We have interviewed 31 people who have overcome struggles as a result of reinventing themselves. These stories show that zooming out and reinventing the way you lead your life is one of the most powerful ways to overcome struggles of mental health.
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I’ve interviewed 31 people who have been helped by reinventing themselves, and here are the top 5 struggles that these people have overcome:
In our many years of publishing helpful mental health content, we always received questions from our readers about specific situations. While we have a lot of helpful tips to share on how to be happier, we simply can’t offer advice for every situation.
That’s why I’ve set out to interview folks with every type of mental health struggle. My job as an interviewer is to categorize these interviews and present them in a way that is most helpful to our readers.
“I was ready to do anything and everything to get sober. For the first time in a long time, I was honest. I got honest with myself and everyone close to me. I was going to do whatever it took to successfully detox from the drugs and live a sober life. I dropped my ego and asked for help.”
Struggled with:
Addiction
Anxiety
Depression
Helped by:
Rehab
Reinventing yourself
Treatment
“We all struggle, it’s part of being human. Once we can accept the normality of struggle, we can stop self-criticism which just makes things worse. Struggle is just a sign that we need to learn and practice new skills, our beliefs usually change in the process. “
“I have tried to reframe what depression is and rather than see it as a sickness, I see it as a state of my being. So instead of trying to fight it back, and remove it completely, which I have so far failed to do, I’ve tried to work with it as part of how I am. I find I suffer less as a result.”
Struggled with:
Depression
Helped by:
Reinventing yourself
Therapy
“One thing I did was to force myself to get back into the water, something I loved instead of staying in the house crying. Getting back to surfing began my journey to a new “me”. The ocean has a way of washing away whatever feels wrong. This was my best therapy. I strongly advise others to find something they love to do and rekindle their spirit to make good things happen.”
Struggled with:
Depression
Grief
Stress
Helped by:
Reinventing yourself
“I did not have an internal sense of self. It didn’t matter how much I accomplished or how many people I helped. I only measured positive outcomes by how others perceived and recognized me or my actions. The sooner we let go of labels, expectations, or the pain of past experiences, the sooner we will feel joy in our hearts.”
Struggled with:
Anxiety
Cancer
Childhood
Depression
Identity crisis
“Drugs and alcohol were common place and I was constantly moving around. That’s not to say that my parents were using in front of me, just that it was fairly obvious as to what was going on. Because of this, I actually grew up attending AA meetings and was introduced to “recovery” pretty early on. Even so, I would go on to spend 16 years in an alcohol and drug-induced nightmare that almost consumed my life. Irony at its finest.”
Struggled with:
Addiction
Childhood
Depression
PTSD
“What therapists would label as “mental health” issues—as I’ve aged and grown perspective in my life, I would have to disagree wholeheartedly. Unstable environments and adults that failed to protect me from predators were the sole contributors to my unstable years.”
Struggled with:
Childhood
Depression
Suicidal
“I met my future husband when I was 26 but I never felt truly connected to him. I felt just as invisible to him as I did to everyone else. When we decided we wanted to have children, by some miracle, I was able to abstain from drinking just before and during my pregnancy. I coped by being very controlling, a shopaholic, and a workaholic. The twins were born when I was 31 and postpartum depression led me back to the only solution I thought I had: drinking”
Struggled with:
Addiction
ADHD
Anxiety
Depression
Panic attacks
Suicidal
“No one ever seemed to get it. It was never about being skinny. It was the sense of numbness, false sense of control, and comfort that kept me addicted to the high of this cycle. I was eventually hospitalized and then sent off to residential treatment.”
Struggled with:
Anxiety
Eating disorder
Negative body image
Helped by:
Reinventing yourself
Self-improvement
“No one possesses the ultimate truth. The advice we receive from others is usually drawn from their personal experiences, but it doesn’t necessarily mean their truth will align with ours. This includes advice from our parents. Although they usually offer guidance out of love, their narratives are unique to them and should not automatically become our narratives. We must consciously create our own stories, otherwise we risk blindly following in others’ footsteps.”
Struggled with:
Feeling lost
Helped by:
Meditation
Reinventing yourself