Suicide Lane Cafe

time capsule from 2013

When I was younger, I came to the realisation that part of my mind was lost, and sought advice. I sought wisdom in between the lines of borrowed books and in the static of TV shows from the 50s, but it turns out the best way to seek advice is from a human being.

And so I did. My teacher from secondary school said:

Why are you sad? Everybody's sad sometimes. I got over it. Look at me, I'm doing fine! I know what you're feeling. You just have to love yourself. Once you love yourself, everything will be okay. You don't need psychiatric help, you just need to get over it. 

I tried sawing down the spiky pieces of me to fit through a human-shaped template, and came out scathed and scared and wondering why nobody else felt the same. I wrapped myself in a blanket and pretended a gun was pointed at my face, and wished I knew someone who found comfort in the same.

When that didn't work, my colleague from work said:

It's okay to feel sad! Love yourself; take care of yourself! Read a book, cuddle a cat, make a blanket, take a bath! Paint your nails and revel in your colour! Take a nap because it's okay to rest! Drape fuzzy blankets over your shoulders and watch Disney movies from your childhood! 

So I bought a set of fifteen nail polishes and daubed yellow and blue and pink to fill in the grey and black pieces, and shattered them against the wall when it turns out eventually polish peels and you can't hide beneath paint. I tossed a bath bomb and submerged myself underwater and watched air bubbles escape from my mouth and wondered if I could combine the two and take a nap underwater. 

Somewhere out there is a scared teenager, trying and failing and feeling doomed to repeat a cycle that stretches on beyond death. This is not advice for that teenager. This is a letter from me to me, two years ago:

Take a shower, because you haven't in three days. Do your laundry, pick up your clothes because yesterday you tripped over a sweater your cat puked on and started crying for an hour. Put away the crackers because that's all you've eaten for five days straight. Do not look at the scale, because where you see the same weight the rest of the world sees a girl who's lost twenty pounds. Call someone to give you the courage to go out and see the city. Apologise to your parents, because you haven't called in two weeks and they're worried.

One day you'll look back on your journal from two years ago and realise when people say mental illnesses are okay, they really mean only the cute ones. You are lost, in a city a thousand miles away from home and trapped in a mind like a cage. It is not okay. Do not get over it. Embrace it; revel in it; and know that nobody but you can truly care for you.