Dear Mom, You Knew You Had Mental Illness. Why Didn't You Tell Me?

I’m not writing this because I’m mad.

Not really. I mean, yeah, I’m pissed, but not at you.

I know how hard it is to admit you’ve got a brain that hates you.

It’s embarrassing. It’s exhausting. And no one ever believes you the first time. Maybe not even the fifth.

Still... I wish I’d known.

I grew up feeling it in the air, your anxiety and depression. That was easy enough to verify- I saw how many medications you needed on the daily. I learned how to read your moods before I could spell my own name. I knew not to go out after dark, to keep the windows locked, to sniff the meat before cooking. And God help me, I still keep spare cash and backup supplies tucked away, just in case.

Because like you always said,

"You never know."

It was your motto. Part warning, part joke.

You turned that phrase into a punchline, but it was also a map.

A way to prepare for a world that was never truly safe.

The House That Held Your Mind

When you died, I had to sort through everything. Of course I did. I'm the only child.

Boxes on boxes on boxes. Manuals. Quilting fabric. Gardening magazines. Unopened mail. Cookbooks with your handwriting in the margins. Notes, receipts, records. Some dated, some not.

It felt like walking through a to-do list that never got finished.

I couldn’t just throw things out. It didn’t feel right.

You spent a lifetime collecting those objects. Burying yourself under them while still alive. So I opened every box. I held every item. I tried to witness each thing, one by one, before it went to the trash or the yard sale or the donation bin.

There were almost no childhood things in the house. Very little of me. Nothing much that felt like us.

Just your things. All the parts you couldn’t bring yourself to say out loud, wrapped in plastic and waiting for someone else to understand them.

You Tried to Prepare Me, In Your Way

You taught me to be cautious. To pay attention. To stay ready.

But you never taught me how to fall apart. How to deal with the intensity of what my brain receives, the constant flow of input, the sound always playing in the back of my mind.

Or how to ask for help.

I begged you to move in with us.

You said you were fine.

Then one day you stopped answering the phone.

It took two weeks before they found you, I left work immediately and was on the road for the nine plus hours of driving within an hour of receiving the call. I rushed anyway.

I Tell the Kids It Ends With Us

Both kids are grown now.

M lives by the beach. D is in love, long-distance, but happy.

Neither of them lives alone and I doubt any of us can.

We all agreed. No more children. This thing in our blood is too heavy for anyone new.

They watched you fade.

I think they’re still scared of what it means for them.

I am too, sometimes.

But we try. We listen to our bodies. We move when we can. We don’t eat much sugar. We know the signs now.

You’d Be Proud of the Wedding

We sold the house.

I know what you thought your things were worth, but....you were wrong.

We didn't get enough to buy our home, our freedom, like you hoped.

It paid for the wedding in New Orleans.

I decorated with butterflies, just for you.

We couldn’t save the furniture. The floor had to be raised before anyone could live there again. I tried to give away your antique desk and Grandma’s dressers, but no one wanted them. I packed what I could into a U-Haul and drove it ten hours by myself.

Your 5’5” daughter, solo in a big truck. It was invigorating and terrifying at times.

I’m a size 6 now, by the way. No more diabetes. No more obesity. I don’t know what it cost me to get here, but I did it and now I can deal with the discomfort it takes to stay. I won't die fat and unhealthy like we usually do.

You Were Always Going to Leave Me a Mess. I Just Wish It Had Been a Bit Smaller.

And maybe with a note. Or at least your internet and banking passwords. That was a nightmare and I'm sure I've missed something somewhere.

Not a goodbye. Not some dramatic reveal. Just anything useful.

Something that said,

"It wasn’t just you."

"It wasn’t just in your head."

"You weren’t wrong for struggling."

If I ever leave that kind of mess behind, I hope someone will see it for what it is. Not shame. Not failure. Just love, paused mid-sentence.

Grief doesn’t pay the bills, but art keeps me alive. Tip jar here

if you want to help me keep writing.