I had learned to hide my fear, to continue with my life without showing what was happening inside me. From the outside, everything seemed fine. I was studying, living abroad in South Korea.
Until one day, an incident happened with a Japanese girl, my former roommate. She started bothering me, doing things that made me uncomfortable, so that I would leave the room and she could keep it. I endured it until she accused me of strangling her. I told the director that if I had really strangled her as she claimed, there should be marks. There were no marks, and we were both separated, leaving the room empty. After that incident, which happened in December 2018, I moved out of the university dormitory and started living on my own. After what I experienced with her, I was left with a deep fear that someone might try to harm me without me even realizing it.
At the same time, there were reports in South Korea about perverts installing hidden cameras in women’s bathrooms, and even landlords secretly recording their tenants. That definitely altered my mind. I began to believe — and at times I felt it was actually happening — that my landlord was fumigating the apartment when I wasn’t home. On my first day of work, I felt so dizzy that I thought I was going to die. I confronted him, and it stopped happening, or at least it happened less frequently. I lived there for a year (2019).
Later, I moved in with an Ecuadorian girl and a Malaysian girl (2020). That period felt like a moment of peace for me because COVID arrived, and I allowed myself to slow down and rest mentally. However, my fears were still there.
At some point (2021), the landlord asked me to host a woman from the Philippines. This older woman turned my peaceful life into a nightmare. Do you remember the fear I had about someone harming me without me realizing it? She made that fear feel real. So many things happened that I prefer not to mention them.
And that is when the delusional disorder began. There was no clear line between what was real and what my mind was creating.
I was losing control.
Emotionally, mentally, and physically, I was exhausted.
Looking back now, I can see that it was the result of everything I had been carrying for too long — without help, without treatment.
That breaking point was not the end. But it made me realize that I needed help. Unfortunately, I depended on my ex-boyfriend… and I moved to the Netherlands.
marimo 