Not long after I got out, my first marriage ended. I'm not going to tell that story here. Some of it isn't mine to tell, and I don't blame anyone for it.
But I will tell you about the boxes.
My parents owned a bed and breakfast at the time. One day, twelve boxes turned up on the back veranda. Everything I owned from that life, packed up and sent home.
My life had been archived.
It's a weird feeling, having your life packed up. And packed up by somebody else as well. You don't choose what goes in which box. You don't get to say goodbye to the rooms. It just arrives, taped shut, and you're standing there looking at it. Like you've been shipped off.
It's something I've known more than once now.
I'm not telling you this so you'll feel sorry for me. I'm telling you because of what happened next.
I was fortunate. My parents had been able to buy the property next door to the bed and breakfast, and I moved in there with my foster brother, Brian. We carried the boxes over the road, one at a time. I unpacked them. And away I went.
The house got sold. With my share of the money I bought a motorbike, a Honda VTR 250. Beautiful matte black with gold trim. I'd never ridden before, so I learned. There's something about learning a new thing when your life has just been taken apart. It gives you somewhere to put your attention.
Then I got a job as a youth worker at an emergency accommodation place just up the road. Kids living on the streets. Kids with borderline personality disorder. Kids self-harming. The whole box and dice.
People sometimes find that strange. I'd just come out of a forensic psychiatric unit, my marriage was over, my stuff had arrived home in cardboard, and I went straight back to looking after kids in crisis.
But that's what I did. It's what I'd studied. It's what I knew. I loved people, and it was just up the road. And honestly, it was a good experience. It's hard to stay stuck in your own boxes when there's a fifteen-year-old in front of you with nowhere to sleep.
I think about that young bloke a lot. Sitting on the veranda, twelve boxes around him, not knowing what came next.
Living with bipolar type 1, I've learned that the illness can take a lot off you. It can take your freedom for a while. It can take a marriage. It can pack your life into boxes. But it doesn't get to decide what you do once you've unpacked them.
If I could sit down next to him now, I know what I'd say first. It isn't comforting. It's not what he'd want to hear.
But the second thing I'd tell him would make it all worth it.
If you're struggling right now, call Lifeline on 13 11 14. In an emergency call 000.
