These past few days I’ve been working on drafts for my blog. I even mentioned some of those ideas in previous posts. It was going great and I was planning on posting one of the drafts today. Why am I writing about something completely different? Because in my first post I wrote about travel being my therapy. It always will be. But as life is, somedays you need a therapist more than on other days. Right now, I feel like I need that kind of therapy, that I need to be somewhere else. It’s one of these times, when talking to my friends and my actual therapist aren’t enough.

I’ll try to describe it: I have a tattoo on my arm, it says „saudade“. It’s a brazilian word which I got on my last trip a few days before I was flying back home. It can stand for different things but it’s usually put in reference of the intimate feeling and mood caused by the longing for something absent that is being missed. It’s a word, travellers use often, when speaking about the way travelling makes them feel. What it means to me? Wow, where do I start? I got the tattoo because it should be a reminder for what travelling meant to me. How I had this feeling inside of me, whenever I was at home, that something else was calling for me. And for me it’s not only people: it’s emotions, places and adventures. Most importantly it’s the way, travelling makes me feel about myself.

Let me be honest: I’m writing these lines with tears in my eyes, in the middle of the night because I can’t sleep. The thoughts in my head are going crazy. I’m back at overthinking, making scenarios up in my head and doubting myself, my worth. Guess why? Because another person made me. Now guess who that person was?

Me.

Sure, there were things other people said, did or didn’t do. But in the end, it was my decision to let those things affect me. I’m the one questioning myself.

A few days ago I was proud to know my worth and proud about my progress concerning my mental health. Realistically speaking I know that healing is not linear, that there will always be ups and downs. But there’s always this small glimmer of hope, that this time, I’ve really managed for my lows not to be that low anymore, to love myself unconditionally and not let other people’s actions affect me. Like when I’m travelling.

The moment I realized my worth

I remember on my first trip, looking in the mirror with tears in my eyes after a few weeks and finally being able to say: „You are worth being loved. You deserve good things to happen to you.“ That was after almost three years of self hatred and self doubts. The weight that fell of my shoulders was huge. And it got a little lighter with every day I kept on travelling. It felt so good to finally being able to see my worth again. Problem was, at some point I had to go back home. I was fine in the beginning. So many people told me, how happy and self centered I looked, how I’ve developed over those 6 month. It was great to hear that, because I knew it was true and I was able to feel it every day.

About two month after I got home, I had an injury, a disc prolapse. In the beginning I couldn’t walk without pain, lifting even the lightest things wasn’t possible. So the first few weeks I had to get help with everything. Accepting the help was one part, but feeling so helpless was the thing that got to me. All my progress from travelling was gone. At least it felt like it.

During the time I was injured, I talked to my therapist a lot. She saw the change, I knew was there. The good before and the worse at that time. We talked about, how the injury made me doubt myself again, how I felt that I couldn’t really be my true self at home. I didn’t have my saudade-tattoo at that time, but that didn’t change the fact that I was feeling it all the time. So I booked another trip as soon as my doctor gave me the permission to do so. I did two month in south east asia and again: The feeling of coming back to myself was amazing.

While I’m travelling I don’t have to pretend to be happy. The smile is stuck on my face all the time. I made the most out of the time in asia and it was easier than on the first trip to feel the progress of accepting myself for how I was. Not only I felt it: People I just met told me, what I beautiful soul I was, how amazing my inner glow was. When I think about those moments, feeling like I am right now, the urge to just leave again is massive. But I have a life here and I love my job, my family and my pets. Just leaving isn’t that easy.

Do I want to keep living like this? Having to travel to feel good again? Sure, the travelling part is amazing, but it would be temporary and also it would be like running away again. I’d much rather face my problems, work on myself at home to REALLY be able to say, that I feel better. It has to be a long term solution, otherwise it’s a vicious cycle of travelling, coming home, feeling good, feeling down, leaving again. What that long term solution will be? No clue. I’ll let you know as soon as I’ve figured it out and if you have any recommendations or ways you dealt with stuff like this, please let me know. But it felt good to write it off my chest.

So long

Eva