My Story Goes On But My Depression Began One Year Ago Today

“Happiness lies in your own hands” – Madonna (lest, she was wrong).

Dzien dobry! This is a happy blog, my real life story and I try to tell it like that, I am so grateful for you all and for your support, but as I am so honest and open, here is today’s truth. A year ago today, my long term depression began and it’s got gradually worse despite my hard work and promotion of Polish towns. 21st July 2016 was just supposed to be a normal day on my journey – nothing new – I was simply going to visit my “friend” and write about their town, promote it, the same way I had been doing for the previous 12 years. I was then going to get my Kaliningrad visa and leave Poland. At the time I was self employed as a professional travel writer, stemming from my back catalogue on the ill-fated “Don’t Stop Living” blog. But depression kicked in and my destiny changed…

“When the smiles were genuine” – Nicky Wire.

My Depression Began One Year Ago Today

However, that travel “friend” was unkind and lied.

None of my other tourist or travel friends had ever been that nasty to me. It was horrible. I had been totally disrespected, my business was made a fool of. I was lied to, the other tourists that they knew were told the truth, they chose to lie only to me. I couldn’t cope. I couldn’t work out why I was lied to. I continued my journey but life has never been happy since. I STILL don’t know why they lied to me, a nice, happy travel writer. I only want an admission and to know why. They must have had a reason to pick me to be the one they lied to. I was an innocent victim, a tourist only going to write another story on my journey. Nothing else.

Gdansk that day on my walk up to the largest brick church in the world

The only positive I can see now from this is that after seeing psychologists and psychiatrists in the aftermath, I decided to stay in Poland and with that, I made a wise choice. I have a nice new life in Poland, this new blog and some of the best friends I have ever and will ever meet. Each day though, I pray and pray that they will finally admit and apologise to me for a string of nasty lies aimed to humiliate me and destroy what was once a nice travel blog.

Life must go on, and daily I fight against depression and suicide. But I am so grateful for the new friends I have made, my countless Polish media appearances (Radio, newspaper, magazine, online and TV to come) and this website, I am proud of.