feel better plan: a letter to myself and healing
So I’ve been having repeated mental breakdowns ever since returning from China. After going to a therapist from Healthiest You who just told me to “hang in there” and “have faith”, I decided to sit down on my self built IKEA couch and make a list of problems that have influenced my life for the past month.
First issue, detachment from my routine. The way I see it, everyone is playing a role in a stage called life. People either immerse the role or pretend to be immersed. Obviously, I’m turning to be the latter. A bad actor. Frankly speaking, I feel like I would act much more professionally if whoever was directing this comedy called My Life actually paid me. No rewards you know. I spend my day not knowing what the next bad thing is going to hit me. It got to the point where I have mentally shut myself down. After all, growing numb to everything is better than being sad about everything.
Right? NO!!
Realistically, I have an education, an occupation of my dream, and three friends to support me right now. (That’s one more than when I was in China!!) I should be normal. Yet I sit at night listening to sad music and blaming myself for being unable to feel grateful. I want to say that I care about everything I do and everything I have but I don’t. I do not care about the fact that our world may be burning down from war. I do not care about the fancy afterparties I get to go to after fashion shows or influencer gatherings in Beverly Hills. And I certainly couldn’t care less for the new guy that I’m telling everyone about to reassure them that I still want to form relationships with new people. I feel nothing but guilt and imaginary judgemental gazes from my Chinese ancestors looking over my shoulders as I type all this but I’m just trying to survive each day at this point.
So I guess, I am feeling something at least. That’s good!
Second issue, no supporting roles. I have somehow managed to push everyone around me to a certain boundary line. If you cross that, all of my vulnerabilities and dark thoughts will spew out like a fire hydrant if a car rammed into it from accidents that frequently occur in Los Angeles. (Personally, I don’t think LA people are capable of driving.) Honestly, no one actually wants to hear the terrible horrible trauma that I have experienced throughout my life. They want to hear the good things. Things that will help them, motivate them and alleviate their burden. This becomes an issue because I find it difficult to actually say anything truthful or honest to people. It got to the point where when a friend asked how I am doing, I simply just made up a lie to alleviate their concern about me:
“Hey, how was your therapy appointment? Do you feel any better?” Says Yin, my concerned friend who recommended this fantastic woman.
It’s her birthday. Give a good response. Don’t make her feel bad for not being able to help.
“Yeah! I feel so validated and relieved that someone was REALLY listening!” I responded in a positive tone while ignoring the fact that I had broken three pimples on my forehead upon sitting there listening to that therapist talk nonsense to me.
“That’s so great! I’m happy for you! I see you like a sister and I just want the best for you” She said with a relieved looking face.
To meet a normal standard, family should be the first thing that comes to mind when you can’t find reliability in other relationships. However, my parents do not believe in the concept of mental health. This is ironic in the sense that both of them are doctors but do in fact suffer from extreme temperamental behaviors. (I only realized the effect they had on me recently because I discovered the reason why I cannot stand loud music was because I was yelled at way too much throughout my childhood/teenage years). Don’t get me wrong, I still have an immaculate amount of respect and appreciation for everything they have sacrificed to get me to have everything I have now. They are just very noble people who care about pride and honor WAY TOO MUCH. I’m not a disappointment. But to them, saying that I had a bad day at school will only result in an hour long lecture of why the problem is on me.
“I see that your schoolmates have severely traumatized you but you need to reflect on why these misfortunes always happen to you and not others.” Says Mr. and Mrs. Critique.
In a good way, this made me become a strict person. I’m always looking for ways to better myself. In a bad way, it has made me feel shameful to share anything remotely negative about my life.
Third issue, severe rejection to the concept of failing. As a Bay Area High School survivor, I am driven by my will to achieve success and fear of being “left behind”. This energy motivated me in high school to pass all those AP tests and it’s motivating me today to attend every single casting I could for better opportunities as a model. Like I said, I’m a model and NOT an actor. Well not entirely. I am a silent actor. You would be surprised by how challenging models find facial expressions to be. Although being emotionless in itself, is a requirement as well. Everything else should be perfectly controlled under an “natural looking vibe”. Most of my coworkers tell me they tend to imagine a specific event when asked to express joy and change it up to a sad one when asked to have that on instead. I don’t have events like that. I just study others. I’m good at that.
I suppose I’m a natural actress huh.
The movement of the fashion industry happens fast. Very very fast. At one moment you could be booked for ten photoshoots and the next have months on without any bookings whatsoever. Obviously, my toxic competitiveness trait does not sit well on the couch with me when I don’t get booked right away. Instead of sitting, this part of me decides to bounce around the room, cry a bit, work out , stop eating and even begin calling up plastic surgeons in the Los Angeles area all in one go. (The guy I went to told me I couldn’t get botox because the problem was my jaw structure and I would look like a Tim Burton character if I got it.) I do recognize that I am still young and energetic if we want to look at age. However mentally, I am often told to be within the fourty to fifty year old range of an old person whose just finished menopause.
“Babes, you are someone who prefers doing instead of saying doing!” My flamboyant agent from Shanghai who refuses to wear anything besides neon pink and gems would often say as she checks off my attendance for the fifth casting of the day.
Does she actually think I would even be able to book ONE out of all these today?
“Thank you for always being here for me” I say as I suppress my heavy breathing, intense heartbeat and shaky hands, “It’s all about the attitude right!?”
While I do appreciate the support, all these bouncing emotions drags me down instead of pushing me to do better. It’s like my height. The more I try to grow, the shorter I feel. That feeling is like walking down the runway stage with the heaviest and pricest heels that mankind has ever created.
I wonder if I could even hold everything in at that point.
Most models are around 5’10. Making my 5’8 and a half stand at a very awkward range of being too tall for normal girls and short among models.
“I mean like, how did you even get signed?” Julie, my aggressive coworker exclaimed at the casting for Louis Vuitton, “I think it’s probably better if you just gave up on high fashion like our agent would say the same.”
Okay Lucy, find a way to respond to that without embarrassing yourself or her infront of all these casting directors and fifty other top models in the industry.
“I totally agree and I guess they just thought it’s never too late to test new things out!” I said while holding my urges to chop off her 5’11 legs, “I still have so much to learn from you all! Hope you get booked!”
Julie never got booked.
Genetically speaking, I don’t have much hope seeing that I am quite literally the tallest person in my family. (My 5’7 father still refuses to admit this and wears insoles around the house) I searched for ways to grow that extra two inches. Learning pilates, finding chiropractors, eating calcium tablets and everything else that I can’t think on top of my head. This sounds very absurd but I did in fact, grow. Half an inch.
“Lucy, I’m going to charge you extra for this session because this is extra cautious work to straighten out your back” My sixty year old chiropractor who claims to have fifty years of experience says.
One and a half inches to go. Then you would become flawless.
I was willing to go through the eight circles of hell and stride through the pits of fire with some professional catwalking if that made me taller. (Those noises my bones made certainly did sound like hell). Somewhere deep within my brain, that dangerous thought would torment me each time a client lets me go. As if somehow, I am trying to rationalize all the other factors to something that I at least would be able to change about myself. So I wouldn’t be completely hopeless.
Here’s my solution to this: have faith. JUST KIDDING. (You can really tell how upset I was by this suggestion especially because of the three pimples still attached on my forehead) Well it’s not like I shouldn’t have faith but simply having that is something in the spiritual realm rather than reality. So what should I do to fight all this off? Take medication? Go to the insane asylum? Perform lobotomy? Okay too far. Get this, I’m doing it right now. Write it down. Sitting here in Guy Fieri’s Kitchen & Bar at the Burbank airport, I am waiting for the next flight at 6pm so I can return home. (I missed my flight at 11am) Although the missed flight aspect is disappointing, I think it’s also given me time to reflect on myself.
Why are you upset?
Why are you NOT upset?
What makes you upset?
How upset are you?
I write all my issues down because even just doing that will help me move forward. In a less abstract sounding way, confront your problems! So imaginary person, if you’ve read up till now, you probably think I’m a psychotic bitch. That’s fine because I know I am! In no way am I trying to relate or find resonation with you. I am simply coping in my own way. People go through so much every single day and you can’t expect me to not explode one day if I bottled all this up. I don’t think I’m going to resume my sense of interest, trust for others and healthy mindset for a while but at least I know I’m working towards that. (As I typed this, the guy I’m talking to texted me saying he wants to read this paper. No thanks. See, I still hate sharing.)
Like Mr. Critique once said, “Rome is not built in one day. You must put one brick at a time to achieve, my daughter.”
BRUH, What bricks???
I don’t even know what I am building with my life. Reconciliation is not something that I can proudly say I have done at all. I am extremely critical, prideful and most likely depressed. In fact writing this and admitting that I do in fact have these issues have taken more life out of me than anyone who's ever crossed my path. I’m going to try completing one task everyday. That’s all. Just try my best to finish one single task each day and be proud of myself for finishing that. To give a wonderful example, I am proud of myself for staying calm despite the fact that I have not eaten anything besides coffee and that piece of whole wheat bread slice covered with peanut butter this morning. (It’s currently 4pm, I have another two hours of fun with Guy Fieri and his staff that is just discussing everything wrong with their kids instead of working) I am going back to my sentence before the whole starvation thing. To be honest, I think the latter is the hard part for me. I can’t seem to be proud of myself. Yet I’ve done many things that are supposedly harder. So, I guess it’s time to stop running away and begin construction. (Also shit. The workers saw my paper or something, I’m getting kicked out.)
