The Day Everything Changed

There are moments in life that divide everything into before and after. For me, that day came in the shape of catastrophe— noise, unwanted drama and a deep, empty stillness.

That day was my ultimate rock bottom. My mind had become a battlefield, and my body simply couldn’t keep fighting. I had reached the precipice and I honestly thought I was not coming back.

But I did. Somehow, I survived. That was the day everything changed.

Mental illness doesn’t always look like chaos from the outside. Mine hid behind normality — the working mother, the doctor, the one who smiled and kept everything running. But inside, I was unravelling. Years of secrecy, exhaustion, and self-reliance had worn me down to nothing.

My life didn’t change because I suddenly became brave, or strong, or wise. It changed because I realised that if I was going to survive, I had to tell the truth — to myself first, and eventually to others.

That day marked the end of the version of me who hid behind competence and control, and the beginning of a different kind of healing — one that had to be rooted in honesty.

If I learned anything from that moment, it’s this: rock bottom isn’t always destruction. Sometimes, it’s the solid ground we need to start again.