on one unsuspecting st.patrick's day, inside of a hospital room up in the heights of manhattan, opened the portal from whence i came. it was snowing. say my name by destiny's child was the #1 song in america. the world had just survived y2k. i arrived weighing in at 8 pounds 12 ounces, and just a tad bit...blue. according to my mother, every time she attempted the herculean feat of pushing my big ass head out i resisted, worming my way back up her canal.
surprise!
the umbilical cord, the most connected i'd ever feel to her, was nicely wrapped around my neck. like a bow! i was a gift. :)
clearly between the doctors, my mother, and myself somebody worked it out otherwise i wouldn't be writing this now, but that is my origin story. anxiously born into the next millennium, i was shiny, new, and baby blue.
for my first months of life, and to be honest for quite some time after (23 years) i didn't want to sleep in my own bed with no one to hold me close and tell me everything's going to be okay. please! please don't leave me alone with my own thoughts, i can’t take it! it seems even then i was my own worst fear, scared of my own hair in the tub, scared of my own shadow.
with every yearly telling of the story of my birth that my mom subjects me to, i've grown more and more suspicious that i was born sad. all my life i've been in distress, all my days perturbed. i cry these big juicy crocodile tears if you raise your voice even a smidge of a decibel too loud. i’ll lock myself away if i even think you might be mad at me. convinced there has to be a reason why i’m like this, i’ve spent the latter half of my life cramming pop psychology books down my throat for breakfast like a snake, followed by an arctic glass of attachment theory. it has to be the literal way i was born, or maybe it’s the stars! god forbid i consider even for a moment that i’m just genetically predisposed to anxiety and clinical depression.
for as long as i’ve been able to understand the english language, i’ve heard: “alyse you’re SO damn sensitive.” “alyse you are SUCH a crybaby.” “god alyse, not everything is about you, we ALL have feelings!”
i am, and i know! fuck you very much.
what started off as a genuine expression of my internal world quickly became my whole external presentation, and an exhausting one. if that’s what you’re used to, and if that’s who everyone says you are, then it’s really easy to accept the notion that’s all you can be. the sky is blue and i'm emotionally aureate. 2 + 2 equals 4. by my mid-teens it became especially hard to understand myself as anything other than chronically ill with melancholia. few friends, and even fewer goals, i was all vibes. sad ones at that.
even now as an adult i've maintained the habit of clutching on to the crybaby moniker and all that's contributed to it SO tightly. at one point i considered getting it written in ink above my ass. tbh i still might. that’s hot. it was one of the main contributions to the unfortunate demise of my relationship with my first love. after said demise, a fairy godmother (my gynecologist) of sorts came to me (i made an appointment). i told her my emotions were ruining my life and i think it could be tied to my hormones. (i wanted to die once a month and finally came to the conclusion perhaps it isn’t just that i’m a pisces.) she waved her wand (ballpoint pen), granted me a wish (wrote me a script for zoloft, formally known as sertraline), and offered me a secret of the universe (diagnosed me with premenstrual dysphoric disorder)!
that prescription/diagnosis combo saved me. i couldn't let my life continue with my feelings in the driver's seat. ESPECIALLY when i don't even have a license of my own. it gave me a chance to breathe, to sit on a life raft and sail through a lazy river of my emotions as opposed to raging rapids. what a relief to know my teary-eyed disposition is one-part DNA, two-parts trauma, and that with a pill taken by mouth once daily and consistent weekly meetings with my therapist i’m capable of being okay.
if i’m being 1000% with you, i’ve been more than okay. turns out on the other side of my virgo moon there’s a life waiting for me to try and live it without one foot out the door. for the first time ever, i’m peeking my head around the corner eager to see what’s next rather than cowering away from possibility with my face in my hands. (see image of example: a below.) don’t get me wrong, life is still kicking my ass and taking my lunch money, i just take an antidepressant and write about it now to cope.
thank god for sertraline, for the breakup even. without it all i don't know when, if ever, i'd have been pushed on to my hands and knees into the light, and out of the shadows where i’d been self-flagellating like any good ex-catholic would. the light that now dares me to ask, what does it mean to expand beyond our base identities? how does it feel? the good? the bad? what is it like living beyond old margins? what does it mean to be free, and how do we stay here?
to these questions i say this- i don't know, BUT as we descend upon the eve of my 23rd birthday, i'm excited to announce…i’m down to fuck around and find out!