"Mental illness is hard. Being a person is hard. Don’t try to do it alone." | Image Credit: Rhendi Rukmana via Unsplash
Real talk: I am having a hard time right now.
It’s not easy for me to say that, especially to strangers on the internet. But this is a mental health column, and honesty is important when we talk about mental health. So many of the problems we have stem from us not being open or asking for help — so here I am. Being open. Asking for help.
For the past three days, I’ve been riding an ever-crescendoing wave of panic. This is what chronic mental illness looks like in real life: I can barely eat a thing, all attempts at sleep are futile, and I’ve missed a full day of classes at the very start of the semester. It’s hard to even crack open my laptop and write this out — everything feels like it takes about five times the normal effort.
Sparing you all the gory details, I’m basically just a hot mess right now. Simple as that.
It feels very vulnerable to tell you this, Internet Stranger. Because what if you think less of me for it?
And yet, here I am. Writing it down and acknowledging this hard and ugly thing I’m going through. You really might think less of me for it, and that’s scary, but you also might very well be in the same exact place. So many people are spending today scared and alone and sick, and I want to send a message in a bottle out to each and every one of them saying, “Hey. Me too.”
I don’t have that many bottles. Also, how do you send a message in a bottle to, like, Kansas? I figured the internet would be the next best thing. So here is my message — the kind of thing I’d want to hear right at this very second. I hope it reaches you safe and sound:
Sometimes we fall apart into so many pieces that we fear we’ll never be able to put ourselves back together again. It feels like the world will be frightening and unbearable forever. You’re probably thinking, “I’m so tired. This is exhausting.” You’re right. Acknowledge that.
It’s okay to ask for help. It’s okay to say, “This is too much and I am so scared.” It’s okay to just be.
What you’re going through right now is not easy, and I’m so happy that you’ve decided to stick around and keep pushing through it. And when I say “pushing through it,” I do not mean some sort of bullshit bootstrapping maxim where you push all your mental turmoil down and act like everything’s okay. Getting out of bed is pushing through it. Drinking water is pushing through it. Staying in bed and forgetting to drink water is also pushing through it, because you’re still here.
You’re still here.
Isn’t that amazing? Because chances are, this is not the first time you’ve felt this way. It probably won’t be the last. Sometimes the fear of feeling this way is enough to paralyze you, let alone actually experiencing it. And what do you know? You’re. Still. Here.
I’m so happy that you’re still here.
It’s okay to ask for help. It’s okay to say, “This is too much and I am so scared.” It’s okay to just be.
I know you probably get a lot of unsolicited advice, but I can’t recommend the whole asking for help thing enough. If asking for help were a restaurant, I’d write one of those glowing Yelp! reviews that gets pinned at the very top. I would definitely visit that establishment again. I hope I see you there sometime.
Mental illness is hard. Being a person is hard. Don’t try to do it alone. I’ve spent so much time hiding all my damaged and broken parts so that I looked “put together.” It really isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Nobody is put together, so the whole thing is a terribly boring game of charades where talking is allowed so long as you aren’t saying, “I can’t do this by myself.”
Don’t do it by yourself. It’s literally impossible, and in this case, I mean “literally” literally. Chances are, whoever you ask for help needs help too.
Go find them.
