You don't know what you've got until it's gone

It's a cliché, I know, but it's a goddamn truth. I thought I didn't have anything when I was in step 8, but at least I could go to the outside. Now I'm in step 5, and I'm still in the isolation cell. Less and less, that's true, but don't you think it's paradoxical that I have to take medication to be able to handle the time in that rotten cell? I'm traumatised, nothing more or less. I wish I were a child again. Then I had so many things that I have lost now, and only now do I know what I got... but they're gone...

First and foremost, family. Older people die. That's what happens. Only when they're dead do you realise how much you loved them. I was a lucky one: I've known three of my great-grandparents and all of my grandparents. Now there are only two left: my mom's parents, and I'm really careful with them because I know that, irrevocably, that day is gonna come. The day they're going to die. And I forbid myself to think of that day. At least, I try to forbid myself this, but it's hopeless. It doesn't work. I'm hopeless at being optimistic. 

Secondly, what do you think about friends? I haven't got any friend left from high school. Yes, on Facebook, but that's something completely different. No one sends me a Christmas card anymore. And I do understand that people were in shock after what happened in the sixth grade, when I got admitted to a psychiatric hospital and never returned to school. But it's a bitter pill to swallow, it is. Also, friends who committed suicide. I'll never see them back. Maybe I only valued them after their death...

Then, the pets I've had. You don't know what you've got till it's gone. I'm especially talking here about my budgy Chico. What a sweetheart that was. Now I have another one, waiting for me at home, but unfortunately, he'll have to wait another week to see me back. I can barely wait. I love him so much. At the beginning of my admission here, I didn't miss him that much. I think I had too many problems with the demons in my head, but now I'm finally coming back to earth, and slowly but gradually, I start to miss him. My little Timo. I do realise what I've got, so I hope he won't be gone too soon.

Chico, give me a kiss, will you?

Furthermore, being a student. Oh, how I miss student life. I thought it was only hard work: going to classes, studying for exams, writing papers, you name it. But it was also nice in some way: I had things to do, I had a regular schedule, I knew what I was up to. Right now, only uncertainties... Yes, I'm doing voluntary work, but that doesn't pay the bills if you know what I mean. And now I'm back at the clinic, I don't know what I can do more to find a job. A paid job. Will I ever be able to work? Only God knows...

However, it doesn't have to be the big things in life, it can also be small things. Like this what is happening right now. Only now do I realise that I was in step 8 and how hard I fell back to step 1. I didn't value it enough, I guess. But even then, I can assure you, the demons were acting again. It's also my freedom. For many of you it's just a normal thing. For me it's a precious little thing that I have to cherish once I have it. I'll certainly have to be more careful with it. And after this admission, maybe - only maybe - I can go home for a couple of weeks/months, but still, I have to go to the CIB in the Hague, a closed ward - again - where I'll receive the treatment that I need if you ask my brilliant psychiatrist (I hope you have already spotted the cynicism here). So it's not over yet... still a long way to go. 

My take-home message of the day: cherish everything you've got, be it people or things or the intangible. You can only have it till it's gone...