They say that when you become a parent, you either copy your own parents or go in the exact opposite direction. Instead of vodka bottles and guns and anger, I would fill my family’s house with crafts and dinner and warmth.
Welcome to The Converse-Station: A dialogue between writers. With the site getting so much traffic (my Facebook page is reaching over 18 million people)...
I love watching him laugh, and even more I love that he knows that there is something I am not good at. I want him to know that not everybody is good at everything, or the same things, but they should try them anyway, and if they want to be good, they need to practice.
As the days grow shorter so will my lack of self-control. The darkness will be a blanket on my body, thickening my waistline, weighing down my breasts. On December 21st, when the daylight flees fastest, I’ll be my heaviest, my thoughts will be at their darkest, my energy level at its lowest. It will slowly come back over the following months.
December is hard.
For as long as I can remember, I have never wanted to grow up, and I still feel the same now. They call it Peter Pan Syndrome. The fear of growing older.
My body didn't realize that my baby had died and still thought I was pregnant and kept on doing pregnant things. I still couldn't stand the smell of eggs in a frying pan that had previously been my favorite breakfast. Milk made me retch. Morning sickness in full effect. My body wanted her as much as my heart did.
It wasn’t an ex-lover or a fellow student. No. It was someone I had never worked with directly or even exchanged words with. It was a complete and total stranger who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.
I was terrified of getting older. In my 20's I lied and said I was younger. When I was 28, I said I was 25.
I thought once I turned 30 I would be useless. Read that again: useless.
I think how ponderous the shape of sorrow is. How little it takes to upend a childhood, like a table on its side: dishes broken, food soiled, water glasses emptying themselves onto the hardwood floor.
When we think about mental illness, we too often picture the horror movie images: straight jackets, padded rooms, electroshock therapy, insane asylums.
Don’t get me...
