Opinion: Our surroundings play an important part in our mental health battle

We often talk about mental health as a purely internal battle, but our surroundings can play a significant part in how we see ourselves. For me, that battle was mapped out across the relatively short distance between the streets of Mansfield Woodhouse where I grew up and the more affluent surroundings of Ravenshead where I later lived.The move was supposed to represent moving up in the world. Instead, it became a lesson in how easily we can lose our sense of identity when we are trying desperately to fit into an environment where we feel we do not belong.Looking back, my younger years were not simply defined by mental illness. They were also marked by a profound lack of confidence. I felt unequipped to handle the world, let alone understand what was happening inside my own mind. Like many young people struggling with insecurities they cannot yet put into words, I looked for shortcuts.My first attempt was to chemically alter my reality. I turned to illicit substances, including MDMA and amphetamines. At the time, they seemed to provide a functional solution to what was actually a much deeper problem. They gave me a temporary sense of confidence that I could not manufacture naturally.But temporary relief comes at a price. The drugs did not resolve my depression or the emerging psychological difficulties I was experiencing. If anything, they contributed to a downward spiral that eventually culminated in a severe psychiatric breakdown.When that chemical mask failed, my insecurity did not disappear. It simply changed shape. I traded the nightclub for the gym, shifting my search for validation from the psychological to the physical. I became increasingly interested in strength and powerlifting. But I did not simply want to become strong. I wanted to become invulnerable.I began using anabolic steroids, believing that if I could construct a body that looked unbreakable, perhaps nobody would notice how vulnerable I felt underneath it.The roots of this friction can be traced back to when I moved from Mansfield Woodhouse to Ravenshead at the age of 12.For a young teenager, the change felt significant. I found myself in an environment with different social expectations and a different culture from the one I had previously known. I became increasingly conscious of where I came from and where I was expected to fit in.This was not necessarily about one community being better or worse than another. It was about how I experienced the contrast between them.In Woodhouse, I had felt more familiar with my surroundings. In Ravenshead, I became increasingly conscious of social expectations and of my own perceived shortcomings. I felt like an outsider trying to understand an unwritten social code.That feeling of being an imposter followed me into adulthood.Instead of accepting myself, I tried to manufacture an identity that I believed would earn respect. I became increasingly focused on physical strength and hyper-masculinity, attempting to create a form of armour around the insecurities I could not confront directly.But you cannot permanently out-lift, out-medicate or out-perform deep psychological difficulties.Eventually, the combination of substance misuse, anabolic steroids, poor mental health and years of unresolved insecurity took a serious toll. The very things I had used to build myself up became part of what brought me down. Yet that experience taught me an important lesson.Looking back, I no longer believe that belonging comes from a postcode, a property value, a muscular physique or an impressive appearance. It comes from connection.Whether someone lives on a terraced street in Mansfield Woodhouse or behind the more spacious homes of Ravenshead, psychological distress does not discriminate. An isolated mind can suffer anywhere.True strength is not found in a syringe, a pill, a bank account or a barbell loaded with plates. It is found in the much less glamorous work of accepting yourself, thinking rationally, developing healthy relationships and allowing other people to support you.Today, through writing and grassroots community work, I want to speak to people from different backgrounds and challenge some of the assumptions we make about one another.Because the masks we wear may look very different.But underneath them, the need to be heard, understood and accepted is remarkably universal.