[inside]

I have been living with a mental illness since I was young. My illness is based on anxiety, I have OCD, mixed with depression. Every day I struggle with my own mind, my thoughts, I create scenarios, I make cognitive distortions. Though I learned how to live with it, my home has always been my shelter in this world. I loved being at home, in a safe and peaceful environment, creating, relaxing and meditating here. Also as an introvert I was never afraid to be alone with myself. I didn’t want to leave my home many times, but at least I could. Until 2020. With the outbreak of the pandemic everything has changed. One of my basic OCD themes is the fear of being contaminated by germs, so I isolated myself at home and my boyfriend did the shopping for almost a year. As he still has had his job, usually left in the morning and came home late afternoon. I had never spent so much time locked in with myself as I did during this period. I already know the time previously spent together with myself was just passing on the surface. Stimuli and impulses ran out. There was only me and myself. I was totally confused, I had ambivalent feelings. In every aspect I was locked inside. My shelter was no longer as gentle as it used to be. It wraped me around softly, then pulled in and swallowed up slowly.