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In the summer of 2000, I was involved in a fatal road traffic accident. It made front page news, took the lives of 3 of my friends and changed my life forever. 21 years later I realised that feeling ashamed of myself for not being OK was a significant contributing factor to my poor mental health. I recognised the guilt and self loathing that I carried wasn’t loaded by surviving but instead was piled on by the preconceptions the adults around me had about how I should grieve, how I should respond and when I should recover.
It took me some time to truly accept that being on a coach that was hit by two 38 tonne lorries was less painful than being a disappointment to the people that loved you. It took me longer to admit that the grief that has characterised most of my life wasn’t just about the boys that died but also about the life - the hope, the belonging and the opportunity - I lost, too.
I realised that the most significant part of my recovery had begun years early when I tried to do one thing that I could be proud of each week and find one thing - anything - that I could like in myself each week, too. I’ve learnt to forgive myself for being lost and sympathise with myself for being angry. I have found ways to process some of my thoughts and evolve many of my feelings and with a new found stability and safety, I’ve been able to process some of the big emotions that held me captive for so long.
I know that the headline of my life is a success story. I am happy and healthy. I have a family, a career, a home. I have strong relationships and quite like myself, too. But the detail is a disaster. I have lost 10 years of my life when I was too ashamed to ask for help and too afraid to look at any of the broken pieces. My behaviour was so misunderstood that I found myself sectioned with a mental illness I don’t have. I was medicated for a disorder when I instead needed to process a trauma.
I think we fail to really recognise the power of the domino effect of vulnerability. The coach crash took place in a split second but in those moments I lost my foundation and teetered on the edge of a rabbit hole. As soon as I lost my firm footing and as I fell, so I saw hope, opportunity and access to everyday norms become further and further out of reach. Those 10 years were characterised by chaos; my instability and reckless behaviour. From being too unreliable for employment to too ‘in the moment’ for financial responsibility, every part of my life contributed to the falling. I had one abusive relationship after another as friends burn bright then burn out one at a time. The further I fell, the harder it became for anyone to see who I was and the more shame piled on to of me pushing me further and further away from the life that was meant for me.
It is an approach to life that we can’t take. Children and young people can not and should not be expected to lose life at the first sign of vulnerability. The snowball of shame is not a strategy our society should be willing to use. Children and young people should not reach the deaths of despair, given success or suicide on the flip fo a coin and children and young people must not be expected to navigate their lives, and their emotions feeling ashamed of who they are and what they feel.
Feeling ashamed of who you are and what you have experienced is unacceptable. Feeling too ashamed to ask for help is unfair and feeling ashamed of your behaviour but unable to adjust it is a cycle of destruction that we must not allow children and young people to entertain. I will not stop fighting until every adult understands how to wrap every child in relational care, love and kindness. I will do it until the power of shame is understood and the impact it has on children is totally unacceptable.
The offer of a fair, predictable and consistent adult would have changed the course of my life. Hope, opportunity and relational regard is something every child is entitled to and it is what I lost that gives me the courage to fight for those that are unable to do so.