What’s normal anyway…

I spent so many years worrying about what people think. Trying to act happy all of the time, because I thought it wasn’t normal to go through a mental funk and be down on life. This is crazy because what’s normal anyway? I think the sooner you realize that being normal is whatever you want it to be…the sooner you get to accept and celebrate your inner weirdness.

It’s not as easy as it sounds though. When you go through a mental funk you start to question everything about your life and all you want to do is fit in and be normal. The stigma surrounding mental health doesn’t help. Some people who have not been through it or seen loved ones suffer, throw around the terms anxiety, depression and bipolar like they are just an excuse for crazy behavior. I have heard people throw around the word bipolar, to explain someone who is up one day and down the next “oh they must have bipolar”– just because they think they are not acting what they think is normal. People need to get off their ass and realize that we were not born on this earth to be normal and if people are acting a little different either embrace it, or leave them alone to do their thing.

I used to want to be normal and be friends with everyone. That was before I nearly lost my life to bipolar disorder.  I went from doing marketing for a tequila brand and having all these party friends to finding out pretty quickly who my real friends really were. When you disappear to Manly hospital for 2 weeks and then NZ for 3 months, you really find out who your true friends are…the ones that will come and visit you in the mental health hospital. The ones that will just hang out and listen to you, no matter what. The ones that will get you back out in the ocean surfing, when you really want to stay in bed. The ones that will help you find a way to share your story to give you hope that you can turn this funk into something positive. The ones that make you feel good no matter what. I owe my life to my amazing family and friends that got me through the toughest times. They made me feel that it is normal to be weird and that being weird is actually rad…so I just started embrace being my weird self and shit it felt that good.

From that day I started opening up about having bipolar and decided I wanted to share my story, so anyone going through a mental funk in this weird rad world would hopefully know that they are not alone. It’s amazing once you meet another mental funk amigo, you start talking and can finally let years of feelings you’ve had trapped inside flow free.  Once you start talking everything gets a little easier and it feels like you have found a long lost brother/sister, who just gets you and you’re no longer alone.

Unfortunately not everyone is making it easy for people suffering from mental funks. One thing that absolutely rips me in life, is how the media treats legends that have worked their ass off and as a result are in the public eye. They suffer from mental funks like anyone else you dickheads, so keep your cameras and bullshit words to your self. It sure can’t feel good to make someone feel so bad, so keep it to yourself or even better write something nice. We need to preserve the legends, so stop being dick heads. 

The sooner we realize that no body is normal and we celebrate every little weird thing about ourselves, the sooner we can beat mental funks and enjoy this amazing thing called life.

BIG BEAR HUG XX