Maya

Are you familiar with the spoon theory of chronic illness? I think it applies to mental health very well. So there was this young woman and she’s trying to explain to her friend what it was like to live with chronic illness and I think she had something like lupus and then she was in a cafeteria and she was just like, “Alright spoons, alright ten spoons.” She was like, “I only have so many spoons each day.” She was like, “I want you to hold these spoons and then try and get through your day because everything you chose to do will cost you a spoon.” So, you know, you’re getting ready for school, you know what I mean, you’re getting ready for class that’s going to cost you one spoon. And then you go to your classes and that’s going to cost you two more spoons. And now it’s lunch time and so you can either skip lunch and, you know, get whatever this, you know, papers or whatever done but that’s going to cost you three spoons or you can eat lunch and that period of time will only cost you one spoon. You know what I mean, going out to coffee with a friend, that’s another spoon. You know what I mean, by the time you get to noon you’ve already used more than half of your spoons. And so sometimes you have to choose, am I going to do the dishes or am I going to get some work done, you know what I mean. It’s a lot of, “Am I going to get out of bed and go see my friends this evening, even though I know I’ll start with fewer spoons tomorrow?”. So it’s just being aware that sometimes when it comes to your own capacity, it’s kind of this zero sum game and that you don’t have as many spoons to spend as everyone else.

Ok I think that I have felt different than a lot of my peers for almost as long as I can remember. Even in young childhood everyone was very happy and go lucky and I had this, not that I didn’t have moments of happiness but I always had this gnawing, underlying sense of sadness. there was I always had these very deep darker thoughts and when I would ask you know friends that were my age whether they had ever thought about that, the thought you know had never crossed their mind. And I found that so odd, why do I feel this way when nobody else does, nobody else has ever even had the concept of that before.

Are you familiar with the spoon theory of chronic illness? I think it applies to mental health very well. So there’s this young woman and she’s trying to explain to her friend what it was like to live with chronic illness and I think she had something like lupus and then she was in a cafeteria and she was like, “Alright spoons, alright ten spoons.” She was like, “I only have so many spoons each day.” She was like, “I want you to hold these spoons and then try and get through your day because everything you chose to do will cost you a spoon.” So, you know, you’re getting ready for school, you know what I mean, you’re getting ready for class that’s going to cost you one spoon. And then you go to your classes and that’s going to cost you two more spoons. And now it’s lunch time and so you can either skip lunch and, you know, get whatever this, you know, paper or whatever done but that’s going to cost you three spoons or you can eat lunch and that period of time will only cost you one spoon. You know what I mean, going out to coffee with a friend, that’s another spoon. You know what I mean, by the time you get to noon you’ve already used more than half of your spoons. And so sometimes you have to choose, am I going to do the dishes or am I going to get some work done, you know what I mean. It’s a lot of, “Am I going to get out of bed and go see my friends this evening, even though I know I’ll start with fewer spoons tomorrow”. So it’s just being aware that sometimes when it comes to your own capacity, it’s kind of this zero sum game and that you don’t have as many spoons to spend as everyone else.

I would have to say that probably as far back as I can remember, I at least had pretty significant anxiety. I remember when I was really little if someone was late for something I would have this really bad catastrophic thinking like, “Oh no, like, they got in a car accident or they are never coming home,” or something like that. I remember being very scared to be in a room by myself, I had, you know, I had this feeling that just around the corner somebody was going to leap out and get me and pretty much I had that feeling almost all of the time. By the time I got into high school, I was pretty good at masking my feelings. I’m fairly good at, sort of, keeping up, like, a really like upbeat persona, regardless of how depressed I am. Even when I am fairly non-functional, if you see me like out and about most people think that I’m pretty confident and pretty well-adapted and they’re like, oh you know, ‘You’re a really optimistic person’ and you know ‘You’ve got it all together’ and stuff like that. And I think a lot of that for me comes from the fact that we have a fairly insincere culture when it comes to emotions. I mean, especially if you work in something like service, I mean, ‘service with a smile’ and foreigners a lot of times comment on how strangley friendly everyone in the states is and sort of how we have this sort of culturally-mandated exuberance, you know. We can’t just be like ‘Oh you know things are ok, they’ve have been kind of tough lately’. Everybody’s supposed to say ‘Great! Everything, It’s going to be the best day it’s every been and It’s the most beautiful and I am going to be so successful’. And so, I’ve sort of taken that on which I think can make it difficult sometimes because people don’t recognize that you’re suffering especially when you are able to, sort of, beat your obligations. That it can be harder for people to identify you as someone who has depression.

I go to a Baptist church on Sundays because this preacher is just phenomenal, he is such a gifted order, he really touches you at, at the heart and soul and I have really never felt so welcome and so much like I belong as I do when I go to this church and the music is incredible and the people are just wonderful. I mean like I literally can’t count how many hugs I get there just, just for showing up and people are really genuine and they’re like, “Oh, it’s so good to see you again.” And it’s so, it’s so wonderful to, you know, sort of have that space because there are people laughing, there are people dancing, and there are people weeping, you know, whatever you bring to the table, whatever sort of thing that you’re feeling you can feel it there and it’s a place where people are able to feel pain and I think that’s something fairly rare, especially if you are in sort of more of the, like the white American culture where I, where I tend to reside most of my time. There isn’t a lot of expressiveness and there isn’t a lot of safe space to sort of express emotions beyond this really narrow range, but I find that at this church there, you can play all the notes.

By the time I got into high school I was pretty good at masking my feelings. I’m fairly good at sort of keeping up like a really like upbeat persona regardless of how depressed I am. Even when I am fairly nonfunctional, if you see me like out and about most people think that I’m pretty confidant and pretty well adapted and they’re like, “Oh, you know, you’re a really optimistic person and, you know, you’ve got it all together,” and stuff like that. And I think a lot of that, for me, comes from the fact that we had a fairly insincere culture when it comes to emotions. I mean, especially if you work in something like service. I mean, “service with a smile.” And foreigners a lot of times comment on how, how strangely friendly everyone in the States is and sort of how we have this, sort of, culturally mandated exuberance, you know, we can’t just be like, “Oh, you know, things are ok, they’ve been kind of tough lately.” Everybody’s supposed to say, “Great, everything. It’s going to be the best day it’s ever been and it’s the most beautiful and I’m going to be so successful!” And so, I’ve sort of taken that on, which I think can make it difficult sometimes, because people don’t recognize that you’re suffering, especially when you are able to, sort of meet your obligations — that it can be harder for people to identify you as someone who has depression.

… my family was very verbally abusive, so my mother has, threatened to kill me literally more times than I can count. I’ve been disowned literally more times than I can count. I’ve had the cops called on me, at least three times for things like, talking. And it’s because she only sometimes takes her medication, and she has not ever stuck with any form of therapy. And I know a lot of this comes from, I mean, she had a mother who clearly had mental health issues. There comes into a lot of, cultural issues, is that my mother, you know, “I gave you life, I can take it away.” And, you know, threatening to kill someone in China is, or South Korea or a lot of, you know, East Asian countries, isn’t an unusual threat to be made, but, you know, it’s part of, sort of like a cultural thing. And so I lived in a highly critical household, that regardless of how many …. There’s actually, there’s, I mean, it’s becoming more and more common to see this, there’s an, even an episode of, “The Simpson’s,” where – I forget, Marge’s sisters adopts this little Asian girl, Ling – and she is doing spectacularly. She’s like, painting something and playing a flute and keeping plates spinning in the air, and they’re like, “Look at what a good girl Ling is.” And she just like whispers to, whoever’s in the room, “Help me.”

I have complex PTSD because I also endured a great amount of, not a great amount, but I also dealt with sexual abuse when I was younger, and I have been in numerous sexually abusive situations since that time. And so, I want to say that my abuse started when I was probably about 7 and continued on and off until I was like 9 or maybe 10? …
The sexual abuse took place between children, and they were my god brothers who were also altar boys, so I was more or less molested by the Catholic Church. And then you proceed to be in this environment where there is just profound shame about, you know, being a woman, and then, that purity is your highest virtue and, the virgin Mary, and the virgin-whore dynamic, and all of that. And I think that’s a lot of what prompted me to becoming a feminist and also becoming very educated about, sort of, gender roles and sexual health issues in general…
I learned very negative patterns of relating with people that have attracted very dangerous people in my life and I, there’s an incredible book called, “The Gift of Fear,” by, I don’t remember who it’s by, but it’s called, “The Gift of Fear,” that pointed out a lot of things. One of the things was sort of like, the victim interview, like how people, sort of, screen for people who have no emotional boundaries and who can be manipulated, and I was just like, “Oh, that totally happened to me before, that incidence of abuse.” And I was just like, “Oh yeah, that’s, that’s totally what happened.” Because at one point, I was abused by a stranger and that’s when I, and this was, in my adult life, and I was just like, “Oh yeah, I have a giant ‘you should abuse me sign’ on my forehead. I should probably deal with that. I should probably address whatever issues are there that do not allow me to keep myself safe and to avoid people and, they’re predatory.” Because I just ignore my gut feeling that I’m uncomfortable or someone’s doing something wrong, because that’s literally every moment of being with my family – is having your boundaries and your emotions just trampled over, and then being told that, “It’s your fault that you’re upset.”

But I think that it’s very difficult to reduce people to one aspect of their identity and I see that a lot with identity politics like, “Oh, look, gay people!” As though, like, that’s suddenly the most important thing about them is who they do and do not want to love or have sex with. And I think that, being able to be like, “Oh this person is gay and they love guns and country music,” is, is a thing. There are gay people who love music, you know, there are nuns who are pro-abortion, you know what I mean? Many people live in this grey area and I think that being able to not pigeon-hole yourself in any one identity, so you don’t have to be like, “Oh I am a depressed person.” Or like, “Oh this is an autistic person.” Or, “Oh this is, you know,” I think that, that’s unfair, and I think that denies you, your, the totality of your humanity.

I sort of hung out with the, sort of like, the free-thinker, misfit, creative types. There’s actually just like a dorm that’s just like all of those kids, so you just take all like musicians and the drama kids and the gay kids and we’re just like one dorm [laughter]. And I hung out with mostly kids that had lived in that dorm. So, I want to say that mental health issues are, almost a given, with almost everybody I know. The severity and the variety is very different. A lot of people just have – I don’t want to say “just have,” because it can be debilitating – but a lot of people have, more typical things, just like OCD, but it doesn’t seriously impair their function, you know, they’re just kind of quirky. Other people have had very serious psychotic breaks, that have seriously impaired their lives. I have many friends who have been hospitalized for mental health reasons many times. So, I don’t imagine that anyone didn’t know that I had depression, it’s just something that all of us dealt with. In fact, I’ve had conversations with people that are like, “You know? I don’t really trust anyone who’s never really been through really dark periods.”

By the time I was in high school, I started having trouble just functioning. I was, I was just breaking down sobbing, all the time. I mean like, in a ball shaking and that would happen at school. And so I spent a great deal of time in the, in the counselor’s office and around my sophomore year, I mean, I was, I don’t know if it’s fair to say, “intellectually suicidal?” I wasn’t going to take any active steps, but I did have a lot of suicidal thinking, and I had very clearly all the signs of depression to anyone who really cared to notice.
And I tried to seek help. I was just like, “I need to see a psychologist. Like, I’m having problems.” Because all of a sudden I had gone from being a straight A student, or not a straight A student, but an A/B student to, I went from like, having an 89 percent in my statistics class to having a 16, because I just wasn’t able to function …

I have to say, “No.” All the time, I have to say, “No, I can’t come see your show. No, I can’t get coffee today. No, I can’t do that project. No, I can’t do that job. No, I can’t volunteer for that program. No, I can’t stay out late. No, I need to go home. No, I need to rest. No, I can’t do the dishes. No, I can’t cook for myself today. No, I can’t go to the store.” Or, if I do go to the store, that’s literally the only thing I do all day. Like, when I was really sick it was just like, “Wow, that, that was my major accomplishment for this week,” was being able to go to the store and get all the groceries into the house. And so that’s been one of the most difficult things for me, to be the person that does literally everything, at an amazing level, well not an amazing level, but a very high level. It’s impressive that I did all of them at a high level, to be a person that’s just like, “Cool, I, I carried groceries upstairs and didn’t leave any of them in the car for my partner to carry up later.” So that’s been my biggest struggle.

And I was in, you know, cool gifted programs and stuff like that so, I was surrounded by a pretty exceptional bunch, but I’ve seen that, as more of the norm … But yeah, I think that there are alot of things about depression that are very difficult and one of the things that I struggle with the most is just the fatigue. Just the, I can barely – and, I, I’m someone who like, I like to run around and I like to have my fingers in all the pies and I like to be a mover and a shaker, and for many people like, they, they couldn’t imagine me being the person that like, just cannot get out of bed. You know? That like, if I take a shower, that’s, that’s a success. That, in these past three days I’ve been able to get out of bed and take a shower. And I think that that’s the truth, for many people, many people who come across as very high functioning. And I think there is an enormous amount of shame about that, to have other people see that you occupy such a vulnerable space, because I think that, projecting strength is so important here ….

I violate a lot of her understandings of what it is to be a good woman and because I have always been so assertive, she finds it to be aggressive and condescending. So she would always try to keep me in my place because of the Chinese sort of dynamics of hierarchy and what you can and cannot say. And I was just like, “If you wanted me to be a good Chinese daughter you should have raised me in China, because if you’re going to raise me in the United States and I’m to be successful here, I am going to take on American socialization.” Especially since I didn’t know any Asian kids growing up I was literally like, there was like me and the one Jewish kid, so we would like take our turns he would show everybody dreidels and I would show everybody like, Chinese New Year, like red envelopes and give them candy like, Chinese candies and so like, that was the extent of the diversity growing up. So not being within a culture where certain statements were normalized I think was part of the damage, but also I think there are, you know, a lot of issues and I mean this, this is part of the thing, like nobody wants to bring shame on their culture, but I think a lot of East Asian cultures have, you know, very frequent physical, emotional abuse. And I think it’s something that’s commonly not addressed because the kids do really well in school and they don’t act out, so no one sees it as a problem and I think that’s incredibly damaging. I mean there’s like an entire Reddit forum, like a Reddit sub-forum that’s just called like, oh what is it, Asian parent stories. And like, there are stories of people who are just like, “I did it. I graduated from John’s Hopkins and I’m literally a brain surgeon and they’re still not happy and every day I want to kill myself.”

One of the things that I wanted to share in this interview that I was thinking about a lot was the fact that I think so often we talk about depression and anxiety as though it’s only a negative. And I’m really a big fan of the biopsychosocial models of depression and anxiety that show that one, it’s a spectrum. You know, you’re not either depressed or not depressed. But you know, we all have these different ranges. But I’m a person when it comes to like, the analogy of a piano, I play all the keys. I have very high highs and I have very low lows. But at the same time, I think that despite the fact that it has made my life a lot more difficult, I think it also affords me a great deal of empathy, a great deal of sensitivity, a great deal of understanding that, you know, someone who hasn’t struggled with something like this might not have. And I think when it comes to doing interpersonal work or educational work like I do now, having such a broad range of experiences is actually really helpful. And when it comes to sort of creative pursuits, and I mean, I think there is a reason why there is this stereotype of you know the, the tortured artist. I think that if you come into this world and you are more sensitive, you know, you see more or you hear more you’re a noticer whether or not it’s, you know, the dew on some rose petals or just like the immense suffering of the people in front of you. I think that being a noticer is, it’s a strength but also it’s a liability and I think it’s important to focus on both sides of that, and not only see it as a cost that needs to be managed.

But I was told that I was just too sensitive to everything and in many ways I am, but in just the right environment I feel as though I have so much more to offer because I notice so much more and I appreciate so much more and I witness so much more than the average person, it’s just as though I don’t have filters, you know what I mean. It’s like other people wearing sunglasses and so they can stand in the bright light for a long time, but I don’t, I don’t have those blinders so I have to take it all in. And I think that can give someone tremendous strength and so, it’s just about getting those conditions just right for those people.

But growing up, honestly, my pets were probably my closest friends to be very honest, my cats. Yeah and so pets have been a huge part of my life and I’m really sad that my cat’s gone. Yeah but yeah when it comes to like the support systems, I think that you know a cat’s always. For as finicky as they are, they are very forgiving, like regardless of what you’re feeling. Cats and dogs, obviously less so fish, and lizards, [laughter] but they can be present with you and that’s what I think can be the most healing thing, just being with someone or something, depending on how you see your pets…

A fur person.

Yeah fur people, fur kids you know who can be with you regardless of what you’re feeling and allow you to hold that space and not have to fix you, but they can just be there with you.

And I think that for people with depression, people with anxiety, people who have a history of either physical, emotional, or sexual trauma, finding a way to be safely embodied is very important and I think that it’s difficult in the western model to find those therapies that help you find safety in yourself and feel like your body is a safe place to be.

And I think that Eastern models of mental health always include the body and always include, you know, being safe in the body and feeling grounded which is a lot of my work. I work with a meditation teacher.

I actually moved here mostly to join this meditation community, because I found so much incredible benefit from being around people who are doing the work and like, that’s the thing that I like about meditation and mindfulness communities, that like, when you are talking about people who are doing internal work, people who regularly are going to a meditation community are doing the work… And I think surrounding myself with people who are doing the work and whatever flavor that is, whether or not, that’s people who dance at a [unknown] and who sing and play music at the center for conscious learning. Or, you know, people who dance and sing in the gospel choir at this Baptist church or people who chant, you know, or sit in silence or go on silent retreat for weeks or months or years, you know what I mean. Anybody who does the work, that is where I feel at home and I guess I’m sort of like a universalist. I’m not going, regardless of what the sign says on the door I’ll go in if it suits me.

Therapy, and I know this isn’t a perfect analogy, but therapy is like dating. You really need to find someone you can develop a rappor with, who you like, who you feel like likes you. I mean I’ve had therapist who I just feel like don’t like me and are judging me and I might see them for a little bit because they might be useful with one thing or another, but they may not be useful in general and you also need to take into account that, like, these people are human, so they have their limitations. And so I saw a gifted therapist and we mostly did phone stuff and I remember the first time I saw her, I saw her like, literally once and we like, and she was like, here’s some bibliotherapy read these books. I went home and read them and problem solved. I started a new career and I was like, well that was terrible for your business. I saw you once and now I’m not going to see you again. I called her 6 months like, actually no, it was like a couple of years later and then I talked to her once because I was getting so anxious that it had taken me two weeks to buy a bottle of shampoo just because I was like, the ingredients and stuff and chemophobia and I just, you know, I would have this incredible decision paralysis like, “Alright, I guess my anxiety is out of control again I should call a professional.” So I called her up and then talked to her like, maybe twice and for 6 months again I really didn’t need to see anyone, so I really use therapy on an as-needed basis. And I recognize what each individual therapy and what each individual therapist can offer.