Let me introduce myself, I'm all smiles

Sue Zhao

you will love deeper, you will love kinder, you will love more (in spades, in large swatches of caution tape, free and unbidden; the numb finally slushing away)

but you will still sit on the floor of your apartment and feel heinous little snatches of your mental illness. you will unwind over small things. you will desperately want some-kind-of-validation, but know there's actually-something-else-here, a thirst unable to be slaked, a hunger that causes you to rip open the world so it understands your pain. you'll think about how you want to leave before you get left, how the hurt will be so manageable if you just steal out the back door and run with your bare feet. you will call it a controlled detonation, your tongue dry while you plan relocating to the city.

but you will exit the car fire of your childhood and you will hold the child you didn't get to be and you'll say: shush now. we won't run, we know how to make our home.

and the child will say: it's all sand. there's no foundation. the world isn't safe to build upon.

and we will stretch our hands and our old back and the hips that keep clicking. and we will say: from sand we made glass. and what else is there to say after that? the world isn't safe. the world isn't always kind.

it took me a really long time to realize it's a bastardization of good advice.

many of us are recovering from being raised by parents/caregivers that were in toxic relationships or were toxic themselves. we learned behaviors, thoughts, and patterns from these people, and we spend our adult lives untangling and dismantling the harm done to us.

the advice should be - is this the person you'd want a child to emulate? is this a person you'd want a child even around? is this a person you can trust alone with a kid - any kid, mind you - and know that the child is safe, looked after, loved? is the relationship you're in one you'd want children to see and repeat in their adult lives? or is the relationship one you hope they won't follow, after all?

to be honest, i knew when i was in a bad relationship. i'd tell people - i know, i know, i should break up with him. i know, i know. she's not actually a good friend. but the reality was that it's incredibly difficult to escape the-devil-you-know. it was easy enough to train myself to be okay with it; i have very little regard for the-self and the process of cutting people out was simply too threatening for my mental state.

but i wouldn't put a younger version of myself through the same thing. i'd picture her in the same situation. i would tell her, broody as she is - leave, you're happier outside of it, never let anyone talk to you like that, you're worth more than this. i'd tell her when you let him cross your boundaries, the fault is his, but you need to understand you're rewarding bad behavior if you don't do something about it. i would wish, fervently, i could restart the relationship and do it all differently, be-young-again.

and then i realized: i am the younger version of myself. a future version of myself is begging me to leave. to take my happiness seriously. i am a kid to fifty-year-old-me. and i need to take my own advice. it's okay if that sets me up to grieve.

i don't wanna feel sexy like tv. i don't wanna feel sexy like little black dress. i wanna feel sexy like high note during karaoke. like just got done writing 14 pages of poetry. like let me show you this scarf i've been knitting. i wanna feel sexy like hand on the back of the headrest while you parallel park. like did i tell you about that time i saved a baby bird. like don't tell her but i've been sneaking money into her purse.

i don't wanna feel pretty like expensive. like high fashion. like paid to be here. i wanna feel pretty like a bird in a puddle. i wanna feel pretty like streak of dyed hair. i wanna feel pretty like calligraphy, like new leaves, like a skinned knee bleed, like a dog running at full speed. i wanna feel pretty like lying next to you. i wanna feel pretty like the new album just dropped, i wanna feel pretty like a shower, i wanna feel pretty like a stone wall all covered in moss.

i keep saying body neutrality. that feels negative - no bad things, no good things, just body. but i mean - my body is neutral like a flower is neutral like an oil slick is neutral like a day is neutral, too. my body is neutral so a kiss can feel like lightning so a dance can feel like a hula hoop so a walk to get coffee can feel like - god, i'm so happy to just be around you.

mental health awareness also means investigating your sense of what a mental illness "looks" like; questioning how you've seen it represented. it means listening to the communities that experience it, it means making sure that you get your information from multiple sources, not just white cishet activists.

mental illness is recursive; it can return and worsen with environmental stimuli even if someone has previously "seemed fine". mental illness is pervasive; it will affect each person differently but it will affect them. even when it is inconvenient to you, even when you don't "understand" what is causing it, even when it has symptoms that are complicated or unusual.

mental illness awareness is also: just because you are "tired of hearing" about someone's illness doesn't mean they aren't tired of experiencing that illness - all you have told them is that you are not a safe person to confide in. i know, as a person with mental illness, that all people can and should have boundaries about what they can hear from their friends. it is important to know if you are in a good space for empathy. there are things that need to just-be-for-my-therapy. but there are kind, thoughtful ways to tell us that you are not able to hold space for us at the moment - we are usually terrified of being a burden. there is a way for you to not be overwhelmed and for us to feel like you support us. this is going to be different across each relationship - and mental illness awareness is being willing to work with that relationship, too.

mental illness awareness is acknowledging that there are a lot of complicated, difficult situations that arise that aren't clear cut for each person. one person might need physical contact during an anxiety attack; the other might need to remove themselves completely. it isn't always easy-to-understand; there are a lot of factors in each relationship that influences how to support that person. every person, regardless of who they are or how they act - every person you know might be hiding a mental illness.