I’ve thought long and hard about making this post, as I normally do when I contemplate showcasing my most vulnerable side. It’s a similar feeling to when I’m just about to walk into the therapy room, thinking about all of the things that I would update my therapist about. Except, I stopped going to therapy and I’m choosing to write about everything here.

How have you really been doing?

I wish that someone could ask me that right now. I wish that someone could be honest with me when I asked them the same question.

I still get sad sometimes, in fact, I’m sad writing this. I’m not 100% happy with my job because I know that it isn’t what I want to do for the rest of my life. I feel disconnected from my friends and family- especially during this quarantine. I crave the nostalgia that strings from old memories. Memories from when I was younger: going over my best friend’s house every day after school, coming up with crazy ideas, having the time to have hour long convos on the phone, and everything else that made me feel warm. I miss the simpler times. I miss having the time.

When I was 14-years-old, my 20-year-old sister told me that the older you get, the less time you have for your friends. I argued the hell out of that statement because when you’re 14, time is all you have to spend with your friends. But now at almost 23-years-old, I realize that the statement was true. The older that you get, the more career-oriented you become, the more time you spend building a future for yourself. I feel almost guilty for putting all of my time into my future… but would I want my friends to feel guilty for spending time on their own futures? No.

Time is a precious commodity.

So, when we do have the time and we spend it together- it means so much more now when we’re older. I once joked with my childhood best friend saying, “Wouldn’t it be cool to grow 10 years older and not see each other at all? Then, we can come back together and tell each other about all of the adventures we had!” She laughed at me, saying “Why don’t we just enjoy the time we have now together, stupid?” So I did… and I miss it.

I know why Peter Pan never wanted to grow up now.

Surviving a mental illness isn’t easy. How do you come back from taking your own life? It happened 4 years ago, so I should be over it- right? I finished the rest of the pill bottle, 18 pills for 18 years of my life. (Although, my roommate at the time said that it was more.) I woke up the next day and the years following, I fell back into normalcy but the small part of me questions it until this day. Why didn’t it work? Maybe if it worked, I wouldn’t have made the mistakes that I did. I wouldn’t have known anymore pain or hurt. I still get triggered by everyday things. My nightmares have begun to resurface. I still fall into spaces of disconnect and feel sad almost randomly. The scars on my wrists have faded, from anxiously scratching at the skin, but you can still see the discoloration that remains. I sound crazy right now.

But you know what sounds crazier?

The feeling of comfortability that coincides with mental illness. When you grow up with chronic depression and anxiety, when that’s something that you’ve known for a good chunk of your life- It’s not just something that you can pray away. The comfort grew to a point where I thought to myself, a gnawing and unhealthy thought, “I think that people cared more about me when I was suicidal.”

Writing that felt strange. Saying the thought aloud to my boyfriend, when I was talking about my feelings, felt stranger. To help talk me through my sad thoughts, he said something along these lines:

“Every player on a professional sports team plays with some kind of injury. It’s only when a player is laying on the grass, holding their knee to their chest or unconscious, that everyone crowds over them to see if they’re okay. You’re a stronger player now Jess, you survived. Your friends don’t have to constantly hover over you anymore to see if you’re okay and that’s a good thing, isn’t it? Everyone has something that they carry with them even though people may not see it, even though they don’t show it, but they still play the game.”

And what a scary game life is.

Mental health has always been an important topic for me to talk about because I would never want anyone to feel as alone as I once did. I just wanted to note that I’m aware of the current times and I will post a blog about it- I’m just trying to articulate all of my feelings into words. There’s so much going on, for the time being, I will include a graphic that I found on Instagram. (cr: @queenshirin)

Stay Safe,

Jessica