A Time For Journaling

A Time For Journaling

When I was a little girl, my room was full of journals. In a recent attempt to clean my bookshelf, I found journals dating back as far as six years old, written in nearly illegible handwriting but always making sure to include “Dinner was at home” for a reason I honestly can’t remember.

As I got older, journals became less important to me. I was writing stories in fantasy worlds; it wasn’t as important to keep track of what I was doing in the real world. Even after I got into blogging, I never really considered it the same as journaling - a blog post is a story meant for an audience, whereas a journal entry is meant to be just for the person writing it.

When I was young, and I didn’t quite know how to verbalize some of the things going on in my head, I used to show my journal to my psychiatrist, but it always felt strange. I was always careful to mark the correct page and only show her the smallest amount of text she needed to understand the situation. And now, when I blog, I curate which information I feel comfortable sharing and don’t share a word beyond what I am comfortable with.

But lately, I wondered if this was enough. When I took a break from the blog to try to deal with Nana getting sick and starting hospice, I felt overwhelmed by a sudden rush of feelings that I needed to untangle, but I wasn’t ready to share these feelings with the world.

It was then that I remembered all the hours I spent journaling as a child, and the comfort it brought me. I’d heard of grief journals, but all the ones I saw before were for after losing someone and had prompts to write about the person’s last days, death, and funeral - things that have not happened yet.

It took me a while, but I eventually found a journal relating to a term that was new to me: “anticipatory grief.” It means exactly what it says - the grief of being in the process of losing someone who is still technically here - but it also means so much more. I ordered the journal to be an outlet for the overwhelming confusion of medical decisions and the sudden loss of a relationship Nana was no longer capable of having.

I wound up with a simple journal that started with writing about the person. That, I could do - and I wanted to, so much. But I never knew if my friends were getting sick of hearing about what was going on in my life, and I spoke a lot with my parents but also limited this since we were all so embroiled in the process of keeping Nana safe and figuring out her next steps.

The pages in the beginning of the journal I bought were guided with prompts about death that helped me realize I was lucky in at least some aspects. I had Nana as her full self in my life for thirty years, and she got to see everything from my birth to my recent trip to New Zealand. We didn’t need to forgive each other for anything, and we had no unresolved business - just a jagged end.

The middle pages just had a line for the date and one question: “How are you feeling today?” It seemed a little too loose for me to like at first, when everything was up in the air, but as soon as my pen hit the page, things started to make sense. I journaled in these pages until the complicated knot of emotions started to untangle, and I started to feel like things were more manageable.

And, unexpectedly, the prompts at the end of the journal weren’t about the end of her life. Instead, they were about everything else - the memories we shared, the good times we had, the things I wanted to remember about her as things got worse. The things that were so hard to think of at the moment, but could help so much in the future.

I don’t know if I’m ever going to return to regular journaling. But for now, a little structure to sort through these unfamiliar and overwhelming feelings has been a huge help, and I’ve extended it to other areas of my life as well: I’m writing in a planner book instead of just using my phone, jotting down daily goals and to-do lists, and writing anything else that feels relevant.

Like last week’s shopping trip, this is just something little that I can control. But the more I do to wrangle these feelings, the less powerless I feel at such a tumultuous time.

Michelle Cohen, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.

The Cheez-It Phase

The Cheez-It Phase

You may have noticed that I haven’t written a blog post in about a month. Usually, I don’t take long breaks like this, but thanks to an unexpected family tragedy, I haven’t quite known what to do.

I’ve written about Nana, my beloved grandmother, on this page before. She’s read every blog post, and more than that, she’s supported me through literally everything in my life. And a month ago, she was completely fine.

But then, she had a nervous breakdown. Even after my own breakdown nine years ago, I had no idea how devastating one could be, and I watched her descend further until she required hospitalization from multiple falls. Something broke in her brain, and although we don’t have a completely secure diagnosis, we know a few things: Nana has rapid onset dementia, has lost her ability to take care of herself, and is in hospice, which means she has six months to live at the most.

I know I’m lucky that it’s taken me this long in my life to experience grief like this, but it feels overwhelming nonetheless, and as soon as I got back to Chicago, I was unsure of what to do. I started researching the phases of grief, but nothing made sense. I’m certainly nowhere near acceptance, don’t think I can bargain with anyone about this, and the initial anger has faded to a weird sense of feeling out of control.

I know there is nothing I can do. Her care is already figured out, and nothing I say or do can fix her head or return her to the wonderful person she was just one short month ago. I needed to leave her, go back to Chicago, and figure out how to live my life as best as I could while dealing with all of this.

When my dog Reese died a year and a half ago, I told my therapist that I felt like everything was out of control. Everything was so sudden, and I couldn’t fix anything that actually mattered. She told me that I was right, I couldn’t control the things that would have a large impact - but I could control the littlest things in my life until I felt like things weren’t quite so out of control.

She told me to pay a great deal of attention to the fact that I chose my own outfit for the day and what I ate for dinner, how I organized my desk, and in what order I got my work done. I couldn’t control life and death, or the processes of either, but I could choose these little things and feel like I had at least somewhat of a grasp on things.

This is why, when a friend let me know he was going to visit our neighborhood Wal-Mart before it closed for the last time, I tagged along. I couldn’t control Nana hurtling towards death at an alarming pace, but I could control what was in my pantry, specifically one of my favorite snacks.

As someone who has always been picky with food, I often frustrate people by having a favorite shape or type of common snack foods, and don’t like eating others. I was upset when I heard this Wal-Mart was closing because, so far, it’s the only place where I’ve been able to find Scooby Doo stamped Cheez-Its, which taste better to me since they are crunchier and also have the cute shapes to enjoy.

It’s not that my world would end if I didn’t have the right Cheez-Its in my pantry, but I knew that something small like this was exactly what my therapist would have told me to do at that moment. And so, an hour before the store closed, I bought all five boxes of Scooby Doo Cheez-Its remaining in the store, and texted my therapist:

I told her, “I think I’m in the ‘I can’t control life and death but I can control what’s in my pantry so I’m buying all the Scooby Doo Cheez-Its in the Wal-Mart in the hour before the store permanently closes because they’re good for a long time and that’s one less thing to worry about’ phase of grief,” and although this phrasing is kind of funny, it gets at an important point:

I don’t know how much longer Nana will live, nor will I have the opportunity to speak to the person I loved for so many years once more. I know I’m the sort of person who needs to control things or I will start to spiral - it’s an OCD thing I’ve had to grow used to over my life. And although I don’t know the specifics of how this situation will go, I do know exactly how I will fall apart if I don’t take care of myself.

It feels strange to say this, but somehow, buying enough Cheez-Its that I don’t have to think about a future supply feels like putting a band-aid on the most gaping wound, but it’s somehow still helpful. I know it won’t fix the wound, but it will at least give me the tiniest bit of energy to focus on the things I need to do, and a splash of happiness in a deep well of sadness.

Michelle Cohen, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.

The Great Kiwi-Finding Mission

The Great Kiwi-Finding Mission

On the first day of my trip to New Zealand, I planned to see kiwi birds - a national emblem of the country that is also quite fluffy. As a fan of cute animals and learning about new places, I wanted to start my trip with the iconic kiwis.

I had originally planned to see kiwis at the Auckland Zoo, but when I got there, that part of the zoo had been damaged by recent storms, and the entire area of New Zealand native birds was unavailable for viewing. Unexpectedly, right at the beginning of my trip, I had to change my very first plan.

This hasn’t always been easy for me to do - and I still struggle sometimes to change plans. I prefer to have everything organized well ahead of time, and by the time I went to New Zealand, I had been planning rather obsessively for the previous eleven months and had everything figured out perfectly.

Before I left, my parents reminded me that sometimes things change - and this can leave opportunities for finding fun new things I didn’t know about. But there were some things I considered non-negotiable, like seeing kiwis, and I knew I needed to find a way to make it work.

I still went to the Auckland Zoo to see other animals, but I started to worry. What if I didn’t find another way to see kiwis? Whenever I had a quiet moment that day, I researched the other places my tour would take me and if there would be kiwis there.

My next idea was to visit the Te Puia Kiwi Conservation Centre in Rotorua, on the first full day with my tour group. After a wonderful morning in Hobbiton, we had scheduled time to explore Rotorua, and I said I wouldn’t go to a popular excursion with most of the group so I could see kiwis. Little did I know, the kiwi center closed before I even got there, and so I made a quick decision to join the group for their evening activities. I ended up seeing a haka (war chant), eating food cooked in the ground, and watching glow worms in their natural habitat - none of which I thought I would be able to do in New Zealand, and none of which I would have done if my original plan worked out.

I was encouraged by this, and therefore not too disappointed when I tried to see kiwis in Nelson to little success. The trip was nearly halfway over at this point, and after asking several tour guides, I reached the conclusion that the last day of the tour was going to be my only option for seeing kiwis.

It stressed me out to leave it to the last minute, but on a trip like this, I had no choice. I had control over some of the activities I was doing, but much of it was decided for me, and since I had assumed I would be seeing kiwis at the beginning of the trip, I hadn’t planned any other kiwi outings. I had to simply wait and see - something my brain finds very difficult to do.

I’m happy to report that, on the last day of the tour, I and several of my new friends visited the Queenstown Kiwi Park and saw many rare New Zealand birds including kiwis. As I watched the surprisingly large brown birds snuffle in the dirt, I was thrilled that I managed to make it work.

My own overthinking and overplanning tendencies aside, I grew up in a family where vacation spreadsheets were mandatory and everyone knew what we were going to be doing at all times. I’m not used to figuring things out “on the fly” on vacation or at home, and the mission to find kiwis was something that I was really worried was not going to come to fruition.

In the end, I saw kiwis twice - I visited the Kiwi Park again after the tour ended - and brought home a plush kiwi I can hug whenever I want. And more than that, I learned that I can be more resilient than I thought, even when things don’t go the way I think they will.

Michelle Cohen, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.

With Friends, You Can Climb (And Descend) Mountains

With Friends, You Can Climb (And Descend) Mountains

Most of the time, when I make new friends, I try to present myself as someone social, easy to get along with, and uncomplicated - I don’t want the things I struggle with to give a bad first impression.

On my recent trip to New Zealand, I was very conscious of this, but in a different way than usual. I wanted to make the best first impression possible, while not hiding any part of myself at all - which is something I’ve never tried to do before. This translated into wanting to do every possible Lord of the Rings-related experience even if it was something very out of my wheelhouse - including mountain climbing.

I will admit that the climbing I did didn’t require hooks or too much gear, but for me, it was something brand new and exhausting in multiple ways. I could handle being out of breath while walking up the sheer slope of Mt. Sunday, but as I ascended higher and higher, I realized that a combined fear of heights and getting hurt while on blood thinners was going to make the climb down an incredibly difficult obstacle.

I had a walking stick with me, and great company to chat with, but neither of those convinced me that I would be able to descend the mountain after our photoshoot at the set of Edoras. But because I wanted to participate in every Lord of the Rings experience, I continued to climb and pushed the fear to the back of my mind. That was a problem for later.

Problem was, “later” eventually arrived after many photos with wooden swords, flags, and triumphant facial expressions. Before long, it was time to turn around and head down, and all I could picture was slipping on one of the many little rocks on the nonexistent trail and plummeting down, bleeding and breaking bones and missing out on the rest of the trip and having to face my fear of going to the hospital alone and looking like a coward in front of my new friends.

Before long, I was petrified to take even a single step, and feeling increasingly ashamed as people much older than me passed me without a care. I chided myself for making a spectacle of myself and my cowardice, but I still couldn’t convince myself to go down the rocks with no railings, stairs, or anything to help me find my footing.

And that was when a few of my new friends - one person who I knew well, and another who I had barely interacted with - stepped in.

I was embarrassed that people noticed I was struggling, but quickly felt supported in a way I don’t usually experience. People tend to try to make me push past fear with either ribbing or telling me I’m not thinking things through, neither of which actually helps - but these two simply walked by my side, offered a hand at the steeper parts where I needed it, and carried on a gentle conversation to help distract me.

This may have seemed like a simple gesture, and it was certainly low effort, but it meant so much that people were willing to meet me where I was at instead of trying to shame me into something different. It’s like when people try to make fun of me for not eating the way they think I should, but it doesn’t actually make me change, it just makes me feel bad about myself and not want to be honest with people.

On this trip, I had so many opportunities to be honest with people about the good times and the bad, and was accepted equally for both. It may have taken me longer than almost everyone else to make it down the mountain, but the mere presence of people who I knew were on my side and willing to help me made the descent easier than I could have imagined. The steep slopes still scared me, but it was harder to spiral into negative thoughts of fear and falling when I wasn’t alone.

The mountain descent was just one of many moments during my New Zealand trip where I felt like I was accepted exactly as I am - and it reinforced that even though it’s hard to not feel embarrassed or ashamed, it’s so much easier to get through difficult emotions when there are kind, caring people by your side.

Michelle Cohen, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.

Finding My People

Finding My People

When I first watched Grey’s Anatomy years ago, I was intrigued by the idea of finding what the show called “your person” - someone who would understand you on such a deep level that it’s easy to form a powerful bond.

It took me a long time, but on my recent trip to New Zealand, I finally found “my people.”

I was hoping it would happen. I’d been planning this trip since I was fourteen and read an article about a tour company that led people throughout Middle-Earth. There were “normal” destinations too, but I let the article fill my head with descriptions of running through Edoras, reenacting battles on the Pelennor Fields, and eating second breakfast in Hobbiton with people who would enjoy it just as much as me.

It didn’t take me long to realize that, after so many years of searching, I found “my people.” I didn’t even make it to the introductory dinner before I met people who appreciated my Lord of the Rings t-shirt and shared their plans for playing music and cosplaying in Hobbiton.

When I sent pictures home, my family and friends commented that they had never seen me smile so wide, and yet it looked completely natural. A major part of it was going on a trip I’ve dreamed of most of my life, but an equally big part was going with people who I felt like I had known forever even though we had just met.

It was the only time in my life when I felt like I didn’t have to pretend to be someone else or worry about how much of my true personality I was letting slip through, and people liked me anyway.

This is a mindset I’ve never been used to after growing up as someone weird, strange, odd. I was often called a freak when I wasn’t able to hide what was going on in my head. And in terms of the positive obsessions that kept me above water, I learned to hide this part of myself even though it was my favorite part, the thing about me that brought the most joy to my life.

As an adult, I learned to let my passions out in certain situations. I started dressing up and going to conventions, but it always felt too short. It’s hard to make a deep bond in two days, especially when most of my time at conventions is split between rushing to make panels, carefully planning my shopping, and entering Magic: The Gathering tournaments.

But this trip felt like the euphoria of the annual elf party at DragonCon for 18 days straight, and I couldn’t have been happier if I tried. Instead of trying to adapt myself to everyone else, I was finally with a group of people who I could understand and who were just like me - people who made me feel like I belonged without having to do anything other than be myself. There was no acting, faking, or overthinking - something that’s hard to even imagine as someone who always had to choreograph my social life.

But I was not the only person who cried with joy when buying replica swords at Weta Workshop or frolicking in an elf dress in the forest. I had a real fight on my hands with the trivia competition, with people who cared about Tolkien and his world as much as I did. I had people to sit with on the bus and at every meal, spend time with every evening after our tour activities ended, and discuss every topic I had ever been told was “too weird” and “no one would ever be interested in.”

Being with this group of people made me brave. I tried more new foods on this trip than I ever have. I did adventure activities that scared me and toughed it out even when the fear really started getting to me. I did all sorts of things I could never imagine myself doing, from riding a gondola to the highest heights of a city to receiving sincere “yearbook” messages in my journal instead of the phony messages I always got in school.

Very, very long story short, I have - after thirty years of searching - found “my people.” I will continue to tell stories of this life-changing trip over the next several weeks on my blog and photo series, and look forward to sharing so many of the moments I never believed I could have.

I finally, finally fit in. As myself, no acting, no games. Just me. And I couldn’t be happier.

Michelle Cohen, a writer in the Chicago area, was diagnosed with OCD at age 3. She hopes to educate others about her condition and end the stigma against mental illness.