Both of these are true.

I’ve been feeling very small lately.

That strange sort of feeling of invisibility. One that teeters between a safe sort of hiding and a dangerous feeling of insignificance.

It came out in my art this week…like an accidental therapy.

“Every day I build a small, safe place inside of myself. It may be messy but it is mine.”

And it was comforting to create a tiny, Alice-in-Wonderland sort of home, to remind myself that it’s okay to hide away at times…to become a sanctuary unto yourself.

But lately I’ve felt it’s more than that, and that the comforting feeling of voluntary introversion is slipping into more. I feel myself pulling in my edges to make myself smaller…to disappear.

And so I picked up the sketchbook again and drew something just as true, even if it’s ugly.

“Sometimes I feel as if I may be disappearing into myself entirely.”

It’s ragged and unfinished and strange, but it’s me.

It’s also a small sign. One that - if the past is anything to believe- I would have ignored for weeks or months as it got worse and worse. One that would have been easier to ignore if I wasn’t seeing it in black and white. A tiny cry for help from my subconscious.

So tonight I’m scheduled for an appointment to restart ketamine injections for my treatment-resistant depression. And every time that I tell myself that I’m wasting hundreds of dollars for a treatment that will mean a day of fasting and a night of visions and exhaustion I look at these images and remind myself that there is a fine line between high-functioning strange and the beckoning edge of darkness, and that I am worth the effort it takes to stay on the safer side of that line.

And so are you.

Thank you for listening to me.

Thank you for encouraging me.

Thank you for being with me on this project that has already given me so much more insight than I ever expected.

This was just supposed to be a simple one-year project of me sharing my silly doodles each week, and I apologize to anyone here who is like, “I JUST WANTED TO COLOR AND SHARE MY CROCHETED SUCCESSION PUPPETS WITH YOU. STOP BEING EMO.” But I’m also so grateful that you’re listening. I’m so grateful to not feel alone even when I am.

I super crazy love you.

(Also, I really want to see your crocheted Succession puppets and would like to put in an order for Roman Roy.)