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At age four, I followed a seven-year-old family friend into a dark closet, our parents downstairs chatting, my brothers watching TV in the room across the hall. I thought I could trust him; I let him grab my hand and lock the door behind us.
He threatened me not to tell.
A few weeks later, I had my first panic attack in pre-school. To this day, I feel the need to tell my parents everything—every fleeting thought, every tiny argument with a friend or boyfriend, every minor hiccup.
In second grade, I was diagnosed with OCD. Three letters: synonym for “different.” Even the professionals doubted my sanity. It wasn’t a well-known illness; I’m not sure it is now either.
I bit my lips for the next three years to stop myself from screaming. Therapist after therapist gave up, ordered me to medicate and coexist as a passionless clone of every other patient I sat with in the waiting room. But I refused.
Fifth grade, my psychologist saved my life with cognitive behavioral therapy. I remember smothering my face with pillows to quiet my sobs at night after fighting my compulsions. After staring at pictures of people throwing up—my biggest fear at the time. After imagining each member of my family dying, consciously attending their funerals before bedtime, then dreaming about morbid accidents and terminal diseases. I wondered how this would make me better, how I could possibly swallow the lump in my throat the next morning before school.
But if it weren’t for her instructions, I wouldn’t have made it to high school; I definitely wouldn’t have made it to college, living away from home with an over-booked schedule.
At age twenty, now, I still battle my mind almost every second. “Am I mentally cheating on my boyfriend?” “Do I want bad things to happen?” “Am I terrible for having judgmental thoughts?” “Do I just crave attention from tragedies?” “Do I enjoy being depressed?”
Every second, I hear a lying bully probing.
The difference? I win. Each time, I gain something. Knowledge. Strength. Empathy. Power. Tools to tackle the next obsession. And I know now to allow the thoughts to stay without feeding them, without making their beds or telling them stories.
They leave, every last one of them, eventually.
We all have baggage. We all have our demons. It’s not about living a normal life; it’s about living your life—and learning to love it.