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I met one of your best friends, then you fell asleep on the drive home.

We exchanged spare keys to each other’s houses, and asked me what safe foods you could store in your freezer for me, just in case.

“This here is why I am not afraid of how you feel.”

Dave was also gonna lend me his sandals so I could walk down and see if I could grab spare keys from Danielle and Ander, if Nic didn’t wake up.

You invite them to a play where they’re going to meet all your acting friends. They talk to their brother about you. You buy a toothbrush to leave at their house. You update each other about your sleep, your coworkers, what you each talked about in therapy.

They tell you that their friends are teasing them about you; you take cute selfies with your other partner to send. Your other partner is delighted to let you babble in all your NRE mushiness while you eat lunch together.

We talked nonstop.

We watched the sunrise through the forest, and held crabs, and searched for nudibranches. We crouched and photographed tiny fish, and I tried to coach a blue crab to climb onto my finger (it did not). I took pictures of them laughing at me in the sunlight; I kissed them in the morning glow. Then we got mushroom pies at a nearby cafe.

We went back to my house and lay in bed and talked for hours. At once point we were lying face to face, nose to nose, holding each other’s heads in our hands.

“What do I call you?” I asked. “Crush isn’t right anymore.”

Boyfriend.

I get to call them boyfriend.

I have a boyfriend.

I have a fellow morning person, nerdy adventurer photographer boyfriend.

“I’m not in love yet, but I’m on the way.”

“Same.”

“I really like you. And I’m terrified.”

I’ve got a crush, and it tastes like hope.

For years now I’ve had contained loves - partners that were married, nested, safe. Straight boys that were interesting but would never be more than a distraction. Girls I would become obsessed with but safely - there were boundaries between whet I could handle and what they could offer.

I’ve got a crush, and it’s not safe, because those arbitrary walls aren’t there… but it feels safe regardless.

My new therapist and I talked yesterday about the fact that I’m so scared of hope. Of possibility. I made my life neat and organized so that I couldn’t fall in love with the “wrong” person. A person who was too available.

This person does not fit in those boxes and I’m letting myself have my stupid crush.

It’s not that they don’t care. It’s not that they aren’t interested. It’s that it horrifies them in a way they are deeply, psychically uncomfortable with. It’s like when you read about a Victorian girl confined to an asylum for hysterics - and you scoff, instead of sitting with the discomfort. I was that Victorian girl, just as mentally cloudy and confused and scared.

I was confined to an alarmed bed for two months. I couldn’t go to the bathroom without an attendant. I was woken up every day early to get my first shot of the day, and sometimes draw my blood. I had multiple shots through the rest of the day. I wasn’t allowed to walk more than around my room, or for physical therapy, and in my wrist the entire time, a neon yellow band that read FALL RISK.

I was still in my coma for this, so I have no memory of it, but they actually had padded cuffs for me to tie my arms to the bed frame, because I was so determined to pull out my tubes.

I was in a very good hospital, with my own private room, with wonderful doctors and staff. I was visited every single day by my mother, and I had friends or partners come see me most days. I had pictures of my loved ones posted all over the room, because mom wanted them to know who I was, and that I wasn’t alone.

But.

I went from working three jobs, going to school, having two partners, exploring the world - to a small room in a hospital for many months.

I went from cooking big beautiful meals, to playing with creating mixed drinks, to working at a coffee shop - to protein shakes and a feeding tube.

I went from reading 700 pages in a day, walking miles - to not being allowed a phone or a tv, and books being too much for my brain to handle.

I was allowed an hour of soft piano music a day.

I had to relearn how to walk. To go up stairs. To tie my shoes. To swallow water. To write. To talk.

I’m lucky. I’m so fucking lucky. The fact that I am writing this, that I am still the same person, that I can hike up mountains, take pictures, talk. That I can drive. That nothing hurts, that the worst thing is my raspy voice and my wobbly balance.

That doesn’t mean I don’t struggle with it, still. The loss, the horror. That doesn’t next I don’t panic sometimes and just have to go somewhere and get out of my room.

I am so lucky.

But.

I can’t talk about it and have people actually hear me. Even therapists. “But look how well you’re doing!” Yes. Yes I know. I am so good at coping. I am so tired of coping.

I need someone to just… sit with the horror of the experience with me. Tell me you understand, and then don’t try to make it better.

I know the common thing to do is “if my friend’s relationship feels weird, I can’t say anything because I will lose them”. And a lot of people do that! They get defensive and stonewall any conversation.

But not me.

My girlfriend was always complicated. Pretty shitty, sometimes, but working on it. Really amazing, most other times. Had some really red flag opinions, but “she had a bad childhood”.

After my car accident, she became awful. Controlling, obsessive, codependent. She also became the person I relied on, and trusted, and loved. And she, honest to god, loved me back. Her abuse was not because of a lack of love. It was because she loved me so much, and then I almost died, and the way to make it so she never lost me again, she had to know everything about me at all times. She had to be my everything, my only.

Which I hate. I’ve never in my life been monogamous. I had eight million friends that I loved as deeply and fiercely as partners. There is never going to be “just one” love in my life.

I hated everything about how she was treating me. In private, I was capable of anything. But around others, she made a show of being the perfect giving partner. She made a point to be generous, to an obsequious level.

But because of my recently brain damaged cognition, and my research into how TBIs affect your thinking, and everything the doctors had told me would be true about my processing. I didn’t trust myself. I didn’t like what my girlfriend was doing, but surely I must be the one wrong. A concept she encouraged by lying about things I had said, telling me my memory was terrible. Getting mad if I didn’t use the exact same wording in talking about something again.

She capitalized on my fragile mental state and basically told me I was as damaged as I feared.

So I didn’t trust myself. And when I was repeatedly upset with how she treated me, I wanted to ask an objective third party, because they would see it, right?

So I asked my partner.

We had been ok and off for a decade at that point, in various formats. He had known and loved me through so many parts of my life. He had been there literally my entire relationship with my girlfriend. I talked to him every day. He knew me. So I trusted him implicitly.

So I asked him, am I being abused? Is this an abusive relationship.

No.

He said it was not. And she, and every medical resource, was telling me my brain was broken. So it must not be abuse. My brain is that broken.

I remember asking him again, a few months later.

No, he said again.

A year or so later, I left her. It was absolutely abuse, and finally I felt bad enough about enough things that it didn’t matter if it was “just in my head”. It was killing me, either way.

The other partner? He helped me move in with him, escape her - but I still don’t think he saw it as abuse. (Because at least she didn’t punch me, right?)

But away from her influence, my brain started trusting itself. And when it told me, huh, I that was abuse, I trusted myself enough to finally listen.

This is why I am the person who always speaks up when a friend’s relationship seems weird from my perspective. Because I might lose them, sure, but worse, they might lose themselves.

15 year old Kayleigh: wanted to be an artist, was dating boys online they met through sailor moon message boards, still thought people sucked. Started having regular panic attacks. Wore cargo pants and oversized band shirts and a million necklaces. Starting wearing drawstring bands as an ocd tic.

20 year old Kayleigh: was employed as an artist, was dating a boy who would later become a girl they met at a goth club, had figured out the panic attacks but was struggling with depression. Was about to start school for photography, was obsessed with post-rock and metal.

25 year old Kayleigh: working freelance as an artist, lived in a converted warehouse with their fiance and a bunch of friends running a dungeon; was very certain they had their shit together. (They did not.) Had started polyamory a few years ago when they met the fiance, becoming gayer by the minute. Had just met the love of their life, who was a tiny obnoxious tuxedo cat.

30 year old Kayleigh: spent a good six weeks in a coma because of a car crash likely caused by their girlfriend; lived in the Bay Area; had put a pause on being an artist to go back to school to become a doctor. Very very gay. In an electronica era, struggling with self-harm. Buying plants and fish as a coping mechanism. Came out as non-binary.

35 year old Kayleigh: recovering from leaving the abusive girlfriend and still healing from the car accident; got the ability to drive back and was exploring the world as much as possible; still wanted to be a doctor but saw no way to make that happen so was again an artist - but much better and more confident about it now. Quit self-harming the year prior with a medication switch.

I'm not talking about suicidal ideation. When you grow up depressed, there's a big, noticeable difference between acute and chronic depression. Acute is active ideation, it's having a plan and thinking about ways the world isn't worth it. 

Chronic depression is being aware that your option B for every single thing in your life is suicide. Like, I'm not ruminating on it actively, but it's never not an option. Do I wanna make lunch, or do I want to kill myself? Do I want to go to the doctor, or should I just die? Thankfully, it's actually really fucking difficult to kill yourself and not have it be a big deal, so it's often way easier to just continue living. I guess. Ugh. 

I like my life. I like my life a lot. I love my family and my friends and my partners and my job. I have a beautiful home in a beautiful city, I make art that makes a difference, I am so loved. I spend my days mostly doing what I want to. 

Thus: non-acute depression. If I talked about it, I wouldn't say I was depressed day to day. Because I'm not, not really. The thing is, I grew up very depressed and became best friends with my depression, so I don't exist without her, now. She's the comfortable wool sweater I wear when I'm cold, the cup of tea I drink when I'm sad, the moody playlist I made that I listen to when I want to be quiet. 

So yeah. There is no me, without depression. 

That all said, while I might be comfortable with it, I don't let it rule my life. I've been medicated since I was 23, which is probably why I am not acutely depressed. (I started meds because things got very acute and very bad and there Was An Incident.) I manage it with a lot of time outside, a lot of time alone with my cat, and various SSRIs. I also don't drink or do drugs; I am very active - actually, what was funny about that: I've always been pretty active; I walk everywhere. Miles and miles and miles. And then last year I started intentionally hiking. Up hills. On purpose.

And my brain went quiet. 

Oh goddamit intentionally exercising does actually make a difference. They weren't lying.  Jerks. 

An interesting side effect of being lifelong depressed is that you don't realize what the signs are until something shifts or someone (usually a therapist) mentions that it's not... normal, to think that way. What do you mean, people expect to be alive tomorrow? What do you mean, people have goals for their lives? Sounds fake, but okay.

I have no great ending to this babble. This is just me thinking out loud about my brain. 

She told me a while back that she plays with one of her best friends (also old) and seeing that each other has played their move in the morning is how they check in to see that they’re still alive.

I know I have depression. I know I have OCD. I know I have ptsd. Those are pretty fucking clear.

I have never been able to find a clear understanding of my anxiety, but because i have everything else adjacent, everyone assumed I had it. OCD is, after all, a VERY specific form of it. And yes, I have social anxiety, but again, that’s needing control over my environment because of bodily concerns. My social anxiety was WAY less when I could move and be loud.

I don’t actually think I have anxiety. I’m just a very depressed, very traumatized human with obsessive control needs over things that impact my body.

But I’ve been thinking about relationships and… I have no idea. Which means I’m kind of open to anything?

Terrifying.

I do know I want

- someone hyperlocal for last minute things

- someone to be physically intimate with

- someone to banter with

But I am so self-aware I know what I don’t want, and that makes me feel a bit better.

It’s raining. It’s pouring. So where in this house, a cat is snoring.

As a California native, I cherish rain. It isn’t often a thing here, so I have learned to welcome and worship it whenever it does come. Our state burns, and this is a sign that, at least today, nothing will burn. (Side note: I think I am afraid of fire?)

Now that I live in the fog zone of San Francisco, I wake up to grey skies more days than not, and I adore it. But it’s still not often rain.

Our streets are always wet and the sky is always grey, but it’s not this quiet patter, this glittering joy.

Which means, unfortunately, California often floods when it does rain, because the ground is so dry it rejects it. There is already widespread flooding happening, and we’re on day two of this storm.

Jaime and Raquel and I went to the SF light show and then sushi last night. I have three partners now - more than I’ve ever had doing poly, legitimately, and it works out so well.

I didn’t expect Jaime to be a thing, but here we are. Neither did he, but here we are.

Anxiety spiraling has no end cycle. Ruminating just doesn’t end. OCD is the anxiety spiral about an action and if I don’t perform the action, something bad will happen. And it just gets louder and louder and louder until I do the action - no matter how fucking stupid it is. And then the voice is gone.

“If you don’t you pet your cat, he’ll be dead when you get home.”

My first therapist diagnosed me with ocd when I told her about how I had to go out and touch my car during school days. 3 times, while I was in school. And to me that wasn’t weird! I had built it into my life to make sense. And she was like, uhm. Kayleigh.

But if I do the thing right away, the voice is gone. If I make sure to kiss my cat before I leave, the voice never starts.

So I have built my life around anticipating the compulsions and doing the action knowing it’s going to be demanded, so I get it over with before it ever comes up.

Touch clover before you leave your house; say goodbye intentionally whenever you part from a friend (I love you for a partner); touch your wallet before you leave the room.

Ocd is an anxiety disorder, but unlike GAD, I get an off button. Sometimes the off button is not healthy, and that’s one of the hardest battles - I know I can turn it off if I take door one, but door one is a door I should not open. But knowing I have the choice is kind of a relief, too.