I haven't conquered anything, if that's what you're wondering. But I assume that is what you're wondering, if you're reading this. Sorry to disappoint.
I guess it all starts with a book. Or at least the spiral does. Whether it goes up or down, I have yet to figure out.
In English class I received a book titled The Secret Life of Bees. You might have read it. The next day, my teacher said she'd read the first chapter out loud, so I took it out of my backpack. And I opened the cover.
And on the inside of that cover was a familiar name. One I hadn't seen or heard in almost ten years. It startled me so much that I couldn't think of anything else other than that name for the rest of the class. For the rest of the day, really.
I used my lunch period to track that name through the yearbooks and I found the four pictures that matched it.
I cried. A lot.
Because, for the first time in almost ten years, I saw my cousin's face.
And no, she didn't die, our mothers just don't speak anymore. Because I have three aunts on my mother's side and I can only talk to one.
That name lead to three weeks of torturous debating over whether to reach out to her, to Sansa. Which I did, over social media. And she answered. Which I loved. So early March came and went in a flurry of late night messages, until I had two consecutive snow days.
And the next day, a panic attack. Over my father's cruel remarks about my grades.
I wasn't doing bad, not by a long shot in most classes, but there were two classes I wasn't doing well in.
And in my panic, I sent a series of messages to my mother as I cowered in my room, too ashamed to come back out. One of them included "Look into a therapist" and the response I got, three excruciating minutes later, was no.
That drove me to the brink of insanity until my mother walked in the door twenty minutes later and I screamed at her until she told me that she'd never seen my message. It turned out that my eleven year old sister did.
In May, I got my therapist, and here I am, sitting in a car, wasting my summer, as my parents tell me.
But it all really started with a book.
