Does anyone else ever just get mad about how health is talked about?
'That's not normal.'
'You shouldn't feel that way.'
But it is for me.
But I do.
But I do.
'You shouldn't be scared of people.'
But I am.
'It's not normal to be scared of people.'
It is.
'Other people aren't like that.'
But I am.
But I am.
But I do--but I do feel scared
but I am afraid
but I am like this
but this is normal for me, what do you mean
It's
Not
Normal
You are not scared
You do not feel this way
You are other people
You are not me.
And you do not have anxiety.
Of course you don't feel this way,
of course you don't see other people as scary
or frightening
or threatening--
You are not me,
and I am not you.
Do not talk to me about other people,
I know what other people are like
and this is normal for me.
This is normal for me.
This is normal.
This is perfectly normal,
and that is the entire point...
Until
It
Isn't.
Because normal was never the point.
Normal is not the point.
This is not good.
This is not okay.
This is not healthy.
Normal is not the point.
Normal is not the issue.
Normal has nothing to do with healthy.
...
not the way it's being said here, anyway.
Because "normal" is a thing--normal pulse, normal breathing rate,
normal vision and normal amount of blood...
Normal that I put in quotation marks because these are all estimates--not random guesses,
do not get me wrong, there is science behind it,
this normal is normal as in ideal.
As in the goal.
As in preferable.
As in.... healthy.
And I think you're missing the point when you tell someone who has always had anxiety
who has always been afraid
that that is not... normal.
Because normal means common,
normal is just what you're used to.
And that, that has nothing to do with healthy.
And wires absolutely get crossed the wrong ways when you act like they are the very same.
And this is not to diss every medical professional that talks like that
'that's not normal' rather than 'that's not healthy' because to them it is the same
because normal here means ideal, means preferable, means healthy,
only that I hope at one point we get better language to discuss this
because it is normal, actually, to be scared, when you have anxiety....
that's kind of it's entire thing.
And that's not healthy at all,
is it?
