3 Things I’d Like to Say to My 19-Yr Old Depressed Self
Things I Wish I’d Known Before I Said Yes to Medication
To my dear, gentle and ferocious 19 yr-old,
Here are some things I wish I could’ve told you just before you crumpled into that psychiatrist’s chair, desperate for help, answers and guidance 20 years ago:
1. You are not broken. You make sense, and you can trust your body as the ultimate authority on what is true for you.
Your body is speaking a language you may not understand yet, but what if you began to trust that it only speaks the truth? That your body is infinite and perfect in its wisdom?
Imagine yourself in a forest. You look up and see a tree that has an unusual shape. Does it occur to you that the tree is “weird” or sick? Do you say “that tree is clearly diseased, look: it’s leaning to the right for no apparent reason!”
Of course not. The tree has very good reason for shaping itself that way. Perhaps there wasn’t enough light or water, or the roots didn’t have enough space and needed to crawl around another tree to survive.
Your body is the same. There is something your body needs, and the signals it’s using which we call…
