Category: motivation

Mental Health Mondays – 3. My friend Alexei

Today I want to talk to you about my friend Alexei.

We met back in 2019, on a cool October morning. I had just moved to Reggio Calabria, in South Italy working as an EFL (English as a Foreign Language) teacher and I spent my morning lesson planning, then Alexei walked in. I still remember the first time I heard his beautiful, deep voice and Southern African accent, and I saw his wide smile.

Alexei had an infectious laughter and a unique, wicked sense of humour. He loved sarcasm and self-depracating humour. Although he was raised in South Africa, his parents were also Greek and he spoke a bit of Greek too. He loved and cared about everyone around him, one of the most empathetic people I’ve met. We connected straight away.

Despite a global pandemic forcing us to spend half of our teaching year indoors and online we managed to make unforgettable memories together like our long weekend in Palermo, wandering around, shopping, drinking, having a laugh and chatting about life, our random pizza dinners in town, co-presenting quiz night, our beach day in Tropea with the rest of the Reggio gang and many, many more little, every day interactions.

We never made it to Taormina or Pentadattilo together before leaving Reggio like we said we would, but he promised to visit me in Cyprus soon.

We messaged each other every now and then but we hadn’t chatted for about a year. Last time we spoke he was really happy with his new job and life in Vienna.

Suddenly, 5 days ago I saw a Facebook post about Alexei, that I still cannot believe.

He died a few weeks ago. He took his own life.

It breaks my heart to think how horrible and lonely it must have been for him. He cared deeply for so many people and we would all have supported him if he had just reached out. I also feel incredibly guilty I let life get in the way and we lost touch for a while.

Depression kills, and even more so amongst men, since society taught them since they were children that sharing their feelings somehow make them look ‘weak’. Alexei had no issue expressing his feelings and his struggles, he was always open about his life, his sexuality and his frustrations, which makes it even harder to believe he kept all this struggle for hismel and reached a point that life was so unbearable for him that he didn’t want to live anymore.

The reason I’m sharing this story is to remind myself and everyone else to keep in touch and check in with our friends and loved ones regularly and please please, if you are struggling, tell someone, you don’t have to go through it alone.

Alexei’s death was incredibly sad and painful for all of us who knew him and we’ve been sharing photos and stories of Alexei with each other over the last week, because that’s how we’ll remember him, having a laugh together, hearing his beautiful laughter and picturing his gorgeous smile.

Ci vendiamo Alexei, we love you.

Eleni

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Mental Health Mondays – 2. Running Out of Mojo

Mojo: a quality that attracts people to you and makes you successful and full of energy (Cambridge dictionary).

What a week it has been. Suffering from COVID (or any other illness) whilst stuck at home, helpless, depending on others to bring you essentials (thank you mamma!) surely takes its toll on you.

I didn’t make it to a work event on Friday or my colleague’s wedding on Sunday. I felt guilty and sad about it, there was nothing I could do though. I had no physical or mental energy left.

My batteries ran out, completely. Walking longer than a few minutes at a time or concentrating on a task requires serious effort.

I’ve been feeling tired, unmotivated and stuck for a while now, and a week at home with COVID only amplified those feelings.

I ran out of mojo and I don’t know how to refill the pot. I’m tired of running around, always playing catch-up, worring about money, never having enough free time to see all my friends, do everything or even some of the things I’d like to do.

I often ask myself lately, why am I doing this? What can I do to feel motivated again? Am I the only one feeling like this?

This pretty much sums up my week. How’s yours been?

Oh, I did make it for a walk in Kaimakli (a Nicosia district, by the borders) on Saturday evening, since there’s a little festival going on (Pame Kaimakli Festival: Urban Playground). It felt great to be out walking about (a little bit at a time), admiring the architecture and chatting to strangers, reminiscing of childhood memories in Kaimakli, the St Barbara church and father Marios, a priest my mum used to take us to as kids I used to love, with his long beard and pony tail, and of course many memories of Kalamies tavern by dad used to work at for years. The festival is on until Wednesday, for anyone interested!

PS Thank you to all you gorgeous, loving humans who messaged not only get well wishes, but sharing how you’ve been through COVID, symptoms you had and super useful tips on recovering. It makes this blog series even more worth it and it gets us all talking about mental health, which is what this is all about!

Namaste

Eleni