Dear Little Me

Dear Little Me

(Mentions of Suicide and the story is about mental health)

  I hate waking up in the morning – especially nowadays. I have since I was young. I think it has something to do with the Pol-G disease or now that I know some more about medical shit possibly cortisol. High levels of it happen right as I wake up? Maybe, maybe… I just know that as soon I hear birds, it makes my bed feel like it’s so much more comfortable than it had been last night. Can you blame me? It’s kind of annoying too, actually, though because then I can’t get started on the day and then I end up feeling guilty, I like I should have been up all night instead.

I lay there in bed as if it’s sport and stare out the window, trying to will the sun to go back down and bring the darkness back. Sounds very Edgar Allen Poe, but sleep is the only time I never think of anything. Another side effect of always being home and alone most of the time. I can’t seem to be of well mind. It’s not that I don’t want to be. I just think and think and think and think and can’t stop, and eventually you just stay on negative thoughts and can’t get out. On all the ends and outs of the universe. Whoops.

Sighing, I do eventually sit up after having a five-minute meditation session to calm the aforementioned anxiety and then slowly got out of the bed to make it quickly. I am watching my older sister again who is sick in bed with the same disease I have, and I feel (“feel” being the operative word here) I am being punished by my parents into watching her with no pay, even though they told me – specifically my step-dad – that they would.

I really should not complain, I guess. It’ll just make me sound like a victim like everybody tells me it apparently does. If you go too raw on something that has seriously happened to you, people always make it seem like you are the one complaining. Especially if the people who are supposed to care for you get ahold of it and start spewing hatred at you for only spewing the truth. The truth… Maybe.

I go to the kitchen to look in the fridge at what I have to eat. Eggs for breakfast again is what I choose. Not to bore the audience who may be reading this, but if you need to fill up a 1000–3000-word quota, well these be the facts of the matter. I ate slowly at the kitchen table and watched my phone as usual. The new Stranger Things season is coming out soon and I am catching up, but I do have to figure out what I am going to do for the day. As I clean my plate and place it in the sink, it still hasn’t sunk in yet what I need to do. I sit on the couch and boot up my laptop and stare at it for a little bit, wondering. Wondering. Wondering…

I then decide my best option is to look on writing websites to see what comes up in the cues. I am writing a book, but it is only partially done and, I don’t know, I guess I need a break from it. Or I have been thinking about that too, maybe I am just procrastinating on it. I can’t seem to get my head to get in the game on it when I am worried about everything fucking else in my life. It seems it ridiculous, yes I am so worried about my family, my relationships and friendships, my money. Even my spiritual well-being. It’s no fun being alone in the house all the time when you are chronically ill, especially when you can’t drive. Of course, that is possibly the younger Me’s fault because I truly wanted to save the planet when I was a child. A honorable sentiment, but that doesn’t quite get you anywhere when you are sick and need to rely on the kindness of the public at large to get you anywhere.

And that is when it hit me. I knew what to write today.

With that, I opened a Word Document to a blank page and began to write:

Dear Younger Me,

Hello from the heck-hole that is 2022. I realize this is a little unprecedented, but I figure now is as good a time as any to say hello from the future. So I guessing, right now you are in the 9586 house reading books and playing Nancy Drew in your room, right? I bet that’s fun, yeah? Of course, I’m not knocking it. You can do whatever you want to, and you can still that. That is first and foremost what I want to tell you. That everything is energy and that is what you must learn to manipulate in your life to get anything you want. That’s an important thing to know at all if you ever want to get by in this world.

The second thing is: I know that…Dad hurt you when he left Mom, but you’ve got to let another man into your life. Do not let him take away your high school experience with boys. Especially if you happen to fall in love with a skater boy named Patrick Jorjorian, who will burp in your face at the YMCA skate park the first time you meet him. You guys will play a game of high school crush cat-and-mouse but trust me on this. He loves you. Give him a chance. Be brave and ask him out. Don’t just leave him with a kiss him on the cheek at the end of junior year – ASK, HIM. OUT. I say it like this because…you never see him again. He…kills himself at the end of March 2020, right before a big worldwide pandemic hit the Earth. Which is, of course, another thing I need to tell you about because it will take a lot of things from you, but I’ll tell you at a later time. Luckily you and your family make it through, so rest assured

Another point to get to is: Learn how to drive. It is a noble thing to want to help the environment, but if don’t learn how to drive, you are going to get stuck at alone all the time and have to rely on the kindness of strangers who you have to pay or that may not always mean the best for you. Be kind to those people (there is a difference between nice and kind), but still learn. Even if you don’t go that many places. Because and this comes to my next point-

You might or might not get very sick with a chronic disease called POL-G Mitochondrial Disease and it’s going to fuck up your whole life. It causes gastroparesis, which makes you vomit and shit like crazy, muscle weakness so that you are always tired, worsen mental illness like depression and anxiety, and all sorts of crazy symptoms that are so insane you won’t believe it. Mitochondria are the powerhouse of the cell, and they are everywhere in the body, so that it is why it affects so many systems. Thankfully, after almost dying with it in the hospital, you’re not…quite as bad with it as your two sisters, but you guys’ kind of trade off. Either way, it’s going to make life a little more difficult for you. You’ll get on a drug trial in late 2018 for it, but the company will have a hard time getting it approved in the third trimester, but don’t give up. You’ve got your stories and characters. You need to have them sorted out in order to try to begin a career as an author/artist. Speaking of…

There will be a boy in one of your college classes. His name is Lucas Eytchison, while he is a good, sweet person, don’t let that go to your head. I know you are obsessed with finding love, but... Just try not to become obsessed with him to the point you are going crazy, and he breaks your heart that careens into a fucking mental break. I don’t know, there are so many roads you can go with this one. 1.) You cannot self-sabotage yourself and just ask him out or cal him out when he starts acting weird around you. Because he had feelings for you. 2.) If he still goes for Peyton Bottoms, though, you can either write him that stupid poem about tarot cards and actually commit to giving it to him, or you cannot and look for someone else, like Patrick because around this time, he isn’t dead yet. 3.) If he still decides to turn his back on you, try to go find someone else. You may truly and well believe in twin flames at this time and want it to happen in this life but waiting for him like you were without trying to be his friend just makes things worse. Who the hell knows if he was your twin flame anyway? You just have trust God has your back. You need keep going whether he comes back to you or if you end up with someone else. It’ll be okay. You just need to not sacrifice a career for him or give up on love entirely or yourself. It’s not fair to you and it’s not fair to him. And if all that still happens keep going.

Also, there’s Casey. I think she still wants to help you. Maybe, but you must be there for her too as best as you can be. Even if she can’t tell when you are. I don’t know, it’s a hard thing to process. She says she’s still your friend and you guys have been for 13 years. Try to be positive.

Anyway, I think I have told you as much as I could. Except for maybe a couple of things. You are a good person. You are a good writer and artist. And you will make someone happy one day. Keep going. It gets tiring but don’t give in to your fears and doubts. They are strong, but so are you. Life is scary and you do have a disease. But God will lead you to the right people and you will be okay. Right now, I am watching over, Kayla, your older sister. Maybe it’s the right thing to do.

And maybe I will write you again. Hopefully it won’t be so ramble-y like this letter was. Now go and grab Patrick.

Good Luck and I love you, Little Me.

Your Older Self

I sat back against the couch, looking at my handiwork, smiling pensively. I figured I probably should have gone more into the COVID pandemic a little more, but that might take a whole letter unto itself. It’s nothing, against nothing.

I closed the laptop just as my sister calls from the back to ask for more water and I get up shakily to get it for her. The hallway swallowed me up into the darkness as she keeps calling me.

The End