Off My Chest
It’s the first week of the semester, and I am struggling to work. Even at halfway through I could understand feeling exhausted and avoiding speaking or writing. But this is too soon, and with too far to go. School isn’t what’s exhausting me right now, and speaking is not what tires me. Holding back is what wears me out, makes me avoid looking at my syllabai until the last moment. So for the sake of my work, I’ll say what’s on my mind. Near the end of the session this summer, I had what I would call a “mental health event”. I was in a foreign country, surrounded by new people, and doing difficult academic work. No surprise then that the feelings of alienation and isolation that I’ve dealt with for so long were intensified. So I reached out to a counselor through the school to talk about what I had been thinking of as culture shock/homesickness. Glory to God, that counselor is helping me to heal from trauma that has diverted the entire course of my life. I’ll cut to it; my parents ...