Letters for My Sweetheart, The Nightingale

Platonic Love Letters From Survivors To Survivors

[foryouthenightingale]

But instead

I want to write a love song for the eggs that got jumbled in your groceries, the part of you you're scared is broken, hoping will hold together til you get home. A song for the first time you stood me up to take care of yourself, for the moment you realised I loved you more than I love loving you. I want to write an ode along your shins sore from learning to run, ink moving along them like shadows of trees in bud.

[foryouthenightingale]

Sandbanks

When the storm is passed, you will make sandbanks. Even if the ground is still mud, or windowsill deep snow, or nothing but blue skies, without even the memory of clouds, if there is nothing but cool breeze and calm seas and peonies, even then. When the storm is passed, you will make sandbanks. Don't you deserve just to breathe, now that your head is above water? Don't you deserve to have a life that is not about the weather, the list of uncontrollables, the parts of you so boring it is a conversational cliché, how is the weather, how are you, fine, what is fine? What is fine? When the storm is passed, you will make sandbanks. You will design bridges which break apart with the flood, you will find a home on higher ground, you will make maps, and procedures, you will build sand banks. You know the telephone lines are the first to go. You know the roads can wash out. You know, fast or slow, the rain will come. But when it does, when it does, you'll be ready.

[foryouthenightingale]

I just found out in some cruel twist that the boy I like and have just started dating lives in the same dorm room as my abuser used to. A room he hurt me in. Small college, not that unlikely. It's just a room, he is gone, but he's like a ghost. 1/2

You are unspeakably brave, opening yourself up to something new, healing and moving on with your life, and then this drags you back, that is truly awful. It is easy enough to be triggered when you are trying these things let alone when the original triggers are everywhere, it sucks, it suuuucks. The good news is, you are impressive. It would be understandable after everything you have been through to cut yourself off from everything and everyone, but you wanted a different life for yourself, and you are making that happen. You are in the one in control of your future, and you’re going to do epic things with it. Even though you are dealing with more than you should have to right now, there is so much hope, there are easier and better things ahead of you that are not this, and I am so excited to see what you do with them, when all this has been lifted.

But as to now, that will depend on your judgement and your instincts. The ideal thing would be if you could tell him, and then he was cool and supportive about it and it doesn’t change how he sees you (you are welcome to check out our post on Sharing and Secondary Survivors if you are thinking about it). You know best though, and it is understandable if you don’t want to, because everything is new and creates even more uncertainty, because you don’t want it to be the thing that defines you to him, or just because it is your own business and you shouldn’t have just to hold hands without getting sick.

Essentially what you need in the short term is establishing safe spaces for you and him to get to know one another. You can say you don’t like hanging out at his college without making it about him or indeed the college, you can say you spend a lot of time studying and everything else, you like to have your down time with less distractions or more distractions, or you made a blanket fort, you cannot bring the blanket fort to college. It may help to think of it in terms of creating something rather than removing it. Where do you want to take him? What do you want to do with him? Who do you want to be with him? Everything is new now, everything is possibilities, what do you want to bring out in each other?

Now is a very good time to keep in touch with your support network. They will keep you grounded, and have your back (i.e. will be paranoid so you don’t have to.)  Also bonus for dates away, invite him to be around people in your support network, it may relax you and give him another perspective on how awesome you are.

True things:

1. While you have had to use everything you are to fight, as a survivor, it is not remotely the most interesting thing about you.

2. You do not have to make it up to him for being a survivor. Everyone has something to deal with you didn’t ask for yours, and you facing it, winning at it in fact.

3. You are fun, challenging and great company, distinct from everything else. Your needs, feeling heard, and safe and in control, these are important things, they are allowed to be important.

4. You are so so loved, and you have a whole life of being so so loved ahead of you, no matter what else happens.

[foryouthenightingale]

All of the terrible things burst forth from the box, and finally when she wrestled the thing shut, when she could make the awfulness end, there was that last voice.

“Let me out. Please let me out.”

Pandora didn’t know it was Hope. Nothing good had ever come of the box, all of her openness, her optimism, had been rewarded with monstrous things. But without her freeing the little creature, nothing would have had the power to change. Pandora’s curiosity, her courage, freed us.

You have faced all the horrors of this world, it has given you no reason to expect any better. You work so hard just to survive, just to get by, with no end in sight, no steady light to let you believe you are getting somewhere, that it will get easier. And what is there to work for that can’t be ripped from you, who is there to love who you can’t lose, who can’t hurt you and lie and what is the point? What is the point of fighting so hard just to be able to keep fighting?

But you are curious still, you are curious, even when there is no bravery left, there is a part of you curious. What’s in the box?

[foryouthenightingale]

20 Things Better Than The Magic Of Forgiveness

The core belief in these letters is that each survivor is unique. A pet peeve of ours here is how strong forgiveness narratives are. We don't doubt that there are people who find solace in it and that is absolutely valid, but in a way, this repetition of forgiveness being the only way to heal once again puts the onus back on to survivors, our pain is our fault because of something we won't do. This is worse when we forgive often by discounting our own worth, our own experiences, by blaming ourselves to excuse others. So we have put together a list of things that we, personally, believe are more useful to us than forgiving soulless gelatinous asshats (childish name calling should be on there somewhere) 1) Safety. 2) Space. 3) Control over our own lives. 4) The financial resources for 1-3. 5) A strong support network. 6) A community that does not enable and excuse perpetrators for the sake of the status quo. 7) Justice, however small. 8) Medical and psychological care that is informed, compassionate and practical. 9) Validation and affirmation from people we trust. 10) Bodily autonomy in all things. 11) Permission to self care. 12) The right to define ourselves, our experiences and our needs in our own terms and ways. 13) An adorable animal companion trained to destroy those who would oppose us. 14) Privacy. 15) Opportunities to progress with our careers and schooling which accommodate our struggles and support us in overcoming them. 16) World peace. 17) Cake. 18) That item of clothing, you know, the one which makes you imagine yourself as a completely different person who has their life together. It is a suit or a dress or fancy underwear, firefighter's uniform, a cape, something, but future you is wearing it and knows all. 19) A movie marathon. 20) Sleep. Obviously this applies specifically to us (and some of them very specific parts of us). But what do you need, Nightingales? Do you think we are too quick to dismiss the magic of forgiving? Let us know.

[foryouthenightingale]

We're back

I have missed you! Oh but I have! What song is but yours, what light but that which catches your shadow! And yet, you have a little magic on you. Even in your absence, all this world has seemed to me our secret and our joke, and it feels as if I was hardly gone from you at all. What trickery is this? So many things I have wanted to tell you, so many thoughts, they in all sorts of tangles, will have to unpick them all, these snarled up live wires, sparks that sprang between us. What’s on your mind? You seem a little…I don’t know what. More still somehow, there is a stillness. The energy is there, the battles raging on, but I can see you growing in a breath, I can see you stronger, I can see it. You may not see it, it happens so slowly, so you must trust me, you’re different. I should have known! More and more surprises, that is you. Surprises and surprises and surprises opening into each other, like an ever-blooming something. Or shark teeth. Or both. How magnificent.

[foryouthenightingale]

I don't know, but I'm with you.

I don’t know, but I’m with you.

I don’t know if it’s going to get harder, I know it is already too hard. I don’t know the way out, or what’s next, I don’t know, but I know I’m with you.

I know that when the night seems to move all at once far too fast and not move at all, when it moves like dread, I can be the voice you need, in that moment.

I know you have seen impossible things and done impossible things, things no one should have to. I trust you. I trust you when you tell me what you feel, when it is too much, when you need time, when you need company, when you need affection. I know what it is it takes for you to even think of asking.

You are not alone, I promise, I promise you, you are not alone.

So much of your life, you haven’t had the option to choose, everything dictated by how to just survive next, how to get by, even survival itself sometimes, was not your choice, there was just always a next before you, always another second, minute, hour, day, no matter how hard it got, life continued, regardless.

Maybe you still have no choices right now in your life, but you can still choose what you want, choose your choosing when there is a choice that is all yours. There is freedom in that, some piece of it, flight in a cage. The cage will break, and you will need those wings, you will need those wings strong.

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: A Castle of Excellent Socks in a No Good World

Dearest Falcon, Of course you can have a letter, it’s the least you deserve!

The short answer is, it is unfair, it is unbelievably unfair, and grotesque, and just plain wrong, and I'm sorry for that. Also, it makes me so angry when they use the family/career/life of an abuser or perpetrator as some sort of evidence of their value or proof of innocence, because the people who live with the damage they do, often it takes more than all of their energy and strength just to get through the day. Because many abusers are adept at manipulating, charming and controlling people, it is what they do, it is a day at the office for them, of course they gain relationships and status.

If there were any kind of justice in the world, he would not have a family, a life, a career, there aren't words for the punishments he deserves. If there were any kind of justice, this would be an uncommon story, and it's not. There are millions of abusers in the world who face zero consequences for their actions, who are successful and lauded. And it is unfair, it is grotesque, it is wrong, you were wronged. I am sorry, I am so sorry that you have had to endure this.

The reason why people do not believe children, or survivors in general, is because those people are ultimately scared, selfish and lazy. They pick the path of least resistance. It was less effort for them to believe you were a liar than to actually take action, they sacrificed your life for the status quo. No doubt they have all kinds of acrobatics in their own heads about how they are still the heroes, it is bullshit. Anyone who does not act to protect the vulnerable, who undermines them, who doesn't do anything to stop it, they are disgusting, they are inhuman. I know that that is something you would never allow, because you do not understand it, because if it was you, you wouldn't even have to think about it.

There is good news. The first is you are getting through it. Hospitals are difficult, but you are alive to send me this letter, and that is so impressive. The fact that you have gotten through two decades after what happened to you, I mean, you deserve all of the medals, and a castle made of, I don't know, really nice socks. You being alive at all, this is a deviant act, this is how you have defeated him, defeated everyone who has wronged you, it is powerful and it is enough. If it is the only thing you accomplish, for the rest of your life, it will still be more meaningful and impressive than anything that upright festering liverfluke will ever do.

There is a strong chance that he will sabotage himself, chances are, you were not the first or the last, and he is fundamentally broken. He will poison everything he has eventually. On paper, it seems like he is ahead. He is not. What he has faked his whole life, you have for real. He can lie, he can hide, he can pretend all he likes, but he will ruin it. You have a chance for genuine happiness, he does not, and by the time you have truly lived, he will be a sad pathetic irrelevant speck, no matter what he has now.

Although there is so much of the world that is irrevocably screwed up, the Internet was a game changer, as it was for many other minorities. We know, as survivors, that we are not alone. They can no longer silence us, they can no longer isolate us, we find each other across the wide world, and we know, there are millions more of us than them, and we are stronger than them, and we are braver than them, and we are going to be the ones to make a difference.

The first priority, the most important, is self care. Please, before anything else, be kind to yourself, be sweet to yourself, be patience with your healing if you can. As I said, your living is an act of rebellion, your living broke his plan. I can tell you, for certain, there are people like you, and by that, I don't mean survivors, because you are more than that, people who are compassionate, people who are protective, people who are brave and clever. There are people who could not understand why someone would not believe a child who needs them, not even if they tried, they are not wired that way, just as you are not. People who are capable of genuine love, who are capable of creating the most incredible things. You deserve no one less than that.

There are adventures for you, there is so much more. The things you are going to see, and do, and discover, and change. You are so powerful, Falcon, you may not feel it, but you are, and you won't always have to use all that tremendous power just to get by, you are going to do great things, such great things.

Do not hesitate to let us know if there is anything we can do to help you get there.

Great chest-aching quantities of bliss to you, like heat through your body after a cold swim, and Love, Swan de Plume.

[foryouthenightingale]

Sap is

This is for those whose family trees begin and end with them, a song for broken boughs, for wayward seeds, this is a song for blooms that held through winds, for bitter weeds. This is the sweetness of the sunsoaked blossom, overtones too sour, this is the bark enfolding every scar from torn off twig and hard won flower. This is for you.

Take up the tide, float down a river, tangle yourself in fraying travellers' socks, there is a forest waiting. There is a valley of distant acorns, apples unrotten far from the tree, there is a spring and sun and chill and company. There is a hill where you can do more than last out the winter, you can grow, and change, you can reach out shoots and find the things you need and more besides.

There is a forest of us. A forest of our kind, and what is seed or sap or hive to that, the rings of us that dare survive.

[foryouthenightingale]

I'm crying?? I feel as if something bad have happened even though nothing is particulary wrong? It hurts... Like one of those scenes in movies when someone dies and a character jus crumbles to the ground... But there's nothing wrong?? Why? I don't like it i hate feeling like that without a reason

Hey Stormbird,

Albatross here, first of all, there is nothing wrong with you, you are not bringing this upon yourself. You are doing admirably fighting this, and it took a lot of courage writing that.

Many people misunderstand emotions and the brain, they have an idea of what is normal to feel, and to be, and the truth is, no one really fits into that. everyone has monumental stuff to deal with, everyone has weird bodies and brains. If you have pressure from people to just “suck it up,” or cheer up, that you can magically be not sad and you’re just not trying hard enough somehow? That is about them, that is not about you. What you feel is very real, and just because no one has shot you with a cannonball or something, doesn’t make it less so. Also, if someone did shoot you with a cannonball, that would still not make the other feelings mystically go away.

You are not feeling like that and crying without a reason, but the reason could be more complicated than cannonballs. It could be that you haven’t been able to work out what is getting you down, it could be a combination of things. I know a number of birds who tend to experience things as FEELINGS, and it takes a bit of work to find out what feelings and why, it could be dietary things, it could be that you are actually dealing with a whole lot of things and nothing being particularly wrong for you is far too much stuff for someone else, it could be that you just feel sad and need to cry sometimes, and that is okay. From your description, though, it is possible that you are depressed.

So many people go through depression at one time in their lives at least, a lot of the people you know, and probably not the people you expect. As it is with survivors, there are people who are depressed who are bubbly and outgoing, who are tough and funny, who are wild, who are shy, who are laid back, who are workaholics. It doesn’t necessarily have an obvious cause, it can be just a chemical thing in your brain, but it is just as real as physical injury. Some of the things to watch out for are changes in how big or small your appetite is, how much you sleep, whether the things you enjoy don’t seem to be able to make you happy any more. It’s worth taking it seriously, and getting checked out, if you can. If you can ask around and get a decent doctor, and they diagnose it as depression, they will work out a treatment plan, which might involve antidepressants to help with your brain chemistry or seeing a therapist or councillor.  

Remember, if you see a doctor, a councillor or therapist, they are there to help you get control of your life and brain, you are still the one in charge. If they make you feel crappy, if they are not helping you, you can find someone else. It might take a few go’s to find someone you like. You can bring a friend if it helps.

If you can’t see a professional, and I know there could be any number of reasons why you can’t, there are a lot of resources still, depending on which country you are in, and online. There are millions upon millions of people who know exactly how you feel, and who have developed a whole arsenal of weapons for you to fight it too. You are unique, and your brain is unique, and you will find what works especially for you, it may take some digging.

1) Keep track of the things that make you happy. Even if they don’t make you happy sometimes, if you keep doing them it will return. Discover all of the things that can make you happy, they stimulate the amygdala in your brain, they are very valuable. This is real and genuine work, you are allowed to spend time on this every day.It helps if these things are strong sensory things, smell, taste, touch.

2) Don’t be afraid to rely on your support network, have a list of people you know you can depend on. When you are really down, it might feel like there is no one, so when you are feeling okay, write a physical list of people to call or message.

3) Most importantly, be as patient with yourself as you can. As I said in the beginning, this is not your fault, this is not something you brought upon yourself, you are doing everything you can to fight it, you are so strong.

Hope this helps somehow.

Flight the good flight,

Alby

[foryouthenightingale]

Request: First Kisses

Dear Bluebird,

Describe a first kiss that is amazing and inevitable? I'm not going to lie, this was the hardest request so far. For many survivors, there are a lot of complicated things tangled around the idea of firsts, and the idea of kissing, but I can tell you what I know.

You will not have one first kiss but many.

First kisses where you are not sure what to do, and you realise that the other person also has no idea what to do, and what the hell? They had a job! Some of the nerves with that, is the idea of being a good kisser, or a good lover, that it is a solo performance which you are judged for. Not true! It's more of a conversation, and it doesn't matter how many people you kiss, every time you kiss someone new, you begin again, you are a different person, they are a different person, and it is really about curiosity and paying attention to them.

First kisses where you have something to prove, first kisses when you are fearless, first kisses when you just wanted to know. Bad first kisses, where all of these small doubts you have about a date come into sharp focus, where suddenly you have to get out, be anywhere else. Good first kisses, that live in a moment, that you keep, this strange intimacy with someone you never see again, these strange kisses in which you live on, one day, as stories to someone's grandchildren, First kisses on which this whole future seems to rest upon, some so simple, comforting, that melt from your memory.

The first kiss with someone you trust. The first kiss with someone you want, unequivocally, and who wants you just as much. The first kiss with someone that was entirely thoughtless, that made your fingertips go numb in the rush of it.

When you are in love with someone as much as a person can love, all contact with them, is startlingly different. It will shock you, physically shock you, how different, it doesn't seem possible. And every kiss with them, that is a first kiss too, and every time you kiss them, you will be a different person, and they. And it doesn't matter if they are the first person you've ever kissed, or the millionth, it will be startlingly new to you, you will not understand it. . Of my first kisses, I can tell you, I have never regretted asking. It can build up as the biggest thing in the world, and what if they never talk to you again, what if you are meant to be together and you ruin it by being too open about how you feel? No. It is never quite as bad as you think it will be, and it is infinitely less painful than dragging around unrequited love, building up what might be in your head until it has nothing really to do with them. If you are curious about someone, there is no shame in wanting to get to know them, and saying so. You want someone who is brave and compassionate like you, and brave and compassionate people respond to frankness.

You'll have the kiss you want, Bluebird. Maybe it won't be the very first person you think, maybe it will, but I can tell you, neither your imagination, nor my clumsy words, can give it any kind of justice, for you will be so so loved, as you so deserve. And the kisses that follow will be something else entirely.

x

Swan de Plume

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: Two Worlds

Dear Tundra Swan,

Sometimes to survive CSA is to live in a separate world, right? It is the strangest thing. And the people around you, even the people you care the most about, even doctors, even therapists, they cannot hear the bombs, they cannot feel the earth buckle, the buildings fall around you. And it is real, what happens to you, it is more real than anything else, sometimes, and you are left thinking you have lost your mind, because everyone else is acting normally. And you think you are over reacting, that you are weak because everyone else can talk, can drink tea with steady hands while the floor shudders and cracks beneath them. And you keep your mouth shut, because that knot in you says, somehow this war is your doing, even though you never fired a shot, because, hey, you are the common denominator, without you, without you, maybe it would all go away.

You are not alone, Tundra. I am not alone. I wish I was. The horror of it, of how common, and how awful these things are, how at peace with it the rest of the world seems, I can't, won't, find meaning in that, no meaning can exist in something like that.

The fear of talking: I want to make this absolutely clear, the priority is your well-being. I know talking is fraught, I know you worry about what else they could do to other people, I know you feel guilty, I know you are scared about the repercussions of coming forward. You will not believe this but it is as true as things get: you are not responsible for them. They are responsible for what happened to you, they are responsible for all of their own actions. You know yourself, you know your life, better than anyone else, and if coming forward is what's best for you, then do it. But they programmed you to stay quiet, they programmed you to hate yourself and in writing what you have, in telling who you've told, but most especially in being alive, you have defeated them. As a child, with nothing, with everything against you, you defeated them. You defeat them every day, with your first breath.

The thing you are dealing with, it is way too much for a person to handle, it is way way too much. You may think that you are malfunctioning in some way, you are not. There is no timeline for that, there are no shoulds, that you have gotten this far, that you are going to get so much further, that is superhuman. It is too much. And I know when I was underneath that, I was a difficult person to know, it was too much for me, I was in too much pain, it was too much for everyone else around me, but you know, they could step back, I could not.

Something I said when telling Swanvelous what happened to me, was, get out! If I had a choice, I said, I would not go anywhere near this stuff, I would not face it for any money, anything. But funny thing is, it was never a choice for Swanvelous either. Swanvelous didn't want to live in a different world, if there are people who are facing such terrible things, you help them, you have a responsibility to them, in Swanvelous' mind anyway.

An even funnier thing is, sometimes sanity is the people around you. Sometimes if you know there is help when you need it, you don't need it at all. Sometimes the thing that breaks you, among all the impossible things you are dealing with, is not having that.

As for a life untouched by the evil of others, I grieved for that life too. But, probably because of Swanvelous' influence, I'm not sure it's all its cracked up to be. I wouldn't want to live in that other world, a world oblivious. They find it so hard to empathise with us, it is easier for them to write likeable characters who are perpetrators than survivors, what an awful life! How meaningless it must be for them, to ignore and blame the people who are actually fighting that evil, wondering why their own lives are so empty, why they have to work so hard to feel like the good guys.

You are not broken, you have seen more of the world than you should have had to. But you still have so much of your life to play with. One day I will sing for you the song of literal oceans. Pick a spot on a map. There are so many lives you have left to live, so many people to be, there are places so new and beautiful, the bombs won't fall. If you know what you want, than it's there for you, there is a way to it. You have already defeated the worst of it. Hope this helps, a little. You deserve some relief.

With love, and all of my hope, in some sort of zeppelin, Swan de Plume.

[foryouthenightingale]

Thank you!

Thank you for all the requests! Send them any time, all welcome and anonymous, for you or for those you care about. If you want to be sure that a letter is especially for you, you can give yourself a bird name, and we will use it. You can also request specific birds to write to you, if you have a favourite, or if you want a particular style.

Thank you also for all the positive feedback. By all means let us know if there is something we are not tagging, or if we mess up. We know we are not immune to being asshats, but we want to be better. These are your letters, we are writing them to you, we want them to be yours. 

We are excited to have so many followers from all over the world. Our dash is so epic. We love you all. Stay lucky, Nightingales. 

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: The Seven Year Itch

Dearest You, The Nightingale,

Moving on from the past, and looking for a bright future, Nightingale? It’s funny how innocuous that must sound to most other people but I felt that one like an arrow, I know it is something I struggle with.

One of the things I return to is that every seven to ten years, you have an entirely different body. All of your cells die and replaced with new ones, some faster than others, until there isn’t a single cell left of what you once were. There are parts of you that are already moving on on their own, some faster than others, you are healing as fast as you can.

If you find yourself dwelling on things,there are a few affirmations. What happened to you was real. It was awful. It was not your fault. Moving on does not change any of these things, healing doesn’t mean that it wasn’t as bad, it means you are stronger, more complex, more adaptable. You are a complicated person, you are infinite, in mind and feeling and in action. This is just one part of you in billions.

You are allowed to forgive yourself for trauma taking up so much of your life. When you are in pain, it is both hard and not generally productive to think of anything but stopping that pain. Do you think Shakespeare spouted sonnets when he stubbed his toe? No! He cursed a blue streak and sat down. Self care is the most sophisticated thing we do, you can give yourself credit for it.

So the future thing. This is where I get wobbly. Because I’m the same, I like having a beautiful future to work towards, it is what gets me through the really brutal stuff, but it is hard to have that faith in it once you realise how tenuous everything is, how changeable. The truth of the matter is, there is nothing you can really know for sure. I mean, there are the big earth shattering, derailing things, the things that don’t work out, but also, with or without them, you will change, what you want will change, how do you build your hopes on something that uncertain?

Maybe if you want something concrete, you build for a series of nows rather than the milestones. If, rather than focusing on the big distant moments, you worked out what you would like your day to look like, what you like to do, what makes you happy. Because being a soldier is not getting a medal, being a parent is not about first words or first steps, being a journalist is not the Pulitzer, being an actor is not an Oscar, if you do not like the mechanics of what you do, it is a lot harder to be happy.

It doesn’t mean that you have to let go of the big dreams, quite the opposite. It means that cell by cell you made real the person you imagined and there was joy in that becoming. It means if a big moment never arises, it won’t break you, and you will have hands on control of your own happiness day by day.

Nightingale, you are brilliant beyond brilliant, strength beyond strength. You have fought through the worst a person can face. And with time, the tender parts of you, the trusting parts, the open parts, the impetuous love, will grow, slower perhaps than the rest of you, but they’re coming. And with time, the fiercest, the wildest, the cleverest of you will grow as well, you will be all you need to be, of past, of present, of future. I can’t imagine being more proud, or loving you more than I do, but day by day, day by day, you break the mould, you surprise me.

You’ll surprise yourself.

The elegant tomato from upstairs Me

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: Summer is icumen in

Dearest Taita Falcon,

Well, first of all, you are a warrior, being 18 and having bipolar, each of those on their own even, are completely impossible things. The fact that you have gotten this far means you are stronger, braver, smarter than I could ever hope to be, so kudos. While it may not feel like it, you are, in fact, winning at life. And my goodness, Falcon, you are going to have an extraordinary life.

The most valuable resource you can have, at any age, is direction: knowing what you want, knowing how to find that out. I am guessing that you still have a school that pumps fear and anxiety in, the whole, "If you do not get this arbitrary number then you will be a failure and your life will be ruination and despair" thing. They mean well, it's basically just to keep you occupied so you don't set fire to anything. The school system, assessment, the class schedule, are kind of arbitrary and designed for neurotypicals, and it doesn't even work for most of them (True Fact: Teenagers, not unlike velociraptors, are supposed to be nocturnal. Studies show if school started later, they would get better grades, lower rates of depression and fewer car crashes.) This is not to say you shouldn't try in school, but:

1) What goes down in school is not necessarily an accurate projection of what your life is going to be like, your intelligence and value as a human being.

2) Don't be fooled by the doomsday talk. There are are infinite ways to get where you want, you will find the right one.

Many of my most favourite people have bipolar, including people whose lives still pack a punch after more than a century, and many of my most favourite birds here. It is not what makes them extraordinary, just as it is not what makes you extraordinary, but it is because you are extraordinary you are able to face it.

And importantly, it gives you direction. Neurotypical people will never know how much they can accomplish if they do not have a 10 tonne depressive episode on their chest. You do. Neurotypical people can afford to feel blah about things, succeed in all the ways they were supposed to, and fall into careers and relationships they don't really want. it will take all of your warrior's heart to do these things, so you will not have to worry about waking up forty years from now realising you have never felt anything. I know, I know, how you feel that you are useless when you are in the grips of a low, that, even when you are not, you might feel like a failure, because you can never seem to cram your life into these 9 to 5 boxes. That might change, that might not. But:

1) You do not have a use for your friends. If they were sick, or if something happened to them, if the only thing they could do was blink, you would still love them, you would not see them as a failure. We do not necessarily have to have purposes, we certainly don't have to have purposes for other people. If you do you best to be not awful to people and if you stick up for people who need it, you are already way ahead of the curve.  

2) It may be that there are seasons to your day to day life, days when you create more than anyone else could in a month, days when it seems bare and cold, but the roots of you are growing, growing.  Down days are just as productive, just as winter is just as productive, if you are moving forward in time, it's a win, you are going to get there, you are going to do everything want to do, you are allowed a fraction of that patience you give to everyone who isn't you. There is that quote, Einstein didn't technically say it, but it's still good, "Everyone is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid." It might be worth considering what a life you could build for yourself that makes the most of these seasons, rather than climbing a tree with fins. There are a lot of brilliant people with bipolar in the arts for this very reason, but whatever field you are passionate about, there will be ways to make the most of your beautiful terrible gifts.

Believe me, Falcon, an extraordinary life, so loved, and so fulfilled and such an impact in this world, and every day you get through is a day closer to that.

P.S. Two facts about Van Gogh: 1) He had bipolar. 2) You're saying his name wrong. No really, even the pretentious people say it wrong, take a listen. Dutch g's are soft, more like h's.

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: Rage, Rage...

Dearest You, The Nightingale,

When you wrote that you were angry, I nearly gave your letter to Cassowary, Cass being our resident rage elemental, but two things occurred to me.

1. You might think that I am less angry. (I'm not)

2. You might think that to be like Cass, to be loud and aggressive and out there, is the only way to be angry about it. That being angry makes you an angry person. (It doesn't)

So, allow me to clear the air. As a logical, reasonable, calm person, such as you are, the fair, balanced, reasonable response to these things happening at all, let alone to you, is ETERNAL RAGE, RAGE TO BLOT OUT THE SUN AND ASH THE CURSED EARTH, RAGE AND RANCOUR TO SPITE THE FOETID ROT OF TIME! It is! No really. Never let anyone make you feel like you are over reacting to it, there is no such thing possible. You are not weak, you are not just being emotional and 'letting things affect you', it is as bad as you know it is.

Having said that.

True story, for a long time people debated whether or not to actually classify Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a thing. They didn't doubt that it was real, but they didn't want to stigmatise it, they didn't want to make it seem like there was something wrong with people were responding to trauma. There is nothing wrong with someone hurt by horrific stuff, there is nothing wrong with you. Something is only classed as a disorder if it is getting in the way of you doing what you want to do.

This is by no means saying you yourself have PTSD, but I want to make sure you know, you are in control, you exactly right, exactly perfect the way you are. If you want to change things in your life, it is just the same as an artist, a writer, a musician, it is building up your skills and strength over time so there is nothing between you wanting something and making it real, so that that is effortless.

E.R.R.T.B.O.T.S.A.A.T.C.E.R.A.A.T.S.T.F.R.O.T. as you know, is a pretty gigantic burden, particularly if it is one you are stuck with on your own, and if you have other stuff to do. It rarely comes in handy making a cup of tea, studying, working, trying to think of literally anything else.

Finding a way through it is different for different people, if you trust your instincts and experiment you will find the things that work best for you. It helps to keep track of the things which make you not think, which keep your mind just occupied enough that you can kind of zone out. For some people that's breathing, maybe with something like counting up by twos when you breathe in and down from a hundred in threes.  For some people it is about putting yourself back in the room you are in, so consciously noticing everything in the room, so that your anger is just another sensation along with the contact of your arm along the chair. For some people it is drawing, music, it is a TV show or a game that they don't have to concentrate on, you will know what works. 

For me, personally, I cannot meditate to save myself, I am never not overthinking everything ever. But depending how angry I am: punk music while doing the dishes and horror movies (I can sometimes convince my body that it is scared from the horror movie rather than petrified with rage. It’s called “Misattribution of Arousal” and it also means if you bring a tiger on a first date, someone is more likely to fall in love with you, mistaking their quickened pulse of tiger-excitement for infatuation). 

Your rage is valid, it's real, and you can acknowledge that, knowing that you are the one in control.

"Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears," Me.

[foryouthenightingale]

By Request: The Heat of Scars

Dearest You, the Nightingale,

I'm so sorry you have been reliving the past, I am so sorry that you have a past like that to relive. One of the things that surprises me about trauma is how physical it is. As soon as you were taught to sit still, you were taught that the mind and the body are two distinct entities, which can explain some of the stigma people have towards people with mental illness. But you can be triggered by something whether you notice it or not, whether you think about it or not, trauma happened to you as a physical entity, and there is a reason why people mistake episodes for heart attacks, trauma is visceral, it is physical, it is real.

In feeling like this is something you are doing to yourself, that you are poking old wounds, it makes me wonder if the people around you are being super normal. When I felt most like that, I had a lot of pressure from other people to be super normal, no one wanted to deal with this unpleasantness, they resented that me. Someone dealing with my trauma shattered this normal illusion for them. So I felt like it was me, I was the one bringing this awfulness into the world.

But you know what, what you are feeling is real, is physical, is visceral. What happened to you, no one should have to go through, no one should allow anyone else to go through. You are allowed to feel broken and frustrated, you are allowed despair, you are allowed to not be the same person. People who are unchanged by this, by this happening to someone they care about, they are much more broken than you ever could be.

If you try to "suck it up," if you try pretending, or convincing yourself it wasn't real or that bad, it doesn't make it go away, it just means you have to deal with the layers of stress coping with that as well as the trauma itself. Part of recovering from trauma is finding a way to trust yourself again, to trust you own body, your instincts and perceptions.

What happened to you was real, it was awful, it was not your fault. Nothing anyone else says or does can change those facts.

If people want to invalidate you, if they want to diminish these victories of yours, that is about them, often them not being able to reconcile with the idea that they are not taking responsibility for the truly shitty things happening around them and helping with the idea of them being a good person. (i.e. If it was that bad, a good person would help, they aren't helping, therefore things aren't that bad.)

Your brain is trying to keep you alive, it is doing everything it can to stay alert, stay aware. You may not necessarily have say in how often you have flashbacks, how often something stings you, but you do have a say in your recovery. If you keep track of the things you find comforting and reassuring, things that make you happy physically, go with touch, scent and taste things, if you use them after you have intrusive thoughts or flashbacks, the recovery will be easier and quicker, and that is half the battle. Then if something happens, you know the way back, and that when you get there, there are marshmallows and your favourite movie and your miniature pet angora goat Calliope.

You are doing so well, so well, so well. You will see, you are epic. Always, always, Me