Séafra Speaks Vol. 1 - From 2016 to 2022: the Missing Years
For my first major post on Tumblr, I felt that I owe it to some people who may have known me in the interstitial years before 2016 and what's transpired between then and now.
Granted, if you're new then welcome to the madhouse club.
So I'll begin by saying that this is going to be a personal story that I feel the need to tell people. To get my perspective on life in the view for others to understand.
Where it all began:
In 2008, shortly after my thirteenth birthday, I lost a close friend. Their death was something that lingered on my mind and became the onus of my depression for nearly ten years thereafter.
My state of mind at the time wasn't really in a good place as I felt a sense of survivor's guilt (if that's the right term) towards this particular friend's death, even knowing now that it was entirely out of my hands. I was inconsolable and a part of me was shaken to my very core about it.
And I nearly killed myself, leading to what comes next...
I ended up in a relationship with a girl a year older than me that ended up being a horrific mistake—knowing now the extent of the abuse I felt by them. From being asked constantly about the hanky panky and rejecting it, it was one of the things that affected me negatively and greatly contributed to my mental decline.
By 2013, that person was gone from my life; though it took several friends to stand up for me as, initially, I was a coward in actually breaking up the relationship. Eventually it boiled over when I had no other choice to stand up and tell her off.
To this day, I find it incredibly hard to talk about this stuff. It takes a lot of courage to get personal like this.
But had I known the things I know now, I don't imagine a lot would have changed—as everything formed me into the person I was.
Needless to say, I won't deny that I wasn't that great of a person either; as my depression affected my personal relationships with people and how I chose to interact with them in sometimes coarse or rude manners.
I was medicated on a cocktail of anti-depressants—it probably didn't help me at the time as they made me feel numb and careless.
Relationships broke down, my life wasn't going the way it was, and my constant panic attacks prevented me from being a mature and reasonable person at the time. It's that indecisive nature that also had me ultimately walk out of one relationship with a close friend—and that was after a one night stand.
In the time between all of these, I had multiple attempts on my life made by the very hands trembling on the keyboard now. I've lost count of how many times these hands have tried—but it's more than enough to make me realize things now.
By 2016, though things were going well in some regard, I was losing more and more of my sanity and grasp on reality due largely in-part to my anti-depressants and the lingering effect that my then-ex inflicted onto me. I also quit Tumblr for the time being as it wasn't something I was keen on using for any longer.
And it all leads to the end of early 2017—I had a near-death experience following a failed attempt to kill myself in late 2016.
The cause of this near-death experience was severe withdrawl from my anti-depressants (they were contributing to my decline) and it lead to my momentary death while asleep.
It was in those three, long minutes of being dead did I ultimately find a way out of my depression... I saw what the world beyond was and it, strangely, it was like what KH3 would describe it: an endless world of sea and sky with no stop in sight.
Then I saw a door—I don't know where it lead but the figure I saw in that dying dream leads to "a place where I am not ready to face."
Then, after what felt like an eternity of being dead and speaking to the figure, I woke up—and for nearly the first time in my entire life, I was able to properly let out some cry of relief; finally feeling the right path opened up for me to face everything.
Throughout 2017 and 2018, I took a seat and began reflecting a lot on the good and the bad—ultimately coming to realize that I can't ignore the faults of my own; nor can I forget the very things that made me be who I am.
But in accepting that, it came with the greatest lesson: that I'm human at the end of the day and, yes, we all make mistakes as a result. That my own shadow is as tall as my soul—to make peace with that repressed side of myself is nothing short of beautiful. It feels like I've finally found some semblance of peace in my mind...
The last seven years has changed a lot of my perspective on life and, in that same narrative, I've come to greatly appreciate the fact that I'm alive and breathing—that even with whatever darkness lingers on the horizon, I can still stand tall to face it head-on. Being stronger than I was before climbing out of that hole to reach the stars above.
But it also has made me more greatly appreciate people... both in and out of my life. Because without those to surround you with genuine friendship, compassion, or even the reminder to bring yourself down out of the skies you become the very thing that you fear.
"To win is to lose, to lose is to win."
I attribute that quote to both needing a win and a loss to truly understand and humble yourself for the better. That the greatest lesson in life is to be your truest and best self.
But more importantly: be grateful of what you have, because you never know when it'll vanish.
I hope you'll forgive me being personal for a first post—I wanted to clear my mind and get this out there.
Stay shining, readers
— Séafra Yeager
