The Reason Behind my 12 Month Blog Hiatus.

Blog lovers, you wonky girl is BACK!

It's pretty clear I haven’t written in a while, some of you may have thought that I abandoned my blog after just a few months, that I’d given up sharing my story after the initial excitement of starting On The Wonk wore off. But the truth isn’t sad or negative at all, it’s something that I think should be celebrated at this stage of my journey. The truth is, life simply took over. And for the first time in two years, my facial palsy wasn’t the first thing I thought about every second of the day. It didn’t consume all of my time or energy, and I learnt that I could start to really live a normal life again.

At first this wasn’t intentional. Those who follow my Instagram know that I’ve travelled almost every month in 2022. Some of it for pleasure, but most of it for work. Work trips are notorious for late nights and very early mornings, for not being able to see where you actually are in the world because you’re confined to hotel conference rooms and laptop screens. I found that I didn’t have the time I did before in order to care for my face, I didn’t have 40 minutes at the start and end of each day to stretch every muscle, so when the trips came thick and fast, the physio came to a halt. And if I didn’t have time for my physical healing, I certainly didn’t have time to write a blog about missing it!

However it's not all bad as with every trip I actually started to find new confidence, which was new to me as I had bags under my eyes as big as my suitcases. But I was seeing all these new places, filming exciting events and awards, meeting incredible people and experiencing so much that I had to put aside all my insecurities about my face and just do my job, because everyone else around me was. Slowly I found myself thinking less about it, not worrying if it was all people could see when they spoke to me, the fact that my eyebrow droops when I’m really tired and I felt more uneven than ever. I really enjoyed truly feeling like I was back to myself before all of this happened. My mental health started to improve, and I tired to make sure that I never once made myself feel bad, or put pressure on myself to make it my focus again.

I felt like I was on a roll and I wasn’t about to pull myself off it.

But that doesn’t mean that I’ve neglected myself this whole time. Earlier on in the year I actually got my GP to refer me to Queen Victoria Hospital, as they have one of the best NHS facial palsy clinics in the UK. It took a few months getting into the system but soon I was seen by a surgeon who decided the best course of treatment for me would be physiotherapy, guided by one of their doctors. I also now attend a monthly zoom meeting which goes through mental and physical therapy for people with different degrees of facial palsy. We are taught about why our brain reacts to certain situations to make better sense of our emotions, as well as what really happened to our facial nerves, and get taken through stretches for every single different muscle in our faces. Amongst the chaos of this year, this is something I have been very firm with in terms of making time for. They have been so informative and beneficial to my ongoing healing, and feel like I now have the right information around what really happened to me.

And one of my favourite things to come out of this year is that I was able to gradually come off my antidepressants. A few months back I felt like I was at a point where I could manage my emotions on my own, with the tools I’ve been given throughout my different therapy sessions, and that I was in a better place with my condition than I was this time last year. With the help of my doctor, I started coming off them, first only taking one tablet every other day for a week, and then one every two days for the second week, until finally I wasn’t on them anymore.

I must say I feel much more in tune with my emotions now, and not in a bad way. I find myself becoming more excited about things that didn’t feel like they had an effect on me before, and I won’t lie about the fact that I have cried a couple of times. But the important thing is that none of it is about my facial palsy. I have arrived in a place of acceptance, I know that my depression was caused by a specific event in my life, and Sertraline supported me whilst I found and practiced the tools to manage my emotions around this. I got to a point where I thought, how do I know if I’m able to really look after myself with these new found techniques without them? So I took a big leap of faith, and so far, so good.

My advice for anyone who may feel the same is to really take your time to do the emotional work first.

I feel as though my transition coming off them was positive because I really did do the emotional work to support myself, and I still feel in control of my thoughts and emotions without them. Everyone’s experiences are different, so do not feel any pressure to come off them if you truly don’t feel comfortable to do so. Talk to your doctor about it and make sure they are aware, they will guide you safely, and let someone close to you know as well, as they will be able to notice any signs of relapse to your old mental state. And if you feel like you may never be able to come off them, that’s okay too. There is no need to suffer through life just for the sake of thinking it’s a better option, when it may not be for you. Each journey through life is a different one, and as long as you live true to your experience, that’s the most you can ask of yourself.

What I’ve really learnt from this year is that it’s okay to not pressurise yourself to do and be everything. I love my blog and what it does for the people that read it, but I knew I couldn’t give more to people when I barely had time to look after myself. Life is all about balance, and this year it fell more to the side of myself than others. But now I feel as though I can continue to give more to my facial palsy community and those around me, and I feel good about my decision to put it on pause, so I didn’t end up suffering burnout from trying to do so much for other people. This realisation is part of my healing, letting my condition take a back seat and focus more on getting back to a normal way of living.

It was therapeutic, it was chaotic, and it was incredible.

Spreading awareness about a condition doesn't mean you have to make it the forefront of every post or conversation. Sometimes, simply demonstrating to your community that you can live a normal and very happy, healthy life, is a huge step in your recovery.