The Modern Day Caveman

Yesterday, I outlined my plan to improve my life by taking things day by day and journaling it here. I’ve mentioned my struggles with mental health before, but I thought now would be a good opportunity to recap things and outline the journey ahead over the next 12 months.

So, where did it all begin?

The first real indication of my struggles can be traced back to the night of my 18th birthday. Like most 18-year-olds, I had a bit of an emotional drunk breakdown – if I remember correctly, over the lack of direction and clarity about what I wanted to do in the future.

That uncertainty stuck with me through college and into the working world. My mental health ebbed and flowed over the years, a series of peaks and troughs that often coincided with major life events. In all honesty, during that time, my mental ill-health was manageable; the world didn’t feel so dark.

That was until October 2019, when I reached one of the darkest points in my life and tried to end it. It still feels strange to think about now – I’d just come back from one of the best trips I’ve ever had in Canada and had holidays to both Disneyland Paris and Walt Disney World planned. That whole period became a blur. And not long after, the pandemic began.

For the most part, the novelty of the pandemic soon wore off, and in the latter half of 2021, I began to experience the heavy, lingering symptoms of clinical depression. I sought professional help, starting both therapy and antidepressants, but found neither to be particularly beneficial and eventually stopped.

My mental health again ebbed and flowed, this time more dramatically, until things took a severe nosedive toward the end of 2024.

What had been a stressful year of selling a house and unemployment quickly spiralled into self-sabotage. Gambling had always been a minor issue, but it surged to the point where I was staking thousands of pounds a day. Over the space of two and a half months, I managed to wager more than £97,000 across various betting sites.

Alongside that, I also developed a compulsive buying habit. What had been a profitable house sale has quickly turned into nearly £45,000 worth of debt in just 12 months.

Of course, my mental health worsened even more. My physical health is at an all-time low. I’ve ruined relationships, lied, hurt people, and lost sight of what’s important.

This is where I am now, at the time of writing:

Debt: £44,052.03
Weight: 107kg
BMI: 30.3
Average sleep: 6 hours 40 minutes
Alcohol consumption: 3/4 days per week
Average steps per day: 10,246
Average weekly stress score: 36

NOTE: Sleep, stress, and steps data are based on my Garmin watch over the past 12 months. Stress scores reflect Garmin’s daily stress metric, where higher numbers indicate greater stress.

On paper, my goals for the next 365 days are simple enough: pay off as much debt as possible, improve my physical health, fix relationships, and above all, rebuild my mental health along the way.

It’s not all doom and gloom, though. I’ve made some good progress in the past few weeks. I’ve started a new job that’s going well so far. I’ve listed a number of the things I’ve bought over the past year on eBay. And this week, I’ve started a bit of a fitness plan.

In fact, there’s a hill not far from where I live that I’ve called The Mountain Ahead. It represents both the physical mountain and the mental mountain I have to climb over the next year. My plan is to climb it every day, no matter the weather.

It’s going to take time. It’s going to take effort. But for the first time in a long time, I’m ready to climb.