Timeline for writing introductory article:
—Week 1: Feel excited. Motivated. Inspired.
—Week 2: Continue to ride the inspired wave. Ride it as long as possible.
—Week 3: Start formulating future articles, but don’t write any of it down.
—Week 4: Realize the introductory article is due in a few days. Panic.
Deadline: Do the dishes (we hate the dishes). Roam around the house, thinking about what needs to be tidied (but don’t actually tidy it up). Text as many friends as possible. Plan for the future. Make a late lunch. Think about dinner. Watch some “Property Brothers.”
I actually read an interesting article that felt, to me, absolutely perfect for my current situation, and it was written by a woman who probably went through a lot of the same steps in her writing timeline as mine. It’s not laziness, it’s paralysis from not being able to achieve perfection. Did it help me whip my butt into gear and encourage me to put aside the notion that I need to be perfect? Well, no. But it also helped me realize I wasn’t alone in my fears and concerns. In my lifetime, I’ve watched mental illness come to the forefront and the stigmas begin to fade into the background (note: begin to fade. Because they’re still there, and my goal is to crush them all).
But despite being a member of the statistically rather high one in five, my life with mental illness has been at times polarizing and lonely. I don’t mean to paint a woeful tale of a sad, pitiful existence, because that’s definitely not been my experience, but am I 95 percent serious when I jokingly tell my friends that it’s hard to be me? Well, yes.
It is what it is — I was born with a particularly broken brain, but I’m also lucky enough to be surrounded by plenty of people who love this broken brain and support me in my quest to bandage it up as much as I can. The stats are as such: OCD, anxiety (the first two diagnoses I received when I was 16), major depression (diagnosed when I was around 24 or 25), a panic disorder (diagnosed when I was 30), and a binge-eating disorder (mentioned by a therapist and psychologist in a past life but officially diagnosed when I was 31). I’m a real riot. Add my highly sensitive tendencies, empathic heart, and sensory defensiveness and it often seems as though I’ve felt it all. I probably have.
I’m not here to tell you how to live your life, how to better cope with triggers, or how to love your anxiety-filled spouse better. I’m not a doctor or therapist, and I would first encourage you to seek out a medical professional. But there are lessons I’ve learned over the past couple of decades, techniques I’ve found that make my life easier, and a strong desire to finally tear down all the barriers against those with mental illness. We deserve it, do we not?
So settle down in your favorite fat pants, turn on a “Law & Order: SVU” marathon (I literally know when each one airs on USA any day of the week), and join me every month as we talk about what I’ve learned as a woman with an array of mental illnesses. (There will be food.)
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