I hold the small red pill between my thumb and forefinger. It’s miniscule. Maybe a third the size of a breath mint. I’ve already taken my antidepressant faithfully, as I always do. I habitually gulp down the rest of my pills but this one I take last, because it’s so small. There was the time it slid silently from my palm as I tossed the pills into my mouth and it was only the next day I realized I must have missed my dose. You’re not supposed to skip a day when you’re on antipsychotics. But …
Mental Illness
Outrage Fatigue and Leaping the Divide
I picked the wrong weekend to return to Facebook. It’s no secret, I have a small capacity for the constant churning machine that social media often is. Most days, it’s loud enough in my own head without adding voices of dissent and dissatisfaction muddying up my synapses. I suppose this is one right of the mentally ill. The removal of oneself from the entanglements of being ever present, ever vigilant, and ever available is self-care at it’s highest form. Maybe that’s true for everyone but …
Bipolar is a Riptide: Breathing Lessons
I’ve written before that ~I write like a woman drowning. I write with a desperation to know and be known, to understand God, to see glory. I write to breathe again.~ I’ve been breathless lately. Mental illness is a riptide on otherwise calm shores. It is the pull of deep waters lulling you further and further from safe and sturdy ground, all at once weightless and buoyant, caressed by the lapping tides. It invites you to surrender, to be carried away in the vastness of the sea. To be small and …