What do you do to honor the day you woke up from dying? Four years ago, on a Monday morning, instead of going to work, I went to sleep. I went to sleep for 4 days. I do not remember a light at the end of the tunnel. I do not remember hearing voices coming [...]
What do you do when little carries a weight of importance? I have spent my forty-four years swinging between depression and mania, being gnawed upon by anxiety, and little clue what these things are. I have been focused on my mental health for the last decade, but it was only five years ago when I [...]
There were three major things that happened that affected me in negative ways in my childhood. I was diagnosed with Executive Dysfunction Disorder. What that means is that I have a hard time doing many tasks others find easy. A family member had severe anger issues that came out in horrible ways. My mom had [...]
Alexithymia in 2020 America We bring in each item: one at a time wipe it down with a Clorox wipe Shadows crossing the threshold My throat tightens My stomach turns My face remains the same Northern winters subside early Plans to landscape the yard Keep Busy Find joy in connecting with the earth My enthusiasm [...]
Tell Me A Story: Introduction ----------------------------------------------- Telling one’s story is complicated. Often, the stigma and uninformed or deeply ignorant opinions someone with mental health conditions display precisely why storying is crucial. To give an account of one’s first-hand experience with various aspects of our day to day lives gives a new life to issues that, [...]
CW: Depression and suicide Staring at my phone when a pop up interrupts my endless scrolling: "Feed the cat, feed the kids." Fuck. I look up. One kid is staring at his tablet, the other is jumping off the couch. Cool-- both kids are still alive. I slap together a pb&j, toss some ramen in [...]
Trigger warning- self-harm I have been diagnosed with depression for the last 26 years. I can barely remember a time when I didn't have it. Honestly, I probably was depressed since birth. It is just how my brain is wired. I have always been a chronic pessimist, seeing the glass fully empty. I was the [...]
The first time I “died”, I was 25. I was walking through a mall with my friends and suddenly felt the weight of the universe crash into me. I was on a roller coaster hurtling down its initial drop. I was a grain of sand being crushed by the incoming tide. Then, I was nothing. [...]
I still get flashbacks. The insecure teen With a broken heart And a hospital bracelet. Lending a clean shirt. It had been washed and folded By his broken-hearted mother. The stacks of coloring sheets In the corner of a barren room, Our makeshift “Museum” of who Had once been enclosed in these same walls. The [...]
Within a moment… it’s gone. The fully-formed sentences in prose form, as well as the captured ideas, vanish from my mind. A perfect essay that would have unfolded if it weren’t for my scattered mind. As I cracked my laptop open, all that remained was a faint memory. Ever heard of the cliché, “the memory [...]
