Mental Health Awareness month: Depression, MBTI Change, Career Thoughts

Happy Thursday, you guys! If you’re feeling bored or down recently, you might want to read this post and maybe you’ll feel like someone is going through a tough time along with you (hopefully).

It WILL be a long read 🙂

It’s been almost two months since my last post here on my blog and I’ve had a lot of thoughts about my life and what I really want to do. Especially since I’ve quit my job in December 2019.

Without expecting the coronavirus breakout (though I expected the upcoming recession, or maybe, ongoing recession), I wanted to take a break from the stress from work and personal issues I was having.

I have not found a job yet and am also reluctant to send resumes here and there just to find a job to ‘secure my future’.

Thankfully, I still have some funds from saving up to tide me for a while so I am trying to take it easy and to also use this time to heal from my personal issues.

I have also been wanting to type a post like this since the start of May when I started having all these thoughts but I really was not in the mood to do anything.

Believe it or not, I visited Instagram and my blog probably less than 5 times each the past couple of weeks. Not even my own Instagram. Heck, I don’t even update there anymore.

Why? Probably because I didn’t want to affect myself further from how people were leading their lives (perfect or not).

There was once in the ‘less than 5 times’ visit to my personal Instagram where I saw a post and it increased the negative thoughts I had in my mind about the path I was on at that moment.

Like, “why did I leave my job”, ” what if I held on”, “what if I had more money”, “I should just find any job now so I don’t lose out”.

I had those thoughts but they were mostly temporary regrets. After a day or two, I don’t find myself really regretting anything I did.

I read a quote last time that went along the lines of, “Don’t regret the choices you made because it was exactly what you wanted at that point in time”.

Tbh, not too sure if that was the exact quote but the meaning stuck with me.

The past two months were pretty depressing for me though I am much better now.

At the start, with the Circuit Breaker (Singapore) measures here extending from 4 May to 1 June, not being able to meet with friends, loved ones and socialise physically made me more withdrawn.

I would also cry often and had my arms and legs breaking out in a rash (that has never happened before). I’m still recovering from it. Never had such a rash and after some googling, it looked like a stress rash (?), though I cannot be sure.

I know with isolation in place, it is easy for your mental health to suffer and truth be told, I never had an exceptional mental health since young.

To briefly summarise my life in a few sentences:

Family issues from ~7 years old (verbally and mentally abused, occasionally physical), Dad left the house (has an affair) when I was around 11 (then had counselling in school) though we still communicated and met once in a while till end 2018 when they started divorce proceedings. I have not met my dad since end 2018 and it seems like the new constant.

So in those years living with just my mom and brother, I felt like there was favouritism from my mom towards my brother. (Typical asian parent?)

I won’t elaborate on those.

Then there was once where I threatened to stab myself with a knife in front of my mom and a friend who was staying over that night because I was so fed up with everything.

Wew, it’s hard typing all these down as it brings me back to when it happened.

I was shaking, scared and really did not want to die but I was honestly so tired of being compared, belittled and feeling unworthy and ugly.

If you read my insecurities posts, you would know the extent of how insecure I was in the past (you can find them here: Insecurities tag – opens in new tab).

Anyway, I obviously did not succumb to stabbing myself or I wouldn’t be here. I did feel constantly depressed at home because I was always faced with insensitive words and vulgarity from my mom, especially.

I was also called names in school due to physical appearance and it was not nice ones. It felt like no one was on my side.

However, to my close friends, I was always the happy-go-lucky girl and the one who was lame and love to make jokes.

Those were also the natural side of me, sides of me that I wanted to show others instead of the sad and demoralising side that were full blown at home. I cannot even count the number of times I cry myself to sleep beside my mom silently, so she wouldn’t probe.

Socialising and staying outside of my home were always better because I was away from the bad energy.

Probably why I got so depressed being cooped up at home these couple of weeks while living with my mom. My brother had moved out since he got married and so it’s just both of us.

She too, has had a tough life with problems of marriage and all sorts of abuse by my father due to money issues. And that stemmed a deep hatred for him while venting her anger on me.

I was mostly on the receiving end with no way out. Hence, I could only resort to blogging (on my personal blog years back) about my struggles and problems. Rarely do I share them with a friend because it’s hard to find friends who really understand or are able to say words to comfort me.

Friends would only know of my problems through my blog.

Everyone seemed to have perfect parents and lead happy lives. (You see how depressing I could have felt at that time? LOL)

Damn, even seeing fathers joking with their children my age made me tear easily last time.

Truthfully, I was also pretty lost at what my career path would look like because there was no one I could look up to in my life.

I did not seek any other therapy help apart from the school counselling in school (which honestly did not really help) because it was expensive and I did not have time due to school and extra-curricular activities. I do however, want to have therapy sessions in the future when I am able to.

If you need to and have the ability to do therapy sessions now, please do it.

I think in this day and age, it is really normal and no one will think of you as a mental patient or a weird person. (Hopefully)

Now, fast forward to current times, 2020, 28 May, today. I am mostly numb to the verbal and mental abuse but sometimes I still let that 10% get to me and that is fine, I suppose. I am thankful to also have a boyfriend who is understanding and consoles or assures me whenever I need them and that’s enough.

With the stormy weather coming in the future, I then decided to retake my MBTI test at 16personalities.com to see what job I could be suited for.

P.S. I don’t see the MBTI test as THE thing to follow for everyone but for me, I wanted to use it as a guide to see what could satisfy me in the work that I may pursue in the future.

Here is my MBTI Test Result history:

In 2015, I was a ENFJ-Assertive (Protagonist) probably because I was more outgoing then. And also the period where I was clubbing almost every week or so to destress from my full-time job during my gap year prior to university.

Related post if interested: Why I took a Gap Year Before University

This attitude, alongside their social skills, emotional intelligence and tendency to be “that person who knows everybody”, can be adapted to quite a range of other careers as well, making Protagonists natural HR administrators, event coordinators, and politicians – anything that helps a community or organization to operate more smoothly.

https://www.16personalities.com/enfj-careers

Also why I thought Human Resource probably does suit me – p.s. I studied and specialised in Human Resource and thus went into a HR-related job post university.

I enjoyed it to a certain extent, but I couldn’t really see myself doing it for very long. Job and employee satisfaction was not very high.

And today, 28 May (yes, I am indeed typing this post on the day of upload LOL), I am an INFP-Turbulent (Mediator).

First and foremost is seemingly every Mediators’ dream growing up – to become an author. While a novel is a classic choice, it is rarely an accessible one, and there are many viable options for freedom-loving Mediators. The internet brings to the world the opportunities of blogging and freelance work – as organizations expand their reach beyond their native tongues, they will come to depend on Mediator personality types, with their gift for language and written expression, to take their rougher translations and stale pitches and inject them with a sense of beauty and poetry.

https://www.16personalities.com/infp-careers

So that could be why I enjoy blogging in my free time (with no constraints or pressure). As I started blogging here and giving deadlines to myself in order to keep up with other beauty bloggers, I then found myself less inclined to do it.

I started comparing myself to others again, and to stop with those thoughts, I stopped posting to pull myself together again lol.

Hence, if you’re subscribed to me here, you might notice my review posts being less frequent compared to the weekly review last time back in 2018 and 2019.

Back to the career path description, they stated that

…it takes a core interest that people with the Mediator personality type share, while helping a cause they believe in, independently, through creative expression and personal growth, and makes it applicable to any interest there is.

https://www.16personalities.com/infp-careers

There was a side hustle I wanted to start which involved creative expression recently, and eventually, I wanted to give back to society using that side hustle. But I do not have much confidence that it may sustain or if I can satisfy people’s wants.

It is not an expensive side hustle to begin with but I am afraid that it would not last. Therefore, it is currently put on hold.. for now.

And from now on, I might look less at HR jobs and probably more on careers like these (if I suit the bill): https://www.truity.com/personality-type/INFP/careers

Haha, but you never know what the future may bring you. You might end up on a totally different path so I guess, take your time and don’t pressure yourself too much.

Recently, to take my mind off things, I have been watch vlogs of people cooking, doing things at home and even Chloe Ting’s workout programmes.

I am on day 24 of her hourglass programme (LOL) and I do have some abs when I flex 🙂 .

No before or after pictures for you guys but a good way to burn some calories and get some endorphins going.

I need to sleep earlier though, I have been sleeping at 2 or past 3 am every day and that needs to change!

Okay.

So before I end this post that I decided to dedicate to Mental Health Awareness month, here’s me giving everyone a hug 🙆🏻‍♀️ and hoping you are all going strong. You are not alone, we will all get through this.

When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going.

Joseph P. Kennedy

Let me know if you have any comments or questions! Oh and share with me your MBTI personality too! Would love to hear your thoughts 🙂

With 💕,

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