The way I explain the difference between normal feeling experiences and my feeling experiences (with bipolar, major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety disorder) is with color: Imagine you’re holding a ball. It is deep blue. This ball contains all of your sadness. This ball is 100% of what you experience when you are sad. Now […]
How To Help A Friend with Anxiety
Talk to your friend about what activities are soothing, as well as what the things they really need to hear from you are. Encourage them to write these things down, with the goal of giving you the piece of paper to keep, so that you can say or do helpful things when they are having […]
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Fact-checking. What’s Real?
Once, I saw a young, blonde-haired boy in a blue and orange swimsuit floating motionlessly near me at the bottom of the pool. I panicked, yelled “Help!” and dove down to grab him and bring him to the surface. When I reached out to grab him, he disappeared. I returned to the surface with a […]
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How I Learned That Change Is Always On The Way (or Hope In Water)
One time, about 5 years ago, I was on an antipsychotic medication that was known for being very safe and having few side effects. I will not name it here, because I don’t believe that telling others about my bad experiences with medication is safe or appropriate. This medicine helps millions of people; […]
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Scared of What’s Next
Over the past month, I’ve been declining. The other night, my husband made a minor comment that made me feel bad, and I fell into a thought spiral on the thought “It’s not supposed to be this hard.” I started crying. I sank deeper into dark ideas, feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness and meaninglessness. When […]
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Memories That Almost Break Me
Yesterday in therapy I told the story of the last days with Sophie and my first days of incapacitating mental illness, just before I was officially diagnosed. I was surprised at how upset I became in therapy, and by the clarity of my often faulty memory. Timeline was: I started to feel like I […]
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I Am Disabled
I don’t like that I’m not supposed to say that I’m disabled. I was told recently that what I’m supposed to say is “person living with a disability.” I was told this by a healthy person with healthy privilege. Something is not right here. I don’t know for sure, but I’d bet my cat on […]
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What to Expect in a First Therapy Appointment
When you see a therapist, it’s good to go in with goals in mind. Those goals can be big or small, broad or narrow. Some of my goals in the past have been “reduce depression”, “cope with anxiety”, “build a healthier relationship with food and lose weight”, “learn assertiveness skills”, “set firm boundaries with parents”, […]
