I moved to Brussels in 2008 for love. Following my ex after spending one year doing a long distance relationship. Before this we were together for six years and in Brussels we was together another five. I found Brussels scary at first, having come Wales. To me this was big city living. I enjoyed my first summer wandering Brussels in awe at the amount of cosmopolitan people that lived here. Eventually I found a job in a independent coffee and bagel shop working initially a handful of days a week. Preparing cakes and other sweets in a small kitchen in their basement. I went on to to work there for a further five years. Eventually rising becoming manager and working everyday, apart from Saturdays which was awesome.
I was super happy with both my professional and my personal life. I felt like Carrie Bradshaw living life in the big smoke. I had it all. The perfect guy, job and friends. Some years later I started to take drugs. Nothing dramatic. A little bit here. A little bit there. I thought this was all fine. It felt very normal to be doing this in Brussels. Everybody else was doing it and I was still living the perfect life. Until eventually I wasn’t. Every weekend I was taking drugs. This would lead eventually to me doing it every other day.
Eventually at a mini break to visit my partners cousin back in Canterbury. My partner told me he had had enough. So I ended up driving back to Brussels in years and single. This same week my boss told me that he had also had enough of my ways and not only was I single. I was now unemployed. I this led to me for the next almost two years to descend into a constant use of drugs. Affecting not only my mental state, but resulting in me loosing the friends I had here in Brussels also.
This year have finally woken up, realising if I carried on I was gonna end up being alone for ever and quite possibly ending up dead in some gutter. I have now managed with much difficulty now to kick this habit. Focusing more on myself both physically and mentally. I have shed weight and I feel I have shed the demons holding me down and back. Coming through the other side stronger. I have been repairing old friendships and many apologies have been made mostly to my ex boyfriend who even to this day is a pillar of strength and now and I believe forever will be one of my strongest and best of friends.
My focus now is to keep going forward. I am in a new and healthy relationship with a guy I adore. I am hoping to go forward now and get myself back into work and to be honest. Just be normal and happy. This wouldn’t have been possible without the love and support of friends. Also the current man in my life and my ex boyfriend. Now the only way is forward.