You push yourself beyond what you believe your body can do.
Heart’s beating fast.
You’re testing your muscles and you feel almost so weak
you don’t feel ready but you know you have to push further and further.
I’ve never had as much motivation as when you have to consider saving someone.
Growing up as a teenager in a city, I felt a lot of pressure on how my body was changing.
I struggled with body image a lot as a teenager.
I guess city life was a lot like a cage in some ways.
You have the drives to be thin, you have the drives to look pretty and perfect.
I became anorexic and also exercised a lot in order to feel good about myself.
When I moved to Cornwall for university I felt refreshed.
Life became a lot more freeing here.
When it got to the end of first year there was quite a traumatic event that I went through
that really changed my perspectives on life
and I guess left me with a distrust of certain people and certain situations.
And I didn’t feel confident any more.
I started to feel things.
I felt very isolated and thought that no-one around me would listen.
I was just going back and forth in my own head
and the thoughts were escalating and escalating.
I guess then I looked to substances to help be my therapist.
Then this January, I entered the worst bout of depression and anxiety.
I didn’t bother to cook because
what’s the point in cooking when you need to clean up after?
I was running out of ideas as to how I could get myself out
and felt like I was in such a hole
and there were very few options left as to how to escape.
I went to the doctor's. One of the options she advised
was to take time out, to do the things that I enjoyed.
Things that would make me happy again.
I used to be a really good artist so she suggested painting.
And that’s the most heartbreaking thing
is probably the fact that I saw no point in painting silly pictures any more.
I think that’s the thing that will always get me the most as well.
I had a friend that kept pestering me to join him at surf lifesaving club
which is hilarious because I couldn’t think of anything worse in that situation.
But he kept pestering me and eventually I went.
Surf lifesaving is a mixture of all the disciplines needed
to be a good lifesaver in a beach and surf environment.
It became the only thing I could motivate myself to do.
It was painful but I almost...
took comfort in that pain because it was a physical manifestation
of what I had been feeling in my head and a great way to let it out.
A lot of the other people at surf lifesaving, it’s not easy for them to make it there.
They have their own demons inside their head and their own struggles to face
in order for them to reach their goals.
We manage it by talking amongst each other.
Supporting each other through our different difficulties.
We just give each other those extra few words of motivation to keep each other going.
So I’m staying in Falmouth for the near future.
I am studying my Master's in Marine Biology here and
and I feel that training at the club will be a massive benefit
to helping me keep my balance over the time studying.
It doesn’t necessarily have to be surf lifesaving which is your solution.
A really relatable way of thinking about it is
to push yourself in something that seems uncomfortable
but you can achieve so much from doing.
Find something that you are able to push yourself in
out of your comfort zone.
Something that you can motivate yourself to do as well
the thing that will get you out of bed.
In a way I guess, surf lifesaving kind of saved me.