#am i growing up by not oversharing on the internet so much anymore?

[despite-everything]

moving across the country in two weeks and im fucking stressed.

im really excited - ive been trying to do this for more than half a year and only just now got a job, but this is hard! ive moved cross-country twice before, but once i was still in high school and was moving to live with a different parent then i moved again for college, so both of those moves were very different than a full adult moving because i want to. ive moved around within an hour or so radius over the past couple years, but this is so different and its starting to feel real.

i have my flight booked. ive put in my two weeks at my current job. i have a date im selling my car. im fortunate enough to have been offered to live with my sister and her husband for a couple months while i look for a second job and a place of my own (def with roommates though. im moving nyc. is this the smartest finanical decision with the current economy? probably not. but i feel like i need to for a multitude of personal reasons).

my cat is my personal item on my flight, and i plan to have a large backpack with important stuff (computers, audio equipment, and a pair of shoes), and one large checked bag. im hoping to send my stuff later once i find a place to live (i can keep things in my dads basement for a year or so which is a huge relief, but i want to get it out of there sooner rather than later since he doesnt know im on hrt and im sure wouldnt react well to figuring that out).

im trying to fit as many clothes as i can into this bag, as well as other important things and damn its fucking hard. i own a lot of things, but even just packing the essentials is tough because idk if this is all i will have for a couple months or for longer. and honestly? the hardest part is my pillow. its the only pillow ive ever wanted to use long term and it doesnt have a fucking tag on it so idk the brand. and i love my sister but i got serious neck pain after staying with her for a week using her pillow options, so i want to bring mine. and the fact that im not sure i can make it work is really activating my stress. i know i could ship a box or two with other things i could really use, but i think this pillow is kinda my breaking point for realizing how stressed i am.

im just trying to stay focused on how much i want this and keep reminding myself that millions of people have done this before me. but its scary! and i have someone in my life who id like to be talking to about this stuff but theyre going through some major shit of their own and i know they really need space this week so im going to wait. but i just needed to get some of this out.

[sinistarz]

I am so sorry you are dealing with a weirdo. Please know what you meant was obvious.

Its no big deal but thanks mate. I just remembered the block button exists and I should go back to using it liberally LMAO

Its not that I don't think kids should have internet access. I just think the abundance of so many websites having such a young age limit is a horribly harmful thing. Think about it. Tumblr. Twitter. Youtube. Tiktok. Etcetera. Because of such a young userbase you have kids oversharing incredibly personal information. Interacting with spaces that do not cater to them whatsoever and becoming manipulated into harmful mindsets about crap that doesn't matter in the long run. Adult content creators have nowhere to fucking go anymore dude. Like I know I laugh and poke fun at the horny crowd but truth be told, it sucks. Nobody has a platform anymore. Its getting harder for adults to assure minors don't interact with them. Its getting harder for mature content creators to even have a platform because websites like the one I listed will ban so much as mentions of words like sex and kill and death and gay and queer and etc. And have content that nulls their mind like those videos with a billion things going on and some nonsense being talked about in the foreground. And then kids on these damn websites grow up thinking those are bad words or gay is a slur and get manipulated into thinking talking about their name and age and where they live on the public internet is a completely okay thing that will have no repercussions at all. Do they not teach online safety in school anymore or something. And because these fucking websites now rely on the engagement of children, they've shaped and catered themselves to the younger audience specifically and now labeled almost everything as a violation of timmy the toddlers privacy because it shows a nipple or a skirt that shows too much knee or a mention of sex and violence and I'm fucking tired. Everybody preaches on and on that "limiting children from posting on social media" is harmful to them but its literally the fucking opposite. Its the fucking opposite. In becoming more "child friendly" these websites have literally become more harmful and dangerous to children AND adults and its impossible for me to point this out without people claiming I'm preaching censorship. I am literally preaching the fucking opposite for the love of God

[nutley-rp]

personal

I’ve never been one to spill my metaphorical jelly beans over the internet, preferring instead to drip feed bits here and there that I’ve sanitized and deemed safe to share. I worry about blending online and personal lives while simultaneously wanting to 1) ghost people immediately upon thinking I’ve messed up and 2) sharing way too much. Thankfully, my cautious upbringing has me leaning more towards 1 (without actually ghosting people) but, that said, the idea of oversharing is super weird to me. Like, it just feels like something I’ll regret posting about tomorrow. Why publish something when it’s private crap? Shouldn’t that stay to yourself? Aren’t you going to bother others, IF others even bother taking a look?

This is my final warning to you to stop while you’re ahead lmao. I won’t judge.

Over time this cursed space on tumblr has begun to feel safer, but maybe it’s because I’ve become more confident (or maybe I just don’t give a shit anymore). Instead of it being a performative and curated space for others (and fandoms), it’s more of just...me. Posting increasingly more unhinged nonsense online, sometimes seen by others, sometimes not. So first and foremost, this rant is for myself. Maybe it belongs in a journal but, somehow, this pseudo-private blog of mine feels better to write in. If I regret this I’ll just delete it anyway.

So anyway. I ended a relationship of 4+ years. That sucks.

2022 is going to be wild. Work-wise, the more senior coworker I leaned on is leaving, so I have to pick up the slack and be more responsible. Living-situation-wise, I feel like I’ve never really “adulted” by myself before. I lived with my parents for a hot second after college and then latched onto my ex’s established life. And of course relationship-wise, that’s going to be different. There’s a lot to figure out but I think this is all stuff I SHOULD figure out. It’ll be good for me. A lot of discovery and growth down the road but hell, I’m so lazy and I’m not looking forward to it. But it’s exciting at the same time. There’s a lot to feel and I’m just kind of bouncing between holiday cheer and feeling a little frustrated/empty/afraid. I’m not extremely torn up about the break up. We both knew it was coming and it was like staring down a tunnel for 6 months, hoping for a different conclusion but getting to the end of it anyway. And there were so many good times we shared. I think that’s what makes it so sad. So much worked out, but then, it couldn’t. Not in the long term.

It’s a beautiful thing to “grow into each other” for the sake of love, but I found myself becoming resentful of change, and I shouldn’t have ignored that feeling for so long. I kept thinking - I LIKE WHO I AM. Why should I change? Why should I bend when it doesn’t feel like the other side is bending just as much? What if I just find someone else that can accept me for who I am naturally? Or just live by myself? I know this sounds really negative and I’m tempted to sugarcoat it. I used to think to myself whenever I wrote in my journal - what if I just left out all the bad stuff? Then, I wouldn’t remember that, and I’d only remember the good? It’s being dishonest but like...it’s not like I didn’t do this to myself anyway. I feel myself rubbing against the same urge to sanitize my thoughts for future me but, I don’t know. It is what it is, right now.

Ultimately this opens a lot of doors for me. I’m thankfully financially independent, and I’m...confident, enough, in my professional capabilities to hold down the fort for whatever lies ahead (god, we’ll see). I’m eager to focus on myself for a while. I guess this is why I’ve been unraveling recently - that’s just. Who I am? Who I always was but was holding back? I don’t know. Still debating whether or not I should continue censoring myself like this or if I should just let loose for once, especially since I’m just me now, and not. Us.

Life is wild. Will just have to see.

[sageofsarcasm]

Hey, this is important if you care about me.

I’m leaving. I know I’ve been joking about it forever, but I really am going this time. This blog will still be here, because I can’t bring myself to delete it. (anditalsomeansicancomebackifiimmediatelyregretmydecision) I may log back in to look at it every so often, but this is the end. I’m not posting here anymore. Oh, and my discord won’t be around for much longer either. If that’s all you care about, feel free to leave. The rest of this is just emotional bullshit. And it’s long.

I joined tumblr in 2017 to follow some of the blogs that were posting good shit about Markiplier and Jacksepticeye. My anxiety disorder was wildly out of control, and my lovely genetics were just about to kick me in the ass with depression to follow it. I was also, at this point, a bit of a religious fanatic with no education on anything outside of conservative protestant beliefs. I had never felt more alone.

Within a few months, I was part of something. It started with @cosmicsnowcryptid back when she was still theowlandthefinch and me sending super cringey asks under a pseudonym, because I was hurting and I didn’t know what to do about it. And then came the CYM discord server. It’s been emotional for me, because I’m weird like that, seeing it grow from the three chapters of My Mistake to what it’s going to become, and I’m so proud of everyone involved. One of my biggest regrets is not engaging with the development of the game, and then promising I would, and immediately dropping off the face of the earth again. To any of you that this may have inconvenienced in any way, I really sincerely apologize. No one deserved that.

For a while, in this community, I felt like I’d finally been accepted and free. I learned that I’m asexual, I stopped denying that I’m attracted to all sorts of genders, and I’m finally starting to accept that I’m not cis. And I’m grateful for that. To anyone who ever helped me through that horrible period in my life where I didn’t know anything about the world or myself, and my brain was completely fucking me over, thank you so much. From the bottom of my heart. Even if we barely ever talked. Thank you.

Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and my bad habit of not keeping things in my head and grossly oversharing came back to bite me. I alienated myself from the friends I made, if any of you would still consider me a friend, if you ever did. I never felt like I belonged (which is no one’s fault), so I left. 

Allow me one last moment of divulging things you don’t want or need to know before I vanish into the void that is the internet: I never felt like I deserved to be treated the way I was. I was negative, annoying, pushy, and probably toxic, in some ways. And still you all kept reassuring me. You told me I was okay, even when I was so sure I wasn’t. I didn’t deserve that. So instead I ran away, and tried to convince myself you would forget, even if it hurt. When I felt alone again, I wanted to come back, but every time I was about to, I would worry myself into a near panic attack, because I was so sure you wouldn’t want me. Not with all I did and all the time I’d been gone. This is, of course, my own head, and my own fault. No one should feel guilty for this.

So I’m alone again, and that’s whatever. I’m used to it. Seriously, I know this sounds sad, and like I’m trying to get attention or some shit, but I mean it. It’s not a big deal. Still, my presence on tumblr and in these communities is… obsolete. I don’t need to be here. I hate my url, I hate the name I chose, I hate that I was still identifying as female when I started this blog, and I hate the mark I’ve left. Between all that mess and the simple fact that my blog is full of horrible cringe and the confusion of all the names I’ve ever gone by, it’s time for this to end.

If you care at all, I will still be around. I run another blog that I’ve had for a while now, and it’s not that difficult to find if you want to. But I’m not linking it. I don’t want to carry the identity from this blog to the next one. If you see me around, however, know that I probably miss you, and I probably still check your blog from time to time just to see what’s up. Even if we weren’t mutuals. I’m a sentimental person, and closing this chapter of my story, and the first time I ever put myself out into the world, is a bit of a painful moment for me. But it’s time.

Thank you for everything.

[daughterofdescartes]

29062020

This is the first time in my life I will be writing about my childhood sexual abuse on paper. This is also a letter to my abuser.

I honestly don’t know where to start. I don’t know how long this journal entry will be. What I do know is that after this chain of events my life was never the same again. This series of events happened for a very short period of my life when I was eight years old in the third grade. 

I think it happened over the summer vacation or some other vacation period. So it couldn’t have lasted more than two to three months maybe, but the memories have been haunting & tormenting me ever since.

At first when it all started, I obviously didn’t know what was going on. There was no way a clueless eight year old could understand what she was doing at the time. All she did was obey her older brother, who must’ve been twelve at the time. I thought what I was doing was an act of love. I wanted to make you happy because I looked up to you as my older brother. When I asked you if you loved me, you replied confused and said: “Uhh yeah. But only as my younger sister of course.” 

Is this what loving siblings do to each other? I remember you promised you would “return the favor” when I would grow older. I wonder if you meant that.

We would do these bad things behind our parents backs, while they were sleeping in their hotel bedroom and we sneaked to the bathroom. 

I remember threatening you in the car, that I would tell mom and dad, but then you said: “But then they would know about you too.” I’m surprised thinking back of this moment right now, because it means that I knew in the back of my mind as an eight year old that what we were doing was wrong, but you wanted to make me feel guilty, claiming that I was an accomplice.

Because I agreed to do these things as a child, for the longest time, I believed it was my own fault, that I let it all happen, and I started hating myself for it. I blamed myself for years and years. I think I started getting mortified by these memories when I started middle school. That’s when it really dawned on me that what we did was very very wrong. 

“Oh god. Why the hell did I do all of those things. Nobody can ever find out about what happened.” I was so scared about people finding out, I even contemplated suicide if news were to ever get out. I was extremely embarrassed and ashamed of myself. Did you feel that too? 

After a while I started convincing myself that none of it ever happened. It helped a lot to repress those memories and just pretend it never happened. I tried to convince myself that i had a normal childhood, normal family. But when people made incest jokes, (which were popular at the time) I couldn’t help but feel they were talking about me, joking about what happened to me. They know about me. 

I was very upset with you. I hated you. For the longest time, the password on my laptop was “ihate(your name)”. I pretended my hate and anger came from teenage angst when in reality I was angry for what you did to me. 

As years passed by and I started actively forgetting about my trauma, I also started forgiving you. We eventually became best friends again. People always comment on our sibling relationship and say it’s so nice and rare that we are so close, but nobody knows about our dark past. 

Even to this day I have complicated feelings about you. I am fully aware that your abuse stems from the abuse we witnessed from our parents, but that really doesn’t justify things. We both use anger to cope with our feelings, because that is what we learned from our father.  Every day I still get triggered thinking about what happened. I get triggered when I see you in your underwear, when you overshare about your sex life, when you talk down on women, ... 

Have you hurt other women in your life the way you hurt me? Does this incident haunt your mind as much as it haunts mine every day? I don’t think it’s fair that you get to live your life like nothing ever happened. I’m tired of this terrible incident seeming like it’s just a story made up in my mind. 

I only realized recently that i am still suffering from long term side effects of sexual abuse such as fear of intimacy, fear of men in general, an inability to trust others. Do you think I was just born this way? What happened between us has moulded me into the person I am today and I’m only starting to realize that now. This traumatic event has been a huge contributor to a lot of my (inter)personal issues, maybe all of them. I can’t even imagine who I would be today if this never happened, because that girl would not behave half the way I do right now. You joke about my personal problems like you have nothing to do with them, like my issues are merely “girl issues”. Well guess what, you have EVERYTHING to do with my issues because you created them when you were twelve. 

So how are you going to take responsibility for this? How are you going to hold yourself accountable? How are we going to fix this? Because it turns out: I still don’t know how to cope. 

A few years ago was the first time I confronted reality again and stopped pretending my memories were just “silly thoughts” in my head. I looked up about childhood sexual abuse on the internet and felt relieved for the first time. At the age of nineteen, I finally forgave myself because I realized none of it was ever my fault. None of it. I was a child. I didn’t know any better.

I don’t want to keep this a secret anymore. I really don’t. I can’t deal with this by myself anymore. I want people to know what happened to me. Especially the ones who feel like they are going through what i went through and feel like they’re alone. It turns out sibling abuse, the most taboo case of them all, is also the most prevalent. It is unfair that there are so many of us yet none of us are allowed to talk about our experiences because of societal norms. 

Listen, I don’t hate you, I actually even love you because you are also my best friend. And for the longest time I wanted to protect you because your life would obviously be ruined if everyone would know. But I want to start protecting myself, I want to protect all other abuse survivors in the world. 

So I think we can start by acknowledging that what you did to me was wrong. 

It’s time to address the invisible elephant in the room.

[brittanyinterviews]

Eben Benson, Managing Editor of Juxtapoz Magazine

Eben Benson, Managing Editor of Juxtapoz Magazine

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This interview was conducted via email in November 2018.

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Brittany: Can you tell me a bit about yourself?

Eben: Hi! My name is Eben Benson, I’m 25 years old, and I’m managing editor of Juxtapoz magazine. I’m from Gorham, Maine, but live in SF now. I generally take things one day at a time.

Brittany: How did you get into writing and editing? Have you always been interested in writing?

Eben: I’ve actually never been much of a writer. I’d try writing stuff for myself in high school, but then I’d burn it because I’m dramatic and also have had a hard time creating certain types of things since I was young. I did okay in English class, and have always been a pretty strong reader, but I would get really distracted and bored in school so I never dedicated much time to it. I became a substantially better writer when I became more engaged with history and politics, which I ended up majoring in at UMass, where I went to college. So, expository writing has been more my thing.

Brittany: How did you come into your role as the Managing Editor of Juxtapoz? Did you have prior experience in publishing?

Eben: I didn’t! I was managing the web store for Thrasher magazine, which isn’t an editorial role but is in the same office as Juxtapoz. One day, my boss came downstairs and asked if I wanted to work at Juxtapoz, and I was like, “Wait, what? Seriously? I don’t know how to edit. I feel like I barely know how to read? I don’t know anything about art?” and everyone was like, “Eh, you’ll figure it out.”

Brittany: Can you describe your day-to-day in this role?

Eben: Basically I get into the office at 8 and leave at 4:30, between those hours it’s a toss-up. I spend a lot of time posting stuff on our site and social media platforms. Other than that, I edit the print mag, plan events, interview artists, check out new books, respond to Instagram DMs, and read through, like, 200 emails a day.

Brittany: You've interviewed quite a few artists about their work. In your opinion, what makes a great interview?

Eben: It’s tough, because I’m sure I drop the ball on good questions sometimes, but I think when someone writes back something funny and unexpected, they make the interview so much better. The work of course has to look nice. I hate when people send me shitty photos of their amazing art. I wanna be like, “Where are you located? I’m going to go buy a camera right now and get some higher res images because I know your art looks better than this.”

Brittany: In an interview with the graffiti artist known as SLUTO, you mentioned that you crowd-sourced questions on Instagram and scrolled through 150 of his post recent posts. Can you elaborate further on how you prepare for an interview and what research it might entail?

Eben: Yeah, I usually go deep on the IG. I’ll be back in like, 2013, looking at heavily-filtered photos of artists and their high school friends, or their emo phase, or something like that. I spend a lot of time looking at their work and their progression. I love seeing how an artist’s work has changed over the years. I’ll usually check and see if they’ve done other interviews, to make sure I don’t ask redundant questions. Thankfully, the internet has short-term memory loss, so even if I ask some of the same questions, it’ll be new to the reader.

Brittany: Have you always been a big fan of art? Can you describe your first "art memory"?

Eben: Honestly, no. I grew up on music and skateboarding, and felt like critically successful or “fine art” was some exclusive club that I was actively excluded from. I had some people just really turn me off from art, kind of shaming me for not getting it, and then I’d try to “get” it, but since there’s nothing to “get,” of course I never got close.

I think my earliest art memory was looking at a Picasso at the Portland Museum of Art (in Maine) and thinking, “Oh, this is apparently the good stuff.” I had to have been like 6, and I think I hated it. Growing up on a farm, a lot of “high culture” is really distant and kind of unattainable. I associated art with yuppie intellectuals, which isn’t entirely false, but they aren’t entirely bad. Haha.

I went to a drawing class in college because my friend was modeling for it, and this girl I was dating at the time laughed at all the sketches I made. She ended up talking hella shit on me after I started working at Juxtapoz because she went to art school and I didn’t. I think it was people like her who made me think art was bullshit, and there are plenty of people like that. I just don’t hang out with them anymore.

Brittany: Who are artists we should know about, particularly any local ones in the Bay Area?

Eben: Wheeew. Well, I am going to ramble here. In no particular order: Jeffrey Cheung, Oliver Hawk Holden, Calvin Wong, Muzae Sesay, Casey Grey, Yetunde Olagbaju, Kristin Farr, Lena Gustafson, Nychos, Joe Roberts (LSD World Peace), George Rocha, Paige Gausman, Alán González, Ellie Andrews, Max Stern, Olivia Krause, Elizabeth Yoshiko Schmidt, Cannon Dill, Brett Flanigan, Anson Cyr, Austin Leong, Maryam Yousif, Marcela Pardo Ariza, Meryl Pataky, Kellen Chasuk, Anika Chasuk, Laura Rokas, Robbie Api, Michelle Fleck, Terry Hoff, Bryon Christman, Yarrow Slaps, Joonbug, Odysseus Wolken, Ryan Whelan, Liz Hernández, Sofie Ramos, Tim Diet, and damn, a few more. The Bay Area is the shit, there is so much good stuff happening here right now.

That’s more the younger up-and-coming crowd. Then you have the legends obviously: Alicia McCarthy, Barry McGee, Rigo23, Jeremy Fish, John DeFazio. There are more I’m forgetting…

Brittany: I think you use social media, specifically Twitter and Instagram, in a fascinating way. Although both are public accounts, you discuss very real, potentially sensitive, and very personal issues around topics like mental health that are still often seen as off-limits. Is using social media in this very public way a conscious effort? Can you speak more about how you approach using social media?

Eben: I think it’s odd that my generation has been on social media for more than half our lives. Starting out on Myspace, AIM, and forums like 4chan, etc, the internet definitely became a very normal part of my life at an early age. Then, moving on to Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, Slap magazine, etc. became organic too. I hit my self-conscious adolescence at the same time the internet was in its adolescent phase, so I was very fragmented in the way I used it. I would post the most random shit, trying to keep it “safe” and not, like, overshare. I used to be freaked out a lot, thinking of every person who might see anything I do.

Around 2013, I started opening up a little more, I think that was when I got Instagram. I definitely used it in a lot more boring way, just not as self-conscious as before. In 2015, I got super depressed and started just pouring it out online. I was spiraling hard, but it was nice to have some company and to feel a little bit seen, even if I was being annoying in my head. Then at one point, I kinda synthesized the self-conscious and manic-sharing, where I recognize that seeking validation will only solve half the problem, but also that no one has to follow me, so I have the “right” to be as personal as I want, and if someone really hates it, they can unfollow me, and that’s fine. I think my progression in how I use social media reflects my own mental health progression. Coming to terms with who I am has made me more comfortable sharing what I’m going through, or what I think, and at the same time, the internet is now growing up in a way, too, where we collectively know that whatever you post will be quickly forgotten anyway, at no fault of our own, so why not just live it up online? Four years ago I would have been bummed out that nearly everyone reading this interview has clicked out by now, but me at 25 is entirely fine with that and I’m having fun talking about myself. Haha.

Brittany: What can readers expect to see from you in the future?

Eben: Hopefully I’ll introduce people to new, challenging, and talented artists that make work they like. Hopefully they can get a few laughs or feel some comradery in the feelings or thoughts that we share, and hopefully at some point I can make a big enough mark on the world that I will leave it slightly nicer than it would have been if I never materialized.

In the meantime, like I said at the beginning, I’ll be taking it day by day. Thanks, Brittany <3

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Photo provided by Eben Benson.

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Special thanks to Eben for discussing his work at Juxtapoz with us. You can follow Eben on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

[extremelyaverageincrediblynormal]

“13 Reasons Why” triggered me into therapy.

I am not kidding. I hate the word “trigger” because it’s such a meme, but it really happened.

I was actually very excited when I heard that there was going to be a TV show about suicide and mental illness, and that they were going to give people who maybe haven’t had to struggle with mental illness an idea of what someone like me has to go through. I felt like, somehow, this would help break down the stigma. I had never read the book but I knew the content of it going into it. I had seen lots of movie with scenes of rape, bullying, and even suicide. (the virgin suicide was one of my favorites growing up as a depressed teen). I was a little late to begin watching it, and all I heard were rave reviews about how when you start, you wont be able to stop. There were even memes about the show, how could something so talked about be so bad. I was glad it was getting so much notoriety. 

This show came out while I was in the middle of the most stressful situation I’ve had to deal with in my life so far. I was looking forward to a distraction. 

A little background on me. I had dealt with some sad things in my early teenage life, losing loved ones and so on. I was also bullied, not super bad though; I was never called a slut or beat up, but I was constantly working on projects alone because people would rather work in groups of threes than work with me. I was not the prettiest, and a couple people made a point of reminding me of that and embarrassing me in front of everyone by means of pulling my pants down in front of the whole class, slapping my ass on a dare and then yelling “EW” and telling me the guy I had a crush on liked me back and wanted me to ask him out. Lucky for me, I was smart enough by the time they came up with that last one to recognize they were just saying that to embarrass me. It was awful, but I got through it and came out with friends in high school, and a new set of friends as an adult that I cherish every day of my life. But I also came out with a couple other things. I was already dealing with depression from other experiences, and soon after came social anxiety and self hatred. I decided the only way someone would like me would be if I changed who I was completely. So I did. I deleted every single picture I ever had from that time, said goodbye to the only two people who would talk to me, and got a whole new wardrobe. I made my voice sound higher, I made my stomach look smaller, and my hair look straighter. It took me until very recently to realize I have no idea who “I” am. I know what I tried to be, I have all these personalities that I tried so hard to become but none ever stuck. And here I am now, 22, and watching a Netflix show about teenagers, that stripped me down to my core and left me raw.

So why did this happen? I don’t exactly know why or what set me off, but as the episodes went on, it got progressively more difficult to watch. Watching Hannah get called names and made fun of, exposed in vulnerable places, I knew those feelings. And watching Clay feel so empty inside, wondering what he could have possibly done to make Hannah feel this way was so heartbreaking. Losing someone you love is the hardest thing to go through, in my opinion. But I was angry at the writers, because I know that if someone decides to take their own life, it’s not fair to lay blame on the people left behind. I have always held that opinion and it’s not always a popular one, but to me, it makes sense. This “That will show them” mentality is EXACTLY the type of problematic thinking that a young, depressed person could have, and if that’s encouraged? My goodness, 

Every article you read that agrees with this opinion will use the word “glamorize” when referring to what the show has done to suicide. I don’t think it glamorized it at all. It validated. 

I am not saying this out of a completely ignorant place. I have had suicidal thoughts in the not-so-distant past, and as far back as middle school. They have been a part of my life from time to time, and I am not ashamed of it. I’ve never been ashamed of what I’ve had to deal with, mostly because I’m really great at oversharing and telling people things they really never needed to hear (see: this entire paragraph) But that mentality helped me feel less alone as a teenager struggling to float in the ocean that was terrible thoughts, sleepless nights and self-hatred. Telling someone about it meant it wasn’t just my battle anymore. 

BUT ANYWAYS. I was mad that they were showing suicide like this, and not ONCE discussed how she had suffered from depression or any other kind of mental illness. I waited until the end of the series to see if this changed; maybe there was a huge reveal, maybe there was something the audience didn’t know yet. But, to my dismay, nothing of the sorts came about. I saw it as blaming the people around her for not being more understanding and nice. People in Middle School and High School are ASSHOLES. They do mean, stupid things to try and fit it. It is always ALWAYS  a personal and selfish decision to end your own life. But, I still saw a part of me in Hannah. I got to the last episode, and as you may have guessed, she kills herself. She slits her own wrists. But they made the creative decision to show it. The whole, brutal thing. So I watched in tears and horror, and I saw something on her face... not pain, or sadness, but relief. Finally, after thirteen grueling episodes, after 4 terrible years of her life, she was finally free from the pain, and she was happy. And a small spark of a thought came to mind, that I hadn’t felt in a couple years... Relief would be... nice. 

Now, after years of working on my own mental illness, recognizing bad thoughts, learning how to stop a panic attack, how to get through a depressive episode, and so on, I knew this was NOT a good sign. I had to stop. I shut off the TV, curled into a ball in my living room and broke down. Shortly after, my panic attacks started again and I dove into a 2 week long nightmare. I was panicking every day, not sleeping, depressed, nothing felt worth it anymore, why am I even here, I wish I showed my bullies what they did to me, I wish they fucking knew, if only the people who hurt me knew how much it hurt, and so on. It got really dark, really bad, I didnt shower or leave my room until one day, I was scrolling through facebook at 3am. I wasn’t going to be sleeping any time soon so why try? And there was a post from a local radio station. It was a test to see how depressed you were. I scrolled past, almost laughing because 1. I already knew, I didn’t need an internet quiz to tell me how fucked up I was and 2. CLICKBAIT. The post read: 

2 years ago, I took this exact same test because even though I knew something was wrong? I wasn't really ready to admit I finally needed to get help. This test was a major factor in finally getting my mental health back on track.

Even if you think everything is okay? Take it anyway. I could change your life in ways you never expected... It did for me.

I scrolled past... and then scrolled back up. I thought, what the heck, why not. 

I took the test, and on a scale of 1-100 I was at an 82, which basically means I was real messed up. Then I was taken to an intake form page. And I started crying. I was trying to get help in the week prior and was just coming back with either too high rates, or not anywhere near me. And this basically just fell into my lap. It was like a sign, or something stupid like that. I filled out the intake form, basically pleading for someone to help me, and they called me the next day. I’ve been in therapy every since, and it actually feels like it’s working. I’m not healed by any stretch of the imagination, but this felt like a lifeline. I feel like I’m connected to people who could really help me. I feel like I’m not alone. I feel like I’ve started my healing path and it feels amazing. I am so grateful.