Top Stories
Stories in Psyche that you’ll love, handpicked by our team.
Neurodivergent Dogpile
My mind is in what seems like constant warfare. I’m autistic, with obsessive compulsive disorder diagnosed. Highly suspected ADHD, living on a sundae of anxiety, depression and trauma. There’s no sprinkles though, there’s not really any cherries either, just the stems from so many “and the cherry on top…” scenarios. The sundae of my mind has kind of melted into a goop soup of mental illness and disorder. I also had to spend most of my life not realizing what flavors were even in my sundae. For a long time I thought that it was only one flavor, the autism spectrum of rainbow sherbet.
By Josey Pickering9 months ago in Psyche
Becoming My Own Gravity. Runner-Up in The Metamorphosis of the Mind Challenge.
I was standing at the end of a hospital bed, holding my son’s hand as tightly as I could, hoping if I held his hand, it would help to anchor him as we witnessed the unthinkable. He was about to turn twenty-two; she had just turned twenty-one six weeks earlier. He was in shock, not knowing how to process what he was seeing. I didn't know how to process what we were seeing. Thirty-six hours earlier, he had kissed her as she and her mother got into a cab to go to the hospital. At the time I could feel him trembling inside as he stood there stoically. I could feel his world slipping away beneath his feet as much as my own. The doctors and nurses had just taken her off life support. Tubes removed, monitors silenced. It had only been twelve days since she first felt that earache. Twelve days from ordinary to catastrophic. The doctor called her time of death within two minutes. This was the pivotal moment—an abrupt halt to life as I knew it, a violent scratch across the record of my life that had been playing. It was the moment we felt the ground beneath our feet disappear.
By Xine Segalas9 months ago in Psyche
Homunculus. Honorable Mention in The Metamorphosis of the Mind Challenge.
The homunculus is a representation of the man behind the man, the woman behind the woman, the body behind the body: the graphic mapping of what parts of the body are put together in proportion to how they’re laid out and innervated as related to our brain tissue. Not all sensations and volitional movements are distributed evenly. Thus, the homunculus is a distorted—even a comical—little creature.
By Gerard DiLeo10 months ago in Psyche
Now Is Not Always. Runner-Up in The Metamorphosis of the Mind Challenge.
The world is so much softer today than when I was a kid. I take my three boys, two preschoolers and one toddler, to the park and I can’t help but chuckle to myself. Not only is the ground not covered with concrete or pea gravel, but it’s not even hard. Stepping on the artificial turf is almost like stepping on a springboard. All the playground equipment is softer too. What ever happened to polished steel slides and rough wood posts? When I was a kid, you left skin behind on the slide and if you didn’t come home with at least two splinters, you weren’t playing hard enough.
By Altum Veritas10 months ago in Psyche
I'm Not Adjusting Well
Transformation is change. And not all change is as good as we wish for. William Wordsworth wrote, “The child is the father to the man,” implying that our childhood is what tends to mold and shape our future life, including how raise our own children. I felt this to be true with my own upbringing. I grew up with my live-in Italian grandmother who took care of me until I was eight or nine years old. I understood she looked out for me, cared for me, but it didn’t always show. It was an old army blanket - scratchy at times but still warm. It was only a few years later I learned my mother did not fully embrace her own mother for reasons she never divulged. She took care of Nonny because my mother did what a daughter ought to do through filial obligation.
By Barb Dukeman10 months ago in Psyche
Free Art Lessons
Paul was staring at the Monet’ when something moved, barely encroaching his peripheral vision. The object was on his right side, so he had to verify that something was actually there. He always had to check the right side because he had a “floater”, a tiny scar on his retina that, in certain lighting conditions, created the illusion that he had company. He liked to josh that he got the scar fighting for a maiden's honor, but it really was a tussle with a weed eater that left him with this annoying little blind spot. He knew other blinding forces too, like the dazzling brightness of a beautiful woman. He turned his head to see this manifested in that moment, and through the glow he could discern that she was young, but not too young, and his first glance at her countenance incited him to take a closer look.
By Tom Bissonette, M.S.W. Ret.10 months ago in Psyche
Grieving is More Than Losing People in Your Life
Grief is normally associated as a strong, natural, multi-faceted and significant emotion, when it comes to the passing away of a loved one. In such a context, a loved one means a family member/relative, friend (no matter the closeness), and (if relevant) a partner/significant other.
By Justine Crowley10 months ago in Psyche
"LOST IN UNDERSTANDING IN TIME". Content Warning.
I created this video song story to talk a little about mental health and what happens when one divorces a narcissist. I thought I would create this out of memory of a friend I knew who was hurt deeply by her ex-husband. This situation occurs in many relationships. The older lady friend of mine reflects about her over 30 years ago. She is sad, but therapy and time she begins to heal from her pain that she hid from people for many years.
By Vicki Lawana Trusselli 10 months ago in Psyche
Teacher. Runner-Up in The Metamorphosis of the Mind Challenge.
Like a 1960s version of Tom Sawyer, my big brother got me to purple-wash the beige walls of our parents’ former conjugal quarters. Our dad had moved out of the house and our mom had turned the den into her new bedroom.
By Marie Wilson11 months ago in Psyche
