Right after her undergraduate studies she did her masters (MBA) in a very good UK university, graduated with distinction, and landed a job at a well-recognized bank. She had always admired banking as a job, and in this century anyone in the banking field is seen as lucky. She dreamed of being the best CEO or highest shareholder of a Bank. Well now she was in it. She was a Banker with a well paid position as well.

For her first 6 to 9 months at work she worked so hard and made a great impression, which became visible to all her colleagues, branch management, and also the entire management team of the bank at the head office level. Her volume of work was increased weekly as there was literally nothing this “human-robot” could not do. Her colleagues and managers sought her for advice and tips related to work and the right way things should be done to yield expected results. She was growing so fast in her career that she was always recommended to anyone at any medium/ higher level who needed to brainstorm for ideas or needed some guidance. She was always in the selected team for any new projects the bank was interested in undertaking to improve their services and for profit maximization, and she was always there to perform beyond expectation.

She got promoted in her 9^th month; a promotion that took some of her colleagues years to achieve. Some of her colleagues began envying her at work, yet she still continued to work at her well known pace and was still available to help anyone who needed her assistance. She always had a bright smiley face and kept her vision ahead of her.

She was so focused on her dream, that NOTHING could stop her… Well so she thought.

Out of nowhere she was suddenly hit… By what you may ask? First I must mention that she had been diagnosed of Bipolar Depression/ Disorder about 2 months after her employment, so throughout her 2 months to 7 month period she had been on Bipolar medications, and she was managing her medications, psychotherapy sessions, and job well. So well that she felt so well she thought she was “HEALED” from her Bipolar Depression. She stopped taking her medications and her therapy sessions, and she was well for 2 more months till after her 9^th month WHEN SHE GOT HIT REALLY HARD.

She got the worst depressive episode of her life since she was diagnosed of having Bipolar Depression, a mental illness which affects how a person feels, thinks, and even acts sometimes.

Suddenly this human-robot became so depressed that she lost all hope she had in herself and her career, she started paying attention to negative things people said about her even at work. She lost all her motivation, so much that she got to the worst feeling ever: she became SUICIDAL. She adopted over-drinking alcohol every other day after work to numb how terrible she was feeling about herself. She had no close friend aside work friends to actually confide in, to talk about how she was feeling. She was ALONE, though with people moving around her on a daily basis. She decided to man up and fight her battle alone. She got back to the hospital for treatment, she was put back on her medications, though they didn’t work as fast as she wanted them to.

For her first suicide attempt she slit her left wrist with a razor blade. She couldn’t cut deep enough to bleed and she drunk herself to sleep. Unfortunately for her she realized a bit of euphoria when she cut her wrist, and she wished she had cut deeper. The next day she made a cut again, went deeper than the previous cut but still was not deep enough to bleed. The next day she cut deeper and could bleed a bit this time round. As the days went by after work each day when she got to work she takes some alcohol and makes another cut mark with the razor blade, to bleed a bit more. What she didn’t realize was that she was falling into a terrible addiction.

It got so bad that by almost 1 YEAR at the bank she was sneaking into the toilets anytime she was slightly less busy to cut. She always hid a razor blade on her to the office every day. Due to the nature of the banking attire no one figured out what was happening with her. She always had her suit on and never put the jacket off, because her long sleeved white and blue shirts always had so much lines of blood stains on them. She only took the jacket off when she was alone in her office.

She had become addicted to Self-Harming and Alcohol.

She was no longer able to work tirelessly like she used to. She lost all her motivation and didn’t care about her dreams anymore. Suddenly she felt her life had no direction and that her life was already ruined. She was still on her medications, but taking them wrongly. As a result they were not working for her. She was either mixing them with alcohol, or overdosing them for some euphoria. Gradually her situation became worse.

Eventually, few months after her 1 year at the bank, she quit. SHE QUIT HER JOB. Yes, the job that she loved so much and worked so hard for, was now less important to her than her freedom doing nothing at home, satisfying her dangerous addictions. To her she felt she was doing the company a favor by quitting since she saw herself not to be an asset anymore but a liability to the company.

She soon became suicidal for leaving the bank and being unemployed, she wished she would get her job back but she couldn’t. She was admitted to a hospital under suicide watch for some weeks, and was finally discharged. She attempted again and was admitted for a longer period and was finally discharged when she got better and was no more suicidal.

To date it has been exactly 2 years since she quit the bank job, and she has been very stable. She is currently working as a Freelancer in writing whenever she feels stable, and is taking her medications and psychotherapy sessions seriously.

When you ask her about her banking job you realize that she still regrets her decision back then, but she has moved on and has new goals for her new business. Her arms are filled with scars of the deep cuts she made on her wrists, all over her left and right arms. There are times she hates to see them and a number of times she has to cook up stories to explain to people what those scars are when she wears clothes showing her arms. Seems people often ask because they are all in well drawn lines and hardly look like an accident. These are a part of her now, and she is learning to accept them and get used to people staring at her arms. She is taking her medications and psychotherapy sessions seriously now, and it is obvious that she is going to have her life back on track again.

Goodbye Message… “As a society we must note that Depression, Bipolar, Schizophrenia, Psychosis, and all other mental illnesses, do not care who a person is or what they do. People are going through serious mental issues out there, and unless we stop stigmatizing about mental illnesses and those who come out, we will not know who is going through such problems and need help. Your child, brother, sister, father, or mother, might need your help, but you will only know when there is no stigma”.

Let’s stop stigmatization and listen more. WE HAVE TO FIGHT MENTAL ILLNESSES LIKE LIVES DEPEND ON THEM, BECAUSE THEY DO.

Thanks for reading!