I'm going into therapy

Because I want to be a therapist. So I'd better darn well be familiar with the process and have some empathy for those on the other end of things. And the most respected areas of the field pretty much expect that you receive therapy yourself as a lifelong endeavor.

Because I believe in therapy. I think the majority of the world's problems would be solved if everyone got over their bullshit egos thinking that you only get "help" if something's "wrong" with you and you can't "take care of yourself." Because one of my favorite quotes is

"Every single person has at least one secret that would break your heart. If we could just remember this, I think there would be a lot more compassion and tolerance in the world."
— Frank Warren

Because sometimes I forget that I'm not normal. Because I had help to get through it and I ended up ok and I feel like I should fit in with the world. But most people did not lose one of their parents when they were fourteen. And that stays with you forever. Every loss does. But I have been thinking about the concept of being an orphan lately. About how Harry Potter is an orphan, about how he has automatic conflict and depth and never ending heartbreak because he will always always be the boy who feels the stinging deep ache of his parents' absence. But there is no word for being half an orphan. I think there should be. Because I think that feels appropriate, to find some way to pin down what I feel, what I am - I am half an orphan. I think I will always be damaged and I will always be missing something and I will always live in an entirely different world than people with both parents. At least people who got to graduate high school with both parents, who got to graduate college, who got to have their fathers walk them down the aisle, who got to have their parents meet their children.

But my therapist isn't going into all this yet. We're mostly talking about my sleeping habits and such so far. Which is fine. I know we have to "build the therapeutic relationship" and start on the easier things.

And I'm also going because I'm using the University's clinic that they use as a training tool for their students. So I get to pay $9 a session in exchange for a girl who is my age if not younger and who I don't think has ever been out in the world not in college. But that is ok. Because one day I will be her, and I will need understanding clients to learn on. And one day I will be able to afford therapy with someone older and wiser and strong enough to hold everything I have to share.

So this is my activism against the stigma of therapy, against the way the normal response is to laugh at it as only something "silly elitist self-centered people do" or shudder in disgust at even taking a look at the deeper issues or say, "well that's great for you but I can certainly take care of myself."

Because, guess what - I can take care of myself too. I even welcome it when people have the courage to ask me about my dad. It's not taboo, I'm glad you want to know. I can answer your questions appropriately and calmly. And I can function in the world like any human being. But I want more than functioning, I want more out of life, I want to take absolute thorough care of every crevice of my psyche, I want to ascend to new levels and I want to face my weaknesses.

If only the men who start the world's wars had the courage to do the same.