#HereAndNow: Cathy’s Recovery Story

In 2019, I was diagnosed with anxiety. I was living in recovery, then in 2023, I was diagnosed with depression.

Ever since I graduated from university and started working, I was deeply troubled by insomnia. I was only getting three hours of sleep every night, and this continued for four years. It didn’t only affect my job and interpersonal relationship, but also made my basic living full of challenges. I didn’t know anything about emotional disorders at that time, I thought I might as well give it a try and started seeing a psychiatrist.

After taking medications for two years, the doctor evaluated and decided I had recovered. Throughout these two years, I found that keeping a hobby is very helpful to my treatment.

In my recovery I joined the ambassador training organised by Mind HK. I gained knowledge about mental illnesses, and I shared my story along other people in recovery. We all want to contribute to destigmatising mental illnesses.

In mid 2023, I went to see the psychiatrist again due to emotional distress. The thing that’s different this time is that I sought help from counselling service too. While searching for counselling services, I was met with many difficulties, fortunately, I got a very good counsellor. Counselling had great therapeutic effect on me, I felt a kind of understanding and compassion that I’ve never felt before. More importantly, I realised I was still rejecting my negative emotions. During the counselling process, I learnt to accept my emotions and understand that all emotions are protecting us. Learning to accept myself under different states was the first step to successful treatment.

My experience of emotional disorder was a gift. It helped me learn to accept my emotions sooner and handle them with confidence. I have heard countless stigmatising words and experienced countless lonely moments, but I understand, it is normal that our brains get sick sometimes, it is okay to be still on the way to recovery!