My name means joy.

I would never use that adjective to describe myself before though.

For the longest time, joy was at the bottom of my very self-identified labels. From the beginning, I’ve always been a performer and peacemaker, which are just nice ways of saying perfectionist and people-pleaser. What I didn’t know for most of my life was those were my chronic trauma (C-PTSD) survival responses.

For ten years, I was performing in my relationship. Keeping it perfect on paper for the partner I had planned a life with. When depression crept on me, it shook an already unstable relationship. Like Alice, I was free falling into a new wonderland where I didn’t know myself or the new reality I found myself in. It was the longest fall of my life but it woke me up.

It’s taken years but glimmer by glimmer, I’m rebuilding a kaleidoscope of my metamorphosed identity and life. And let me tell you, it’s more vibrant than ever, as the light shines through the cracks.

I am becoming joy, through my mental health recovery.