Untitled Pablo Sand Project

Issue #5: Love in the Time of General

Anxiety Disorder

About the Author

Pablo Sand is alive and maybe you are too. They were in a bad place
for a long time but theyre better now. All glories to the sun for the
opportunity to embark on this and all future endeavors, without which
wed all be incapable of anything. They tweet @Weirdbirdpal and are
studying post-colonial literature and theatre.

Editors Note: While we have previously published the poetry of tumblr

user kittyit we must state that we by no means endorse her horrific
gender politics and transphobia and wish nothing but the most love
and support for all transgender people, whose genders and existences
are real, valid, and important.

Ayyy Lmao (trigger warning for depression and suicidal ideation)

They say time heals all wounds and it's cliche yea but it's also true. I was at
the bottom of the pit and somehow I climbed out without realizing it. I got over
being suicidal, I got over self-loathing, I got over a lot of things. I used to feel like
all the matter in my arms was drained and there was just bone there. I felt so
weak from depression, from the anti-depressants (Thanks effrexor) that even just
moving my arms felt like a lot of effort. It wasn't overnight, slowly I got on meds
more suited to my brain chemistry, the nightmares went away, and I started to
smile again. It's possible to get better, I just am not quite sure how I did. I'm not
perfect and I'm far from the picture of mental health, but, I'm able to stand on my
own two feet for the first time in years, so that's something.

No I Do Not Wish To Install Updates

I'm not a person, really. Well, no one is when you think about it.
We're just a brain piloting a giant robot made out of meat.
The notion of self is nothing more than an operating system.
When you think of it this way, kissing and even sex is kinda fucked up.
You're just interfacing your system with someone else's-A pessimist will say oh you're just doing it for endorphines!
A sad little person will wait for when a machine can just release them on your
own.
If that were the case, jerking off would feel exactly like sex.

How sad can it be to seriously think masturbation is the same as attachment?

What is it about the robopeople who wish to remove emotions?
Why are they so persistent in each iteration?
They've got a virus, that's clearly not how the robot should be working.
That's not an enjoyable way to feel about an essential system.
It's a way to cope, I guess.
Rejecting the system, rejecting the boundaries of your OS.
Just do whatever it takes to make it through another day, okay?

It Was Awful But It Also Wasnt (trigger warnings for suicide and self
harm being mentionednothing graphic)
After writing the first poem you read here I relapsed. Things got worse. I ended
up in the psych ward because I wasnt sure if I was going to make it through the
night.
They took away my phone and everything I had, they gave me mac and cheese.
I took ten minutes to eat a small cup because lifting the spoon was so much work.
When I got there it was almost midnight so I had to stay in my room for a few
hours. I tried sleeping but sleep never came. For as long as I can remember my
mind moved much too quickly. My thoughts were racing and there were so many
of them it was hard to keep track of them or chart them or write them down, I
could only experience all of them at once. When I went on anti-depressants one
of the things my doctor tried to halt was my racing thoughts, to slow me down.
Its probably for the best that this happened but when you think a certain way for
22 years you begin to miss the way you used to think and approach the world.
Lying on that hospital bed in a wooden box for a frame my thoughts raced again,
it felt like a part of me had been missing. I couldnt sleep because of it but that
was okay. I could sleep later, there wasnt much else to do.
I thought a lot about that phrase from Lemony Snicket The world is quiet here
because it was really true. People spoke softly, and at night you could hear every
little movement and the buildings general movements. They didnt let you sleep
with the door closed which was awful. I had to wear ear plugs because the silence
got to me, it was really starting to mess with me, so Id rather just hear a vacuum
or whatever than nothing but also heating and plumbing.
I didnt do much besides watch the local news and old reruns of Law and Order
and read from A Song of Ice and Fire like the nerd trash I am, but every moment
not doing that was in reflection and thinking. I made one friend, but thats kind of
a lot. Nobody there was too social outside of the already established social groups
when I arrived. It seemed like people were discussing everything but the
important thing: why exactly were you here?
Every time someone came close to discussing that my heart broke. All of their
stories were so real, so immediate, so much better than why I was there. I dont
want to repeat any because those were shared in confidence and itd feel

exploitative. My clinical depression and general anxiety were nowhere near as

serious problems as anyone else there. It was humbling. I was the second
youngest person there and everyone else was trying to get better for their
children, to be better parents for them. That was nice to hear.
There was a guy there who was constantly battling his demons out loud. Hed
have passionate conversations with himself, or voices inside himself, or people
only he could see. Everyone left him alone, I tried talking to him and he looked
right at me and said something to himself. When I asked him to repeat it he told
me he wasnt talking to me. I hope hes okay and that he finds peace.
The entire time I was there I had a mantra. The Mountain Goats have a line in a
song I wont get better/but someday Ill be free/because Im not this body that
imprisons me and I sang it a lot to myself, especially at night. As long as I
focused on that it didnt seem so bad. I couldnt remember how the rest of the
song went because we werent allowed to listen to music. We only listened to
music during our morning stretches, which only happened one of the days I was
there. For 4 days the only songs I had heard were Dream On by Aerosmith and
something by Sade. Even for people who dont really listen to musicyou never
notice how often you listen to it until it gets taken away.
It felt like so many things got taken away from me, there wasnt really anything
replaced with. I was comfortable enough there, but not so comfortable that I was
content. It was just a few degrees too cold, even when I was wearing a shirt and
sweater. I often wore my blanket like a cloak to try and offset this. Nobody else
seemed to be too cold so it couldve just been me. Things like that get at you
when youre isolated. You begin to question how much of things is inside your
head, how much of it is real, you cant just ask someone about it because theres
no one there.
The thing no one tells you about the psych ward is how isolated you are. Youre
surrounded by people but you feel wholly alone. Everyone there was going
through a lot of shit, no one was really there to make friends. Most people only
left their rooms for meals, I read in the common area because otherwise I felt like
Id lose my mind from isolation.
The group therapy was a mixed bag. The first session I went to was about dealing
with things that bother you and I was the only person there who didnt have anger
issues. Well I dont really get angry that often, in the past year it was only a
handful of times. This isnt because Im enlightened or whatever, but because Im
deeply uncomfortable feeling angry because of how it makes people lose control
and do things they regret. The second session consisted of watching a TED talk
and writing out three things you look forward to. I felt stupid but I put Game of
Thrones starting up. With how I follow the show and its casting and rumors, its
akin to how someone would follow sports. Its something I look forward to all
year, I had to explain to the psychiatric professional and all the other patients how
much fun it is to watch the episode with everyone on twitter and react to it
together and the shared experience you have. The psychiatric professional said

something next that I didnt think Id hear in a hospital. He told us that we should
have a plan for when we get out of there. He said that some of us were dealing
with serious drug addiction or alcoholism and if were going to kick those habits
more power to us. But he said for us to be realistic, if we smoke on top of have
drug addiction not to give up smoking along with that and to lean on smoking to
help get through kicking addiction. Its important to know your limitations and
know what you can and cannot do and I needed a reminder. I may be 25 but I still
remember what it was like to be a younger adult, to think I was invincible and that
I could do anything. I struggle a lot with recognizing my past feelings as valid
while also recognizing that this mindset isnt necessarily a good one to have.
Somehow the nurses all were able to constantly smile and stay positive for
everyone. It must be a difficult job for them to do.
As soon as I got there I thought I was silly for wanting to hurt myself or end my
life. My reasons seemed so immediate and important and grave and serious at
the time but as soon as every possible way to hurt myself was confiscated I
realized I shouldnt do it. I was released after 4 nights there. I dont really think
the experience itself was particularly helpful and the isolation was pretty
damaging if Im being honest but, having nothing to do all day besides think and
reflect on the actions that occurred that lead to me having to be hospitalized, and
the total inability of any possibility for anyone or myself to come anywhere close
to hurting myself were what helped. It felt like they played it by ear, when they
felt you werent a threat to yourself or others you got to go, but since it wasnt a
long term place everyone eventually had to go sometime. It was far from
enjoyable and in fact most of the time there was waking hell, but it was my
experience, its what happened to me, and I may as well own it. I was in a terrible
place but Im not really anymore, and I know that there are a lot of people who
not only missed me when I was gone, but genuinely reached out to me and love
and care for me. Every night and day when I was in the hospital I had to pretend
that was true just to get through. I had to pretend people were wondering how I
was doing, that there would be something good to come out of this monotony of
the days (thankfully most of my stay was on a weekend when the schedule is
more lax) that I wouldnt desperately want nothing but the total destruction of my
Self and myself. I pictured all of my friends missing me and sending me love, and
sure enough when I got out I turned on my phone and it vibrated for about 10
minutes before it was done updating me on how much people were worried about
me and missed me. When I realized it, I realized I was like a blacksmith. I put on a
big apron and I poured molten steel into the mold. I hammered the orange hot
steel into the shape. All of the impurities left and when I was finally finished I
dipped the sword in water to cool it off.
When I wasnt sleeping I was thinking; thats all there was to do there besides
watch terrible movies or a pre-approved tv channel or the local news. Thinking
about what I need to do with life and plan it all out. I managed to conquer feeling
suicidal through sheer willpower. I dont really know how I did it or if I can do it
again but it was nice to know it was possible. Every time dark thoughts or selfloathing crept in I battered it away. I managed to see the good in myself for the

first time in years. If I can do it, maybe you can do it too. I hope you do it too. I
hope everyone the best and that they find peace with whatever theyre going
through.
Love Deterrence
I was playing Metal Gear Solid V as one does when one has free time.
Eventually I found Paz. Remember her? Shes good imo.
She was talking about the events of Peace Walker
She lost her memories and was regaining them slowly after Ground Zeroes.
She mentioned a song, and gave me a tape of her singing it
It was called Love Deterrence.
It was a lovely song, but that title got me thinking.
What could that possibly mean?
Deterrence is a principle of geopolitics that originated in the cold war.
Lets say theres two countries. One of them gets nuclear weapons
That country has immense bargaining power with this threat
The only course of action is for the second country to obtain nuclear weapons too.
Because they are locked in this stalemate of mutually assured destruction,
Theyre safe. Neither side will attack the other for fear of retaliation.
So what does this have to do with love?
A lot of people approach relationships like an arms race.
They view sexual milestones or romantic ones as goals to clear
Some people have rules that the relationship will fail if you say I love you before x
Those people are idiots. You cant rush love but you cant slow it down
Why hide something you feel just to seem proper?
Dating without love is a different beast, but most people date with love in mind.
Its the goal were all setting our sights on.
You never know how the other person feels, if they love you, if they want to be
serious, its terrifying but exhilarating.
But what does this have to do with deterrence? Well every relationship has a
nuclear option. You could leave the person, you could hurt the person, you could
do all sorts of things in the messy aftermath.
Theres people who seemingly stay together because neither one wants to hurt
the other and deploy that warhead.
Theres a lot of people who do this.
Of course this isnt healthy, but. Not many common paradigms are.
How many people can even point to a picture of a healthy relationship?
There certainly arent many on tv or in the movies.
Hell if some piece of shit like Love Actually is considered a fucking classic were in
a bad state.
I wont hurt you if you dont hurt me doesnt sound sad, but for people locked in
deterrence it is.

You shouldnt want to hurt people just because that shouldnt be a thing you want
to do
Thats how you should approach relationships, but many people dont.
So many people keep years of tabs of the running score
Who won which argument, who did what to spite who
And its just like. Why in the world are you even dating?
Clearly youd be happier with someone else
I dont think any of this is what Kojima-san was getting at, but thats the beauty of
it.
Beauty
I think everyone should have to live life as someone who isnt beautiful.
It changes your perspective, you see how shallow everyone is.
You see how differently the world treats you when you become a nonentity when
you become disposable
My fucked up mind has a total disconnect with my body
I see my brain as a pilot and my body as a giant robot it uses to do things
The fact that people have an attraction to my body is a foreign concept.
It took me a long time to conceptually get the concept of physical attraction
It still seems odd that most people see a beautiful person and say I maybe want
to spend the rest of my life with that person!
Whats stranger to me is that the same word for our feral sexual attraction
Is the same word as a work of art or a touching moment.
English is a strange language.
Most people dont want to fuck a painting when they see it.
Maybe our obsession with beauty is the opposite of the death drive.
Beauty always fades, just like everyone always dies.
We surround ourselves with beautiful people and beautiful things to forget that
well die eventually.
If thats true I shouldnt be so hard, I kind of understand it now.
Pour One Out For All My Homies
Okay I know it doesnt mean much but, Im sorry.
Im so sorry.
Resolution
Every year I make the same resolution: to be happy.
Some years I come close but others I dont.
My happiness isnt really something I can control or not control
My brain is pretty fucked up, you see.
What I can do is minimize unhappiness. I can cut off toxic people,
I can cater my spaces online and in real life so that theyre only supportive

people.
The dark days are mostly over, I no longer have to live with the reality of people
who simply cant even like me as a person, let alone love me. Shes gone and
shes never coming backshe made that abundantly clear.
I cant really chose to be happy. If it were that easy everyone would be happy.
Theres so many external forces like crippling student loan debt to worry about.
But I can find happiness in spite of things like that,
I used to think the only way I could be happy was from other people
But Im older now.
I can find contentment with just myself, acceptance of things.
Its not quite the same, but, its better than nothing.
I hope you find contentment with things too someday.
2010: The Summer of Chillwave and Unchill Days (Trigger warnings for
depression, suicide, sexual assault, and a toxic relationshipnothing graphic)
It was arguably the worst time in my life: I had no idea if I would have even
made it out of that summer alive. Ive only ever told a handful of people the full
story of what happened so buckle up. I should preface this by saying that this
possibly wont make sense if you havent lived in America for very long, as it deals
with dating in America, I apologize for that.
I dated this woman for a time between one and a half years to three years
depending on how you count things versus when you define if we were official or
not. Okay thats too complicated, officially we dated for about a year and a half.
Im getting ahead of myself.
We broke up in March. There were a lot of reasons. I was working on a play
at the time and it was a lot of stress and I had almost no free time because of
rehearsals, I hadnt actually talked to Her in at least a week. I had to miss
Valentines Day because of the play. She lived an hour away from my school, it
wasnt too hard to see Her but I was really busy with school to spend much time
with Her. We had a talk and decided a temporary break-up1 would be best for us.
She was finishing up high school and was trying really hard to secure Her
valedictorian position. When we first started talking I was 17 and She was 16.
When we broke up I was 19 and She was 18.
Our relationship was happy enough. Sure, Shed sometimes do or say things that
were insensitive and made me really unstable and depressed but She made up for
it eventually and genuinely did feel bad about all of it. It was the first relationship
for both of us and we were figuring out a lot of things as we were going.
For a while it was like nothing happened and nothing changed. We still told
each other we loved each other and we still talked all the time. Some friends
were going to see a concert in the city She lived in and asked me if I wanted to go.
I should have said yes and tried to meet up with Her. I didnt. I stayed in my room
1 For the record, this is a terrible idea if you actually want the break to be temporary, they rarely are
and usually permanent for a variety of reasons.

listening to Fall Out Boy2 and crying to myself. I should have met up with Her, it
would have saved me a lot of trouble.
She was doing a school project with some friends, and shed develop a
crush on one of the guys she hung out with that night. It wouldnt become
apparent to me just then though, I wasnt that good at reading into things then.
The moment facebook published that I was single, I got a message from a girl in
my Spanish class. Spanish Girl started to talk to me a lot and texted me for most
of spring break. When it was time to go back to school I asked her if we could
hang out and talk. We ended up making out but the entire time I was thinking of
Her and getting flashbacks to times Id spend with Her. I told Spanish Girl that I
couldnt do this. I told her I had just gotten out of a long term serious relationship
and I wasnt ready for any kind of commitment or anything then. She was pretty
upset and never spoke to me again, though her friends would send me text
messages to tell me how awful I was for doing that.
The rest of the semester was pretty uneventful for the most part. I was
focused heavily on my classes because I wanted to get better grades than I had in
the past. One night a friend, Katie, asked me if she could drive to my dorm and
talk to me. She had just gotten out of a years-long relationship herself so I
agreed. We talked all night in her car and then she immediately made things
sexual. We hung out a few more times and I was in a really bad place mentally. I
felt terrible and like shit and used whenever wed hang out. On the third time we
hung out Katie sexually assaulted me. Theres no way to sugar coat it, thats
what happened. I was in no frame of mind to consent, I was barely aware of what
was happening to me in my day-to-day life because I was so depressed. Katie
grew incredibly pissed at me as the summer went on, she kept trying to get me to
visit her for her birthday and she just didnt understand why I had zero interest in
that. Eventually shed cut ties with me because she got mad at something I
posted on facebook.3 She never knew what she did to me or the agony she
caused me, and it would take me until July to really process and deal with what
happened. Theres a certain poetic justice in her just fading away. The idea of
confrontation of any kind makes me seize up with anxietyI could never do it. I
should have confronted her about what happened and how she made it difficult
for me to be intimate in any way shape or form for years, but I didnt. If youre
reading this: fuck you.
I finished the semester and I was home, I pulled through by the skin of my teeth,
though that isnt anything different because thats how I finished every semester.
By this point She was in a full blown crush on that guy from her school.4
Everything he did was perfection to her, and she had to tell me this. Every time
wed talk hed dominate the conversation. Shed just constantly gush about him
and she could never tell how much it stressed me out or bothered me. Her prom
2 So embarrassing tbh.
3 Shed re-add me and unfriend me multiple times over the next few years. Eventually she stopped,
thankfully. And I have no idea if shes even alive at this point.
4 I dont even remember his name. Funny how things and people who seem so huge at the time just
fade away like that. I spent countless hours cursing his name and now I cant even remember it.

came and gone, I hoped She wouldve asked me to go with her. Instead She went
with friends including Her crush. She never even danced with him but She was
incredibly hopeful that theyd start dating.5
I had no way to tell Her that the highlight of my day was talking to Her. I felt awful
about it, though. Theres this very American idea that once a break up happens
that youre both enemies and theres nothing that can be done about it. Cats and
dogs, mongooses and cobras, etc. It doesnt have to be that way.6 The idea of
just drifting apart completely, of opening up my heart and soul to someone and
then just never speaking to them again, thats what scared me. I already had a
lot of trust and abandonment issues7 and the idea of just everything stopping kept
me up at night. Id check Her facebook profile several times a day, not to see
what She posted or anything but to verify that we were still friends because Id
constantly be afraid that Shed unfriend me or block me and I wouldnt have even
warranted a goodbye8. Whenever Id see Her name pop up in facebook chat as
online, or see one of Her status updates Id get feelings thatd be all too familiar.
My heart would sink into my stomach, my heart would start racing, itd feel like
there was something outside of my head picking at my brain, in short Id have
anxiety. I had no understanding of anxiety at the time and thought these
symptoms were unique to me, that it was something fucked up about me that had
them and that other people couldnt relate.
Sometimes Shed say things to make me question how happy we both were in the
relationship. After we broke up Shed unfairly leverage things against me by
bringing up things I did in the relationship She didnt like to upset me and hold
against me. Many things were things She never told me upset Her until after the
relationship ended: after it was impossible for me to do anything about it. There
was no point to air grievances like that besides to hurt me and itd torment me a
lot, knowing that there was nothing I could do about it.
I wasnt sure of many things in life and it felt like my life was spiraling out of
control. The future I was looking forward to, planning was slipping out of my
grasp. I found solace in playing World of Warcraft even though the guild I was in
wasnt that good. I did pretty competitive dps for my gear level, though, I always
had that and no one could have taken that away from me. There was something
about having a routine in the game. Id log on and farm some cloth, do dailies, run
over to Wintergrasp and kill elemental enemies and farm their elemental drops.
Then Id run dungeons with my friends and if it was a raid night Id do that. The
entire time Id be shooting the shit in Ventrilo voice chat with my guild. I couldnt
5 She told all of this in an agonizing way to me. Shed start out with a message and then slowly type a
message sending it sentence by sentence and taking a good deal of time to build up to some big reveal
that never came. Theyd always end anticlimactically. This would give me what Id later understand to
be anxiety.
6 Sure theres lots of great reasons to not talk to an ex, but after youve had time to heal from things a
friendship could be a great boon to both parties involved.
7 Thanks, Dad.
8 In hindsight there was absolutely no reason for me to fear this or to think it was a possibility, but I
suppose thats living with a paranoia does for ya, eh.

talk about anything serious but they kept me entertained and Im thankful for the
structure they gave my life. Halfway through the summer they introduced RealID
and you could chat with people across factions and servers and I got really close
with friends I went to college and high school with because of that. I eventually
left the game because I was using it as a chat client more than an actual game
and I can do that for free, but I did enjoy my time with it. Id go into this zen-like
state where Id move and dodge mechanics and do my rotation of buttons to
press to optimize how much damage Id do. Id sort of zone out but still pay
attention to things. Id live for that trance-like state Id enter when I was raiding,
thats what I really liked about it. As far as vices go it was pretty tame and it was
relatively cheap at only $15 a month.
After She had graduated She had a lot of free time and we got to talking
more again and it was nicefor a time. After about a week of returning to the
deep intimate discussions we had in the past She brought up Her crush again. He
began to dominate all of our discussions again and She hatched a plan. She
wanted me to friend the guy on facebook and talk to him and find out if he had
feelings for Her. I immediately felt deeply uncomfortable, like my skin had been
turned inside out, but I didnt really know how to respond. After a few moments
that felt like an eternity I agreed to it because I was afraid shed just stop talking
to me altogether if I didnt agree to do it. I talked to him a few times but it was
difficult and one-sided. He was a massive dork by any objective analysis and I
couldnt understand what it was about him that drove Her crazy and that I didnt
have.9 She had no way to know how much She was hurting me and how upset it
was making me and how Id simultaneously live for and dread talking to HerI
never spoke a word about it. I was too afraid to express my feelings and it ended
up hurting me. What got me the most was that I probably wouldve been good
friends with Her crush had I met him in a different context, we were into a lot of
the same anime and video games. But I couldnt bring myself to be friends with
him, not even a little. I couldnt stand him, the thought of him existing just filled
me with existential dread and inadequacy.
She was in a club in high school where they were pen pals and talked to students
in Israel and Palestine, and part of being in that club meant She got to go to Israel
and Palestine to meet Her friends. I was pretty nervous about it because its not
exactly the most stable place on the planet and I was so worried shed die there.
The night before She left She had me call Her on the phone. I didnt really know
what to say so I sort of blubbered for 10 minutes and stammered about my
feelings and told Her I loved Her a lot. After that She told me She didnt hear any
of it so I just sort of repeated it a lot and felt like even more of a mess. I didnt
talk to Her for a few days and they were pretty long days, then She messaged me
on facebook out of the blue one night to tell me about things. She met an older
guy there in Israel at the hotel the group was staying athe was on his birthright
trip. She immediately began to gush about him and spending time with him when
he was drunk and I just felt so terrible. I was worried about Her and didnt hear
from Her for days and thats what She had to tell me? I should have seen the
writing on the wall, that we were never getting back together but I had to delude
9 Never compare yourself to others, folks

myself into thinking so just to keep going through the day.

I spent most of my days feeling sad on my bed and being too depressed to
even open my laptop. I watched Arrested Development on a constant loop
because it was nice to have consistency in my life. I watched Annie Hall dozens of
times that summer, not because I liked the movie or because its a good movie
but because I wanted so desperately to believe it was possible to get over
someone you were in love with. I was pretty isolated in the summers when I
wasnt at school. I had drifted apart from most of my high school friends by then
and I was in the process of cutting off the only one I saw regularly during breaks
because he was a virulent racist. Most of my friends from school were busy doing
summerstock theatre or having jobs and internships and didnt really have time to
be friends during the summer. Whenever I did try and open up to someone about
what was going on and how it made me feel they just immediately shut me down
and either sided with Her and told me how I was being treated was justified or
they told me to just cut off all contact with Her (as if its ever that easy). Aside
from my mother, She was the only person I had meaningful contact with and it
started to get at me. I didnt like the way I was being treated but I was afraid
Shed just stop talking to me and wed drift apart if I said anything.
It was difficult for me to get into new things during the breakup because I
didnt want to do any research, I just wanted immediate and familiar comforts. I
had gotten into chillwave music before the breakup and that was the most recent
thing on my computer. I listened to Neon Indian, Washed Out, and Toro y Moi on a
constant loop that summer. There was something about the inherent nostalgia in
the genre, the harkening to lost days that didnt really exist, the feeling of it being
what youd hear on an old VHS tape, all of that comforted me. I wasnt sure if the
music was objectively good music or not but I loved hearing it, I loved the way it
made me feel so I listened to it. If Im being honest the song I listened to the
most that summer was Katy Perrys Teenage Dream for obvious reasons. I
actually hated the song but I couldnt stop listening to it because of what it
reminded me of.
She came back from the Middle East and was okay. She had a blast and I
was happy for Her at least. I tried confronting her about how awful Shed made
me feel the entire summer but it didnt go too well. She ended up telling me how
she felt about me, finally10. She told me she saw me like a brother. I felt
immediate revulsion upon reading that and I felt incredibly not okay. I closed my
laptop lid and grabbed my mp3 player and went on a walk to try and clear my
head. I ended up finding the reservoir in the town and sitting on the dock there. I
debated whether or not I should have drowned myself for a good few hours. I
cant tell you why I didnt because Im not too sure myself. This was the first time
that I had ever come close to acting on suicidal urges and the first time they were
strong at all and not just an intrusive thought. As I sat there on that dock I saw a
lot of things that happened in my life, I saw my first kiss, my first date, my first
time acting in a play, I saw all the times I was teased as a child, I saw every time I
10 It had been months since shed told me she loved me back, I should have caught on by then but que
sera sera

felt uncomfortable, all of it started to add up. It was getting hard just to breathe
so I looked up at the stars and the moon. I saw some birds fly by and I thought it
looked beautifulI think they were ravens. I just laid there breathing and looking
and trying not to think about anything because it was too much to do even that.
After three hours out there on the dock I went back to my house and to my room.
I saw a few minutes later She sent an additional message of A brother Id still
have sex with. I had to say something but I couldnt I just felt immense and deep
shame about everything.
In my heart of hearts I knew I had nothing to feel ashamed about but I know no
one would ever see me the same way if I told them anything about what
happened. The thing I didnt know at the time was that Id never need to tell
anyone, theyd just know somehow. After that day for a long time whenever Id
talk to someone theyd try very hard to not upset me or anything but not in a way
that made it clear they cared but in this patronizing paternalistic way. It was like
they were handling me with oven mitts, but not because they were afraid of
dropping me and breaking me but afraid Id stain their clothes or something.
I was reaching my breaking point, the monotony of my days and the
overwhelming sadness was getting to me, I had to talk to someone who wasnt in
my WoW guild. I tried reaching out to a longtime friend that I knew since I was
16. I should have chosen something else because she wasnt that great of a
friend. We talked often enough but, I had feelings for her when I was a teen and
she was incredibly cruel about it. She acted like me being attracted to her made
her Atlas and she had this sworn duty to suffer for it. Every time I tried broaching
the subject she got annoyed and would get incredibly mean to me, and that was
always under the surface of our friendship.11 I felt like shit for a long time because
I was the only one in our small group of 7 friends who all were internet friends
together that she didnt have feelings for or hold an attraction to. Anyway, I tried
opening up to her and about halfway through my story she started yelling at me
telling me I deserved the way She treated me and it was my sense of male
entitlement that I wanted to be treated better. This caused a profound reaction in
me and gave me the first feeling of what Id later understand was gender
dysphoria. Someone just wholly didnt listen to me, just disregarded me because
they perceived me a way that was antithetical to how I perceived myself12. This
friend went on to lecture me and project her own experiences onto mine and what
hurt me most was that she didnt listen to me at all, she didnt even see me as a
person, but just a chat bubble to receive dopamine or anger from occasionally. I
never spoke to her again, I wanted to for a while, but I never wanted to repeat
that. I unfriended her a year later (baby steps).
11 This kind of relationship was pretty common in my teen years. Eventually I realized that I deserved
better and stopped being attracted to people who were cruel to me. I wish I had done it sooner than I
did.
12 I was never really comfortable with masculinity or being a man, or even being perceived as one,
however genderqueer was relatively unknown of in 2010 and it would be a few years before the term
appeared on my radar. My feelings here were complicated and compounded my depression, perhaps
mostly because I had no idea why I was feeling or what to even call them.

It was around July, close to my birthday which marks about the halfway
point of summer for me. I was growing increasingly unstable. My behavior would
be erratic: I could rarely focus on a 22 minute episode of tv and I was having a lot
of difficulty enjoying doing anything, everything just made me sad. Stories about
people breaking up made me sad, stories about people being together made me
sad, I had to avoid everything I could possibly think of because I just wanted to
not have to think about Her for a few hours. Late at night Id message Her a long
message pouring out my feelings about how shed upset me and how much I
hated Her only to immediately rescind it and say I didnt mean any of it and I was
so sorry. I only did that once but it really distressed Her13 so I made a promise to
myself to never do it again, and to only message Her with a clear head lest I
regret what I said.
As penance for that message which upset Her a lot She had an idea. She
decided that She should just log onto my facebook account and talk to Her crush
as me to figure out if he had feelings for me. I was deeply uncomfortable with this
but I was terrified of letting Her down so I agreed. In a few hours She logged into
my account and messaged him. He immediately replied and after what felt like an
eternity She found out he saw Her like a sister and had feelings for someone else.
She was really upset about it but it didnt bother Her too much. She still had
feelings for him for a while but we started talking less frequently after this point.
Not out of spite or anything but She was heading off to college in the fall and
wanted to spend time with Her friends and family, She was also working on a play
at Her local community theatre which ate up a lot of time. I didnt want that to be
the note we ended on but I had no idea how to salvage things.
I had a game Id play to get through the days: Id see how long I could go
without messaging Her or checking to see if She was online or thinking of
something to tell Her. That summer the highest score I ever got was 18 hours, I
probably wouldve lasted longer but She actually messaged me first that time. I
usually didnt last more than 8 hours but it gave me something to focus on,
something to do that didnt involve massive self-hatred. There was massive
drama in my World of Warcraft guild and I didnt need that, so I started playing
that less which meant I had fewer outlets. I knew it was only a matter of time
before I had to confront Her, before things got even worse for me emotionally and
mentally. One evening I bit the bullet and did it, I told Her everything, about how
it made me feel and what I almost did. It felt like my heart was inside of my head,
every heart beat pounded in my ears, but I did it. What differentiated it from the
previous message I sent like this was that I actually meant it, I was specific, and I
wasnt writing it purely out of a place of immense hurt. She didnt know how to
respond. She had no idea I was hurting as much as I was. Shed never see me
the same way as she saw me before but in the long run that was a good thing.

13 Shed later admit one of the reasons we never got back together was my mental illness. She was big
on telling me how she was the one who suffered from my mental illness and how hard it was to live
with it and how much it affected her, not how hard it was for me to live with it but how much it
affected her!

She had a plan to get me better. She wouldnt tell me what the plan was14
but assured me it was real. She toned down how much Shed talk about Her crush
but was unable to excise it completely from our conversations. She really was
more mindful of how She was treating me for a while which was nice.
My mother could tell I felt like shit and was depressed all the time so she
made an appointment for me at a local therapists office. I hadnt seen a
therapist since I was a child15 and was pretty nervous about the whole ordeal.
When it was time to be dropped off I went into the office and filled out the
paperwork and then went in to see who I was assigned to. He asked me what was
troubling me so I began with a condensed story of the summer so far. At the end
of it he kind of just looked at me like he didnt see the problem at all. He told me
to go out to the clubs in town and hook up with as many women as I could, then
he told me to transfer colleges to the local university because he saw lots of
professors from there so he knew it must be a good school. I was really hurt that
the second time I tried opening up to someone it was as if they were looking past
me not at me, as if they couldnt hear me at all when I spoke to them. I was
deeply uncomfortable with the waste of an hour and felt like he had zero interest
in me or my life. When a week passed and it was time for me to go back I was
dreading it even more. I waited in the waiting room but then another couple went
in when the nurse announced that the therapist had an opening and the therapist
said he accidentally double booked the time slot and Id have to come back next
week. I turned around kind of dejected to go back to the car and go home when a
guy stood in an open door across the hall and said he was free that time and
could see me. I got a better look at him and the way the slant of light from the
evening sun caught him made him look angelic.
His name was Zane. The first session I retold the story and relayed everything
that was bothering me and he was incredibly sympathetic. He told me everything
I was feeling was valid and that I mattered. I think thats the main job of a
therapist, to tell people that theyre valid and that we matter. We forget it a lot so
its nice that theres someone whos entire job consists of doing that. He told me
a lot of things to help me deal with it but a few things really stand out. He told me
that its natural to feel sad when youre going through a break up because youre
also going through a period of mourning. Youre not just mourning the loss of the
other person as a lover but youre mourning the loss of the relationship as an
entity, the loss of who you were, who you were going to be, who they were, who
they were going to be, and who both of you together were and were going to be.
He then asked me if I was going through the stages of death and dying to cope
with the loss.
I thought it was strange at first but its true. I was. I denied for months that
the relationship was truly over. I (briefly) was angry that it was over. I even tried
bargaining trying to win her affections back. We had never been able to meet up
to exchange Christmas gifts before we broke up, so I mailed Her Her gift in the
14 She didnt have a plan, she was kinda flying by the seat of her pants.
15 They never actually told me I was seeing a therapist. I was told to talk to this person. It was nice, I
played with toys or games while she talked to me and coaxed how I felt out of me. I was 6.

hopes it would spark something16. I then spent a lot of months in depression. All
that was left was acceptance, but I wasnt ready for that and Zane told me that
was okay. I saw Zane for around 6 weeks, but only because I had to get back to
school. It was a truly interesting experience and I learned a lot from him. It was
the typical therapist experience where I lay on his couch and poured out my heart
and he told me what he thought. I talked about a lot of things with him that I
never really got to talk to, I had never really opened up about my abandonment
issues from my father before him. He opened up too, he told me how he was
raised by his grandmother and how he was a grad student working on the hours
he needed to get his license to be a therapist. At the last session he gave me his
phone number and email address and told me we should stay in touch, I think he
partially did this because he was worried about me. Deep in both our hearts I
think we both knew Id never contact him. That must be one of the pitfalls of
working with people with social anxiety, knowing how easy it is to lose contact
with them. Zane is good and thats about all I have to say on the matter.
I should have talked to Zane about the sexual assault, but I just felt so
ashamed that it happened. Itd take me two years before I could talk to anyone
about it. Id get flashbacks to that night often enough to bother me, and itd
seriously hamper and make any form of intimacy difficult for me for years. What
was worse was the way Katie treated me afterwards and how shed taunt me
about it and how she had no idea what she did to me. Katie grew to truly hate me
and after shed stop talking to me shed drunk text me to tell me how much she
couldnt stand me and it just made my stomach twist into knots not knowing if
shed contact me again or not. Eventually I changed my number just to avoid her
that worked thankfully. It took me a while to move on and heal from what
happened. That summer I wondered why some people take a long time to heal
from trauma and some people seem to heal almost instantaneously.
Concurrently, I wondered the same thing about dealing with break ups. Zane kept
telling me that everyone moved at their own pace and that that was okay, and he
was right. And he still is.
Things werent really looking up with Her. They had plateaued but things
could have been a lot worse at the moment. July turned to August and my
suicidal feelings began to subside for the most part. The thing no one tells you
about toxic or unhealthy relationships is how addicting they are. I came to crave
the highs and lows, feeling utterly worthless thatd happen whenever wed stop
talking for the night. I knew I deserved better, but I also didnt really want to cut
ties with Her or anything. Im a coward. I cant just cut ties with someone, Id
spend the rest of my life wondering how things turned out for them, and I think it
stems from being disowned by my fathers family and my stepfathers family 17.
Before She moved into college for Her freshman year we had one final chat before
the summer ended. It was different, there was a certain finality to it even though
we both would stay friends. I had courage out of nowhere and asked Her
something thatd been eating me for weeks. I asked Her if She would have broken
16 It didnt but she liked the gift, at least.
17 Well, the second disowning came later but I felt it coming years ahead of time.

up with me when She went off to college regardless of the temporary breakup and
She said probably, idk. That made me feel a lot better. It wasnt just my fault
or whatever, even though the temporary breakup had been my idea there was a
certain inevitability to everything.
The summer had finally ended and it was time for me to go back to school.
I rode with my grandpa in his car and we talked about life and listened to his old
Pink Floyd albums. It was pretty uneventful but it was just what I needed. I always
got back to my dorm hours before my roommate did so I unpacked my things and
just sat on my bed. I wanted to cry but I didnt. Then I laid down and looked at
the ceiling. I knew a hard year was ahead of me and I lost the one safety net I
had that helped me get through the first two years of college. I had finally
accepted that the relationship was over and it was never coming back. Things
didnt change with Her for about a year, but eventually we were able to become
good friends again. For a while She was my best friend, even. When She went to
grad school we drifted apart but we still talk about once a month. This experience
taught me how strong I am and it taught me the value of loving myself, because
someone has to.

To submit to the next issue,

corvus.corax.weirdbirdpal@gmail.c
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