Self-Care and Motivation during Toxic Relationships

0:00 [Music] 0:08 hi Valeria hi rali uh can you introduce 0:12 yourself sure um so I'm Valeria I'm an 0:15 aerospace engineer um and I come from 0:18 Mexico I live now in California yeah 0:21 great so you know a little while ago we 0:23 were talking about uh how your mental 0:25 health uh crisis that you had as an 0:28 young adult yeah and you were in a toxic 0:30 relationship yes so what happened and 0:33 you know how did you overcome that okay 0:36 um so I guess it's hard to find the word 0:39 toxic you know like what is a toxic 0:41 relationship and I feel like for every 0:43 person it's a little bit different for 0:46 me I feel like that my partner um was 0:50 holding me back instead of pushing me 0:52 forward um he used to make a lot of 0:56 comments about like my body about my 0:58 clothes about my my career about my 1:01 hobbies and everything had always this 1:05 criticizing um like tone under it so I 1:10 do remember a few comments he made to me 1:13 so for example talking about my career 1:15 he told me I didn't have like the 1:19 profile or the personality to be an 1:22 engineer and that hit me a lot cuz I was 1:25 I mean I was like uh studying in school 1:29 and I was putting so much effort and so 1:31 much passion into the engineering and 1:33 when someone so close to you tells you 1:35 something like that it hits it hits hard 1:38 it's like why I think the whole reason 1:41 he mentioned that it was just because 1:43 I'm an an artistic person apart from 1:46 being an engineer I'm very artistic like 1:48 I like to play the piano I like to paint 1:49 I like to draw and he just thought I was 1:52 more suitable for uh artistic careers 1:56 instead of engineering which doesn't 1:57 make any sense right cuz like they're 1:59 not 2:00 uh non-compatible or 2:02 something um so other comments he made 2:07 uh was like about me walking heels he he 2:10 was this kind of person who always 2:13 pushed me to use other cap of clothes I 2:16 was not comfortable with so he was like 2:18 oh you should use more heels you should 2:20 use more makeup you should get like uh 2:23 more dresses or like so I mean I thought 2:28 it was a good thing at the moment it but 2:30 now when I actually think about it it 2:33 just doesn't make any sense I feel like 2:36 your partner should be very supportive 2:37 and very you know like doesn't want you 2:40 change who you are or how you like to 2:42 dress or if you feel 2:44 comfortable so yeah this person um so it 2:49 started help it started uh you started 2:52 getting more and more depressed and yeah 2:55 yeah I I just started uh changing some 2:59 things for him 3:00 getting away from my friends and my 3:02 family um you started believing what he 3:05 was saying yeah I was I started 3:06 believing what he was saying cuz like it 3:08 sticks he told me I didn't know how to 3:10 walk on Heels he told me I didn't know 3:12 how to dance he told me I don't know I 3:14 should wear more makeup I should wear 3:15 this more that so at one point I feel 3:19 like I was losing myself a lot and I was 3:22 doing all the things that you're not 3:24 supposed to do like getting away from 3:25 your network is the first thing that 3:27 you're not supposed to do getting away 3:28 from your hobbies like stop doing what 3:30 you like for your partner because he's 3:32 not into that too much or he wants you 3:35 to do his Hobbies instead of yours so 3:38 all those things I was completely doing 3:41 that um and I was 3:45 very uh I don't want to say trapped in 3:47 that relationship I feel like we just 3:49 had a lot of codependence cuz um we 3:53 spent a lot of time together and we did 3:55 almost everything together so we went to 3:58 school together we returned together you 4:00 know in the same car we cped uh then we 4:03 went like to language uh lessons on the 4:07 afternoon uh I don't know we prepared 4:09 meals 4:10 together uh so I feel like spending all 4:15 the time with him was very detrimental 4:18 for both of us cuz in the end it was 4:21 very hard for us to actually find space 4:25 or time for us individually instead of 4:29 together yeah and then um then you 4:32 started seeking therapy yes exactly so I 4:35 mean apart from the relationship the I 4:37 was carrying a bunch of things like what 4:40 I told you um the stress from the 4:42 University lack of motivation especially 4:45 in the morning um you didn't want to do 4:48 anything I didn't want to do anything um 4:51 especially in the morning like that was 4:52 my peak of like lack of motivation then 4:55 when I actually reached to school and 4:57 saw my friends I I think it got a little 5:00 bit 5:00 better um and yeah in the afternoon in 5:04 the night kind of like lacking 5:05 motivation as well kind of like just 5:07 going straight to my bed and laying 5:09 there I was very inconsistent with my 5:11 eating habits so I missed breakfast all 5:14 the time food half of the time dinner 5:18 same thing I used to only have you know 5:20 like some cookies for breakfast or some 5:23 chips for n unhealthy food I I just 5:27 didn't prepare anything for myself cuz 5:29 like you know I think it's one of the 5:31 main things that you do when you have 5:33 depression is that you don't take care 5:34 of yourself and that comes in every form 5:37 but for me it came a lot in food I just 5:39 didn't care about my body I didn't care 5:42 if I needed food or not I lost a lot of 5:44 weight I was very thin in that moment 5:47 and but of course when you don't eat 5:49 enough food you also don't have energy 5:51 right so it's like a like a cycle 5:54 because I didn't have energy to cook 5:56 Fine Food and I didn't have energy 5:58 because I didn't eat anything yeah so so 6:01 did you seek help with a professional 6:03 therapist I did I did seek help and it 6:05 helped a a lot I remember one of the 6:08 first things my therapist asked me was 6:10 to write in my whiteboard in my room um 6:14 my needs are 6:16 important um so my task was to read it 6:19 every day and kind of believe it you 6:22 know believe it but like deeply so every 6:25 time I needed to I I readed that I 6:28 remember okay I need to eat I need to 6:29 sleep I need to take care of myself cuz 6:31 my needs are important and that's 6:34 something that no one had told me before 6:36 that I I mean that I need to take care 6:39 of myself that no one was going to do 6:41 all of that if it was not me yeah now 6:45 thank you so much for sharing your story 6:47 and your mental health struggles I hope 6:50 it can help other young people I hope so 6:52 too yeah to get out of this kind of 6:54 relationship right it's really not worth 6:56 it to be demeaned yeah I mean it's hard 6:59 um it took me a while it took me around 7:01 6 months to actually break up with this 7:04 partner um but I feel it was very like 7:08 it was the right thing to do and I 7:09 thought I think everyone takes their own 7:11 time and um there's not not like a rush 7:17 like you do it when you're ready yeah 7:19 not because you know that it's toxic 7:21 means that you can break it up like 7:23 immediately just takes a process to heal 7:26 and everything and then when you're 7:27 ready just ready just know it and then 7:30 getting the professional help yes yes 7:32 that's very important yes that's what 7:34 made a huge difference for me thank you 7:37 thank you rali