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| Taken this morning. No make-up or filters. |
Exactly four years ago my whole world changed and what was once an existence of irritation, pain and suffering was suddenly something very different. I had recovered from topical steroid addiction. On Monday 17th August 2015, I remember sitting on the sofa and looking at my hands and seeing only clear skin. I then looked at my face - the same. Clear skin everywhere, and on top of that, no dry skin, weeping or irritation ... it was all gone.
When I tell people my recovery was that sudden, how am I meant to convince others when even I can't believe it myself. But for me it really was the case that one day I appeared to be in withdrawal, then the next, I wasn't. Like the ending of a film too good to be true.
But how?! You're probably wondering. My answer? I don't know. I don't have an answer for half the shit I went through for over two years of my life because unfortunately we've had to do it ourselves, a mini rebellion against those we are meant to trust, which means we doubt the process and fear we are never going to get better - or get better then flare again.
Fear, the most useless and, at the same time, most overwhelming of emotions. We don't want it, we don't need it, and yet we will always have it because life isn't simple. We see people's problems from the outside and know the answer as if it is the most obvious thing in the world, but it isn't, because it's not happening to you, but inside them. Fear can be crippling and through withdrawal it is the most concentrated form of it because it comes with PTSD and anxiety: memories of true horrors from your past that could so easily come back.
Through withdrawal the only hope we have at our disposal comes from a small handful of people who say they have recovered. Worldwide. And from those few, some flare again. That makes the after of withdrawal not so simple because we don't actually know what will happen and if after really is after or just some extended reprieve.
I have discussed it many times before but for over two years after withdrawal I felt as if I had this dark cloud of anxiety hanging over me the whole time filled with PTSD and fear. Storms of terrible flashbacks and memories of the trauma of withdrawal and the fear it was all just going to come back again.
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| Left: one of the first photos I took on the day I recovered from TSW (Monday 17th August 2015). Right: taken this morning, exactly four years later. No make-up or filters. |
My most vivid memories during the two years after withdrawal were the times where I would see a rash and feel my stomach sink before quickly smelling my arms as I desperately tried to determine whether that smell, so specific and prevalent through withdrawal, was back and my little piece of bliss was over. The smell has never come back, and it hasn't done for four years.
Just like my physical withdrawal, the mental recovery was equally as sudden and happened one magical day after filming Briana's documentary Preventable: Protecting our Largest Organ (here) in June 2017. I may still have anxiety, but I no longer have fear.
I feel sometimes like renaming this blog TIME, because time is all it boils down to. It's all I say now, as it is the only advice that truly means anything. We can take so many paths to try and get better and accelerate our 'healing', yet you can't cheat it because time is the only thing that will really help. And here we are four years later and I'm still ok. Better than ok.
TSW is a trauma that no one should ever have to go through but unfortunately for some of us it is the only option we have left and ended up being the best decision I have ever made in my life.
Now, I have been better for nearly double the time I was in withdrawal for and that in a way gives me some closure. I will never use the H word (healed *gasps*), but I no longer fear flaring or the future because I know that no matter what happens, time will pass and with it comes change.
Give it time.
Love
Cara x
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