Saturday, May 7, 2016

Can I Make This a Tattoo?

Social media tells me it's Mental Health Month, so I keep stumbling across all the great little articles and interviews which say things so much nice than I ever could. Or say things that I didn't even know I was trying to say. Most recently, this:
5 Things To Know About My Mental Illness — Before You Say You Love Me

 Things that especially stood out from this article to me:

1.       "I need to know that you love me with all of my brokenness...I am afraid that if I am completely honest with the people I care about, they will leave...You have to love the entirety of me — even the parts of me that are terrifying…They are still mine. They are still me." This article sets itself up as a warning letter to a fledgling relationship about to spring go to the next level, but for me, it is this fear that plagues me even in the search for a new relationship. I've never had a relationship start out where the other person knew the level of anxiety and depression I struggle with some days, so that they don’t even have the opportunity to think/say “I know what I’m getting myself into.”
2.       “I am mentally ill. Not the cute kind, not the inspirational kind…I feel the constant pressure to present my mental illness to the world in a nice, tidy package with a ribbon on top, to make it friendly, to make it palatable, to make it less scary….I cannot promise you that I will always be this charismatic, ambitious, passionate person that you were drawn to in the first place.”
Can I make this a tattoo? And, on the flip side, I often feel guilty about identifying as a person with anxiety/depression/metal illness, because I know, comparatively, mine is not.that.bad. I feel like I am not quite crazy enough to be a part of this tribe and that talking about it makes me an attention seeking fake.  But it's still the most accurate identity I've tried on until this point. Especially after stumbling across this Kristen Bell interview. To all the people who call me bubbly:





 
 

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