I like to tell stories the easy way, cover the hard parts with metaphors, and beat around the bush till the cows come home. I may exaggerate or plainly detail the brave & optimistic bits. But when a thing needs to be said rashly, I play this game I call ‘let’s call a spade a spade.’ I play it at my therapist’s, I play it when talking to people about my father and I play it when I write most of my posts on Instagram. The honesty of my feelings does not come naturally; the urge for honest telling does, but the accomplishment of the telling is a gamified result.
I recently, again, had one of my distress episodes. I hate to admit it but let’s call a spade a spade: I started crying in the middle of a party, walked out, and hid in the parking so no one could see me. When someone did, I started having trouble breathing so I walked away into a crowded street, wearing an uncomfortable ghagra choli, sobbing. Flashes from the past made me feel rage so hot I had to say something/anything hurtful to somebody I love, break something beautiful. The worst of it came out on R and D. I calmed down eventually thanks to the SOS pills. But I am still cleaning the remains of that catastrophe. I feel physically exhausted with a sense of something that’s survived its own ruins. I feel raw. The embarrassment feels heavier than any school bag I ever carried. And it’s tough to heal fast (let’s call a spade a spade) when you must live with a mother who suffers from schizophrenia daily.
At my therapist’s we reflected that these episodes have reduced in number. They have become less jarring and easier to argue with, in hindsight. But let’s call a spade a spade! I am scared of how easy it is to lose control. To abandon work, and routine to curl up in a ball. I feel helpless to the villainous feeling that is after all just me, that is so much stronger than the ‘medicine, exercise and healthy food’. And let’s call a spade a spade, these reduced-in-number episodes of lesser intensity, for which I have self-help stickers, for which is a puppy, a therapist, a new lipstick rise – from the depth of my future throughout telling me that I am nothing but, let’s call a spade a spade, useless remains of a family catastrophe.