It is okay to be not okay

Lately, articles on depression and suicides among teens and children have caught my eyes and hit a chord with me. It is no secret that I have depression and that I have struggled to manage the symptoms of the illness at times. It has been 231 days since I hung one of those thick orange electric extension cord around a ceiling beam and stepped onto a chair to hang myself. I couldn't think of one reason to live as I prepared for it. I stepped down from the chair because I also couldn't think of one reason to die. 

Photo by Keren Fedida on Unsplash

It is one of those things that I wish I had learned... To be okay with not being okay. Life isn't rainbows and unicorns, but we have been taught that we should be happy. We are told that being angry, sad, afraid, upset, frustrated, anxious, mad and devastated are emotions we should avoid... That these are unhealthy for us. Yet, we also know that these are natural emotions and impossible to avoid. 

To live an emotionally and mentally healthy life, we need to handle a wide range of emotions and uncomfortable ones. Yet, parents often parent their children as though these emotions shouldn't and don't exist. That shielding leaves the children unable to handle life when it becomes other than unicorns and rainbows, often emotionally dwarfing the children and leading to self-harm. 

It is one of the reasons why I irk whenever my Mom sends me one of those be strong, all is going to be okay, how each day should be beautiful, smile gifs. My Mom, with the best of intentions and love for me, taught me to smile and be strong no matter what. That crying and being sad is bad and no one likes to be around it. To a child who was sexually abused, it had a devastating impact. Her words made my feelings of fear, sadness and anger shameful and invalid. Those words, her inability to parent me in a crisis, made me unable to handle life when it handed me other than unicorns and rainbows. Those lessons from my childhood made me feel ashamed while being abused in my previous relationship and hid the abuse for many months before going to the police. 

These articles reminded me of my ex-partner dwarfing his two daughters emotionally from lack of parenting. His needs to be the favorite parent between him and his ex-wife... His inability to cope with uncomfortable conversations and emotions... He would refer to them as "developmentally retarded" privately to me, behind their backs, to excuse their lack of... Witnessing him and them took a great toll on my own mental health. Combined with his verbal and physical abuse, I stepped up to the chair with fear for my life as over a year of mental abuse and nearly a year of physical abuse overwhelmed me. I felt all that happened, him abusing me and what I witnessed, was my shame... I now know that they are his shame. 

I realized in the past 231 days that it is okay to be not okay. That late lesson in my life gave me the courage to open up about my life experience that had been kept buried for the most part. That itself has kept me on this path of healing. I am learning that there are no toxic emotions, but just harmful reactions.

It seems like unicorns and rainbows appear less today than yesteryears. Life has become more competitive academically and socially. While children of today physically mature faster than previous generations, they are emotionally and mentally maturing at a slower pace from their parents' shielding. How can a person with just the ability to cope with happiness and comfort thrive, even survive, in a world filled with so much more than unicorns and rainbows? 

Supportive parents aren't the ones who exercise excessive protection and shielding. As Derek Thompson's Why American Teens Are So Sad on The Atlantic points out, the protective parenting style may be depriving children of the emotional resilience they need to handle today's stressful world. It starts with the parents. 

Parenting isn't unicorns and rainbows. It is about preparing your children, not only to survive but to thrive in this world. It isn't about shielding them from uncomfortable feelings but helping them to be okay with uncomfortable feelings, introspect to determine if those feelings are appropriate and react in healthy ways. 

Think of it as you are teaching your child to drive. You would teach them how to turn right, turn left, make u-turns, parallel park, stop and go. You wouldn't teach them to just turn left because they will just drive in a circle and go nowhere. By protecting your children from all the emotions they will encounter in life, you are only teaching them to live a life that goes nowhere but in a circle. 

Be the parent that pushes you out of your comfort zone and help your children face the truth no matter what. That truth will bring them so many emotions, good and bad, but they will thrive in life once they learn that emotions are something to be worked on and not to flee from. Tell them that it is okay to be not okay as long as they take a healthy step towards being okay once again. Sometimes, that means just crying out loud until there are no more cries left in us.