Trigger warning: this piece discusses themes of trauma, bullying, sexual assault, suicide, suicidal ideation, and psychosis.
I was a really happy child.
I was born in Hong Kong and lived there until I was thirteen. It was home. I felt safe in my community, surrounded by people, and in a place where I didn't spend my time worrying about my safety.
Then, at thirteen, everything changed.
Both of my parents are from Wellington, New Zealand, and they wanted me to have a New Zealand education. School had been difficult for me in Hong Kong as someone with dyslexia, and being different from the other students had already started to affect how I saw myself.
We moved to Auckland, New Zealand.
I thought I was leaving one difficult experience behind, but I soon found myself being bullied again. This time, it was by a group of girls I thought were my friends. I remember being bullied in front of the counsellor's office, and that counsellor became someone I worked with throughout high school.
Those experiences stayed with me. They changed the way I saw myself and made me question whether I was good enough.
Then, when I was eighteen, something happened that changed the way I saw the world.
I was sexually assaulted by someone I believed I could trust. I had thought I was safe because a friend knew him and I believed we were dating. That night, I lost consciousness after being given something I believed was medication for a headache.
I remember fragments.
I remember realising something was wrong. I remember being unable to move. I remember waking up the next morning knowing that something had happened, even though I couldn't fully understand it.
I left and never saw him again.
But I didn't leave what happened behind.
For years afterwards, safety became something I constantly thought about. I struggled to sleep. I became afraid of the dark. I needed a night light. Places other people could walk into without thinking twice would make me feel unsafe.
I didn't tell anyone the whole story for a long time.
Then, about a year later, I met my future husband.
On our first date, we watched Pulp Fiction. A scene in that film reminded me of what had happened to me.
I started crying.
That was the first time I told someone the full story.
He encouraged me to get counselling, and eventually I began working with ACC. Talking about what had happened and working through the trauma helped. Over time, my flashbacks and nightmares became softer.
But healing wasn't instant.
I finished university and started working. I experienced setbacks, including being made redundant, and eventually found myself in a job that wasn't working for me either. At the same time, I was dealing with ongoing physical pain and a long-running stomach problem.
I became depressed.
Eventually, I turned to medical cannabis to cope with the pain. At first, I thought it was helping me get through the day. Over time, it became something I relied on more and more.
Eventually, everything caught up with me.
I remember one Thursday particularly clearly.
I had reached a point where I felt I couldn't keep carrying everything anymore. I called my husband and tried to say goodbye.
He wouldn't let me.
At the same time, he contacted my mum and stayed on the phone with me until she arrived.
When Mum walked through the door, she listened as I told her how much pain I was in and that I didn't want to keep living with it.
She didn't judge me.
She picked me up, told me we were going to get me back on my feet, and started helping me put my life back together.
She opened the windows and doors of my house. She cleaned. She brought light back into rooms that I had kept closed because I was so afraid.
That day became the lowest point of my life.
And I made a promise to myself:
I never wanted to feel that way again.
A little while later, I started seeing a psychologist who was a friend of my mum's. During our first appointment, I told her my story. We were going to begin EMDR therapy to work through the trauma.
She also told me that the medical cannabis could be contributing to how low I was feeling and encouraged me to stop.
So I did.
I didn't know then that I was about to discover something that would change my life.
Poetry.
I had always loved Taylor Swift. I was watching a documentary about her when she talked about songwriting and poetry and how she had always written poems alongside her songs.
Something about that stayed with me.
I'd spent years believing I wasn't good at writing.
At school, being dyslexic had made me feel stupid. I had internalised the idea that maybe writing simply wasn't something I could do.
But that night, at about two in the morning, I thought:
Why not try?
So I started writing.
And I didn't stop.
I wrote throughout the night and into the next day. Then I showed my husband and my family what I had written.
They were amazed.
I was over the moon.
For the first time in my life, I had found something that made me feel genuinely good about myself.
And the most important part was that I didn't care whether anyone else thought I was good.
I loved writing because I loved it.
It was mine.
I didn't need permission to do it. I didn't need anyone’s approval. I didn't need it to become a career. I didn't even need anyone else to read it.
It was something I could do for myself.
But at the time, I was also going through an intense period where I wasn't sleeping properly, and my thoughts and emotions became increasingly difficult to manage. My happiness became extreme, and eventually things became overwhelming.
One morning, after barely sleeping, I woke up feeling unlike I had ever felt before.
Everything felt heightened.
I became confused and frightened. My thoughts were racing, my emotions were changing rapidly, and I struggled to understand what was real. Eventually, I became so unwell that I needed urgent help.
My psychologist recognised that I was experiencing a psychotic episode and told my husband that I needed to go to hospital.
My family came to help.
I was taken to hospital, where I received treatment and was eventually admitted for further care. I spent several days in respite, where I was looked after, given regular meals, medication and somewhere safe to rest.
Then I went to stay with my parents for a few weeks.
For the first time in a long time, I rested.
And I wrote.
During that time, I began putting together my first collection of poems.
I called it 27 because it contained the first 27 poems I had written.
Writing gave me somewhere to put everything I had been carrying.
The trauma.
The fear.
The confusion.
The pain.
The things I couldn't always say out loud.
But also the hope.
Looking back, I don't think poetry magically fixed everything. I don't think one hobby can replace professional support, therapy, medication, or the people who helped me when I couldn't help myself.
What poetry gave me was something different.
It gave me an outlet.
It gave my thoughts somewhere to go.
It gave me a way to process emotions that had been sitting inside me for years.
And, perhaps most importantly, it gave me something that was mine.
Something I was doing because it made me happy.
Something I didn't have to be perfect at.
Something I didn't have to compare myself to anyone else.
Something I could simply enjoy.
There is something else I've noticed since finding that outlet:
My relationship with my body changed too.
For years, I had been dealing with ongoing stomach problems and pain. Since the episode and finding poetry, I haven't had those same consistent stomach problems.
I can't say that writing was the medical reason for that change, but I do know that finding a way to process what I had been carrying changed something inside me.
I had spent so long holding everything in.
Eventually, I found somewhere to put it.
That's what I want other people to know.
You don't have to find your answer in poetry.
Maybe it's painting.
Maybe it's music.
Maybe it's journalling, photography, baking, gardening, walking, sport, dancing, or something completely different.
Maybe you don't even know what your thing is yet.
That's okay.
Try something.
Try something just because you enjoy it.
And make it yours.
You don't have to show anyone.
You don't have to be good at it.
Sometimes, having something that belongs only to you is incredibly powerful.
I've spent a lot of my life thinking I wasn't good enough.
Now, I know that I don't need to be the best at something for it to matter.
I just need to find something that makes me want to keep creating.
My journey hasn't been perfect, and I don't think recovery is supposed to be.
There have been moments when I've felt completely lost.
There have been moments when I have needed other people to carry me.
And there have been moments when I've had to learn how to stand again.
But I'm here.
I'm still writing.
I'm still learning.
I'm still finding out who I am.
And now, instead of asking myself whether I'm good enough, I'm asking a different question:
What can I create next?
For a long time, I thought I needed to shut everything out to feel safe.
Now I'm learning to do the opposite.
I'm learning to let the light in.
If you're reading this and you're struggling, please don't think you have to figure everything out today.
Start small.
Talk to someone.
Ask for help.
Find an outlet.
Find something that makes you feel like you.
And if you haven't found it yet, keep looking.
You might be surprised by what you discover.
Let the light in.
-Kelsey
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