Everything takes time (Time is a gift)

Today I want to talk about something which people either use too much of or never seem to have enough of, time. You see, people who suffer from depression or stress or anxiety or all of the above, need time to recover (just like any disease) and get back to normal. Now a lot people might be thinking, “Well that’s obvious”, and you’re right, it is, but a lot of people underestimate the amount of time it takes to, for want of a better word, heal, especially people who suffer from an ailment.  People who suffer from mental ailments want to get cured, not just for themselves, but for those around them. Problem is they underestimate the amount of time it takes and when it takes too long, they become sadder and start to lose hope.

Depression, stress, anxiety and all other mental ailments can take a very long time to get over, sometimes days, sometimes weeks, months and in very bad cases years. How much time it takes depends on various factors, the environment the person lives in, their situation, and the people around them and of course the person himself or herself. Let’s take myself as an example.

As I told you before, I suffer from OCD, so I face stress and anxiety almost every day. I have good days and bad days and for now the good outnumber the bad. My OCD first manifested when I was in school, I found school life to be very stressful which made my OCD worse and worse, to the point that I became utterly depressed. It got so bad that I had to leave school, something I am not proud of. At first my family and I had no idea what was wrong with me and we were hoping I would get over it by myself, but that didn’t happen. Eventually I went to see a psychiatrist and was diagnosed and they put me on an anti-depressant (prozac). It took a long time, years in fact before I started to get some control over myself again, and now here I am writing about it.

So in my case my school (the environment), didn’t help me at all and made things worse, my parents had the money to get me diagnosed and could afford the medicine I needed (the situation), my parents, my mother especially, was very supportive and helpful and helped me get through it (the people), and of course I was able to find the strength to try and get better; it took me a while but I got there (the person himself).

So you see, these types of things do take time to recover from, you can’t just think of it like indigestion and that you will get better tomorrow. Don’t be afraid to take the time you need to get better, and like Tick-tock said in the movie “Phantom tollbooth,” ‘Time is a gift….given to give you the time you need to have the time of your life..’