Status Updates From A Bitter Pill to Swallow

ok ok good start.

i just realized i am reading two psychology fiction books at once 😁

I’m mad, I’m scared, I’m frustrated, and somehow all of those feelings are normal, and I’m normal, and I’m not my feelings. I’m just me, just Janina.

Afterwards, Gail said I should always remember that I am not my feelings.

“For the first time, I realized what everybody’s been telling me about anger and depression. It really is turning my anger inward and back at myself.”

His teachers had always told him how smart he was and had complimented his mind. His Grandma had said he had a mind like a steel trap because his memory was so good. He felt like he could memorize anything. But now what he once thought was a blessing felt like a curse. He could no longer trust his mind and he could no longer bear his memories.

When I worked there, I realized for the first time just how different the standard of care was for kids whose illnesses were mental and not physical. If children with cancer or AIDS had been treated as my patients had, you would hear about it on the news. But to the staff at Haven House, and maybe to the rest of the world, the patients were nothing but problem children.

She was insistent, but she didn’t sound angry. Just worried. In the past few weeks, it had become hard for him to make eye contact with anyone, even his own reflection.