeutic power of spring cleaning and self-esteem, I am drawn into a journey of self-discovery and personal growth. Growing up, I never realized the profound impact that tidying my space could have on my mental wellbeing and self-esteem. However, as I have navigated through life's challenges, I have gradually uncovered the transformative effects of decluttering and organizing my surroundings. In short, your self-esteem can be affected by spring cleaning.

Early this week at my meeting, we shared some of the toughest hurdles we've faced on our journey to gambling addiction recovery, and I couldn't help but notice that budgeting and debt managing emerged as a key theme. It's difficult to dig yourself out of debt and regain financial stability, especially if you don't know much about finance management. There are also limited resources on the topic aimed at recovering gamblers. This inspired me to delve deeper into the topic, as rebuilding finances was also one of my biggest challenges on my journey to recovery.

Handling others' reactions to verbal abuse can be challenging. Managing a verbally abusive relationship is difficult, especially when an outsider provides their opinion on the situation. Listening to reactions from others dismissing the severity of the problem can cause feelings of anger and resentment. Someone who is the regular target of verbal abuse may seek out support from others only to face avoidance or skepticism.

Life has changed drastically since the COVID-19 pandemic; it's why the term "new normal" was used to describe the post-pandemic world. From work and education to social interactions and healthcare, virtually every aspect of life was affected. Although the World Health Organization declared the end of COVID-19 as a public health emergency on May 11, 20231, many of these aspects never returned to normal. In fact, the disease is around to date, which is why some people still wear masks in public spaces. Since the world went into survival mode for a couple of years, we didn't have time to process the monumental changes we were going through. But now that we are no longer in a crisis, I wonder if we have mentally adjusted to the new normal.