moment of silence for all those who feel lost.

 

I'm almost done with my second year of studies and yet again I feel like I have absolutely no idea what am I doing with my precious little life. Welcome to my world of constant worrying, existential crisis, insomnia and chaotic mind; What have I learnt during these two years? How can I use this knowledge in the future? Is this what I want to do? Am I good enough? 

All of this is floating over my head like a big dark cloud of anxiety because I feel like the people around me are doing great and definitely better than me. All of these super positive, good-vibes-only, fake-ass people on social media have such a bad impact because they only show themselves in the best light. No wonder our generation is (sometimes) so lost when you have all this bullshit around you 24/7. At this point of life, I just unfollow all the people that I don't get any value or aesthetic pleasure from and it's almost like this big pile of worries is removed from my mind. Well not really. It also takes a lot of effort to stop comparing yourself to others, focusing on your own goals and don't take anything anyone else says personally. Basically, the recipe to stop feeling like you have no direction is to let go of everything and do what feels best for you and only you.

Because even the most "I'm always happy" insta-girl is feeling this way and there is nothing wrong with it. We are just humans and we are not designed to be flawless and perfect. If all of these emotions and pressure from the outside creeps in my mind I just go offline, read some good book, learn a challenging yoga pose, drink some good tea, meditate or just take a nap- the best solution for all problems. So yeah, let's just say fuck it because everyone is good enough.

my fears.

It's no news that there is quite a lot of illness going on in my family. Fortunately, I was usually too young to notice the seriousness of different diseases my family members had to fight with but it was always something that gave me a lot of anxiety. All of it started back in 1999 when my grandma was diagnosed with breast cancer and the following years were full of other shitty things that I don't even want to think about.

The thing is that when you're young, you don't think about death. You don't think about the future without your grandparents nor your parents and nothing can't prepare you for it. But when my amazing grandfather got sick in 2012, suddenly it became something that just ate me from inside, that made me stressed out and anxious. And I think that's when it all started; my fear of hospitals, diagnosis, and illnesses. You could say that I developed some sort of hypochondria. But it didn't end there. The lung cancer of my grandfather seemed to be going away and we were all very positive that he might have won this battle through chemotherapy. This was in the summer of 2013 and we eventually decided to go on a family trip to a place where my grandfather spent his childhood. It was as if he was just going there to see it one last time, he had all this energy all of sudden... but then it all went to hell. The next month he stopped feeling his legs and spent the last 3 months of his life in his bed, being unable to walk. Cancer spread to his brain.

I know it's shitty and depressing to read about such things. But this was where a lot of my mental health problems began. In February 2014 he passed away. It was just another Sunday. Me and my mum went to the mall in the afternoon and when we were arriving at my grandmother's house, only the small ambulance was parked in the driveway.  This is when I realised that it was over. We met my grandma in the hall, she said that he passed away when he was taking his afternoon nap. I remember locking myself in the toilet and crying my heart out for hours. Since then, there was always something broken inside of me.

And then, year after, I was told by my gynaecologist that there are some changes on my cervix and that it could be something bad. What she also told me that day I will never forget: "I had a patient who was 25, we found out too late that there is something wrong and she passed away within 6 months." I instantly got the biggest anxiety attack of my life. Am I going to die as well? That's what I kept thinking for days and days. And because of that, I have the biggest fear of hospitals. I hate getting check-ups or tests. I am just afraid that there will be something wrong with me as well.

Why am I writing all of this though? Why am I writing this now? I met my father today on my way home from the train station. Out of sudden, he asked me if I knew what happened to my other grandpa. I had no idea of course. Because my family knows about my fears, they just kept it a secret from me. And then he told me. My grandpa, who has been in the hospital for few days since Easter has been tested because of the low count of white blood cells. And he has been diagnosed with leukaemia. And I'm just sitting here, crying again because I just don't understand why does this happen around me. Shit.

T.

I've got my pms.

You know those days when you just feel like a total mess for no reason? That happened today and I had no idea what the hell is going on. I was wondering if I'm just stressed out because of an upcoming exam, worried because I feel like my time in Prague is slowly getting shorter and shorter or just because I spent a nice evening with my two closest friends but felt like we have nothing in common lately.

Maybe I am feeling like this because of all these things mentioned above but when I was lying in the bathtub, desperately trying to relax my body and mind, I checked my Clue App calendar and there it was; today is the day of my pms. Aka the day when my body is trying to remind me to get ready for a weekend spent in bed with a hot water bottle on my aching belly and a ton of food around me. 

Coping with all of these hormonal changes we are going through, mood swings, periods... That makes us girls really incredible. And now, I just want to curl up in a ball and finally finish reading Kafka on the Shore, fall asleep and try to get over this low point of this month.

Have a good one!

T.

my long and (almost) never-ending journey towards self-love

Disclaimer: This article consists mainly of my own shower thoughts, things which life threw at me and many opinions which some people might find not interesting at all.

It is only right to start in the beginning and that is when I was born to a young couple one autumn day of 1995. My parents started dating when they were 17 (yeah, definitely not going to marry my boyfriend from when I was 17), got married at 22 (another thing I will definitely not accomplish this year) and had me- the most amazing person on this planet at 24. I was an only child back then and I might say- I really enjoyed it. In fact, I enjoyed it so much that my need to get all the attention has not changed even when my brother was born; the sudden sharing of everything I ever received with him was a pain in the ass and caused many scenes. And since then... I have a reputation of a selfish individual. 

But that's not really what I want to talk about today. Selfishness might be a bad thing and I might struggle with it to this day (guilty as pleased) but one thing I had the biggest problem with is the other side of "selfishness" which is the need for attention from others. When you're the first child, you suddenly realize that the parents somehow prefer the younger one more and you are the one who is the reason behind all the cries and broken toys. And that is what might have started all this struggle; me being shy to share my problems with others, cultivating all the bad stuff inside of me, feeling like nobody cares, feeling that all you do is wrong... The list goes on and on. And this issue is what I took with me throughout the rest of my childhood, my teenage years when I was feeling the most vulnerable ...even until now. So how do I fight it? What should one do to find the path towards self-love? 

As Rupaul says: If you don't love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else? And that is the one thing I struggled with during the course of my relationship with my ex-boyfriend; not being able to love someone fully because you don't love yourself enough. Maybe that is why I feel like I am still not ready for a relationship and this realization was one of the reasons why I ended the relationship I had for almost two years this January.

It is a time when Tereza gets her shit together and starts with herself. Embraces the "selfishness" and listens to her gut. So I'm doing it! I'm finally able to talk to people openly about my problems. Having the "big talk" instead of small talk is the one way to go. If we start talking to people openly about what is on our mind, discuss problems or things that worry us, we are able to become much closer than if we maintained the casual how-is-the-weather-today-talk. Being able to open up to my friends about my problems is honestly helping me a lot because when someone listens to you, it feels 100 times better than eating yourself up with bad thoughts.

I'm only in the real beginning but believe me, I feel so much better when I can just focus on myself. Being able to unwind with yoga, meditation, a good cup of green tea, cuddles with my cat or finishing a really good book. Self-love is a whole big thing and everyone can think of it differently. The important thing is, that you feel it and that it makes you feel good!

T.