Unraveled by Claire Olivia Golden

Author:Claire Olivia Golden
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: lgbt, lesbian, young adult, fairy, fairies, fairy tale, curse, faeries, nymph, crochet
Publisher: GurtDogPress

24

Cat

Faeries value the natural arts, weaving their own fabric from hand-spun yarn gathered from their own animals. You will not find factories or assembly lines in the realm of the faeries. They are connected to the earth in a way we have long forgotten. If you wish to reconnect with your own magic, take up a needle art and see if you don't feel more grounded in a few months.

~ The Modern Manual of Faeries by Eleanor Bishop

I'd told her, and nothing bad had happened. The world hadn't ended. She wasn't looking at me differently, except maybe with a little bit more…respect? That wasn't the reaction I had expected to get when I told someone about being mentally ill.

It was just like Stephen had said. I remembered that conversation, three or so years ago, when I was freaking out at him as I often did. He had leaned forward in his armchair, resting his broad forearms on his thighs, and listened as I poured out my stream of anxieties from the past two weeks. Mom had called, and I had overheard the phone call even though Grandma shooed me from the room. Just from hearing Grandma's side of the conversation, I knew Mom was expressing her doubts that I even had a mental illness and that I was just being particular. Even though I knew she was wrong, it still felt so icky to be doubted that I was having a hard time processing it.

"I just want to be normal," I had confessed to Stephen. "I mean, it is just all in my head."

"That's because it's a mental illness, Cat," he had said after a moment's pause. "Let's try to re-frame that thought."

I had had a lot of practice at this since I'd been seeing him for a couple years already. Whenever I had an intrusive thought, there were techniques I could use to re-frame it as an alternative thought.

"I mean, I'm not wrong. It is in my head."

"Okay. What would you say to your friend if they told you that?"

I always pictured Grandma when we did this 'what if it was your friend' exercise. "Uh, I don't know. I would tell her that it's still valid even if it's in her head, I guess."

"Would you tell her that it's her fault for not getting better?"

I flinched. "Of course not."

"Right. So you don't need to be saying that to yourself."

I knew he was right. I would never be as mean to other people as I was to myself. "It's so hard to internalize that, though."

"It can still be true even if you don't feel like it's true."

We had talked about this a lot, how just because you feel something doesn't mean it's true. So when I had a panic attack and felt like I was going to die because the tag on my shirt was itching me, even though I felt like I was dying, I wasn't actually. Stephen liked to say that my brain had a trigger-happy panic button.

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