More often than not, you’ll probably find me with a bright smile on my face, laughing at a joke my friend made, giddily sharing a new song I found, or literally jumping up and down when I see a dog on the street. As a kid, my parents always told me I was their sunshine, I served to light up their world; and all my life I’ve carried that with me, trying to be the light and love in everyone’s life. Through that period, it looked very much like being a people pleaser: always playing the role of the happy and uplifting person in a situation, even when I felt the opposite. It felt as if, my best-served purpose, was to always be the positive one, but in doing that I was harming myself, and ultimately harming my relationships. 

For a long time, the shards of my heart felt like they were held together with scotch tape, gradually peeling and falling away, barely holding anything together. Anxiety and depression are looming figures in my life, ones that are present even after I started going to therapy and taking medication. I allowed few others to see how it impacted me, afraid I would be unlovable, discarded, and no longer wanted if I couldn’t constantly be positive. I tried to hide the broken pieces of myself, afraid I would be too much, that I simply would stop fitting into people’s lives. I tried again and again to be this source of light when I myself felt surrounded by darkness. And eventually, I couldn’t do it anymore, I couldn’t hold the weight. My parents, my wonderful, lovely, supportive parents were the first to see this, to catch me as I started to fall and help pick me back up, again and again, each time I tripped. And they never failed to remind me that even as I struggled, I was still their sunshine.

And eventually, that struggle and that pain I had tried to conceal spilled out into my relationships outside of home, into my friendships. And let me tell you, it is hard to be vulnerable, to let others see that you’re struggling, especially when you want to hide it, especially when you’re trying to hold back this dam of pain to create room for the happiness of others. But I also know, and am reminded every day, that my best relationships were formed and/or became deeper, because I allowed myself to be vulnerable, because I found the best friends in the entire world who encouraged me to be vulnerable, who sat with me in the pain, who saw the tears I tried to hide, who had my back when I didn’t know if I could still stand. And who have made my life so much better because of it, have loved me better, and have in turn taught me to love deeper. Morgan, Celia, Ellie, Davin, Madeleine, Kylie, Hannah, and Lauren, oh how I love you so, I don’t know how I got especially lucky to be loved so well by all of you. The people who deserve you will stay, and they will make your life shine brighter because of it. 

The truth is, when I finally let myself be who I truly was, I was able to love others more authentically. Allowing myself to share more of my pain and struggle let me have brighter joy, a fuller heart, and more genuine relationships. Learning that I didn’t need to always be the most positive person in the room lifted so much weight from my back, and allowed me to fall into the love of all the incredible people around me. When I got to college, I had that desire to hide away, but I was reminded of how much better friendships are when built on the foundation of presenting your true self. When Alison and Kaitlyn walked into my life, and quickly became two of my favorite people in the world, I gradually let my guard down and allowed myself to just be me, and our relationship is much stronger and lifegiving because of it. Existing at the fullest of who I am makes me feel more positive than trying to hide behind a mask of joy ever did.

But that vulnerability, that lowering of the mask, is still incredibly hard for me. My first instinct is still to opt for the positive response, to mask the pain I might be feeling–my anxiety and depression haven’t left me, they’ve just become better treated, better medicated, but not gone. It’s still often very hard for me to share big negative feelings, it takes more mental encouragement and effort on my part, but speaking it, even when it’s hard, always makes me feel better than the weight of keeping it in ever did. So, I keep making the decision, to be truly myself, to let that love in, so that I too can continue to offer love. I remind myself every day that I am loved, valued, and deserve to take up space. So here I am taking up that space, and letting the light in.

Written by Lauren Deaton

Edited by Julia Maynard and Elisabeth Kay

My brother, Nicholas, started to tolerate me 2 years ago. Before that, I was the snitch younger sister who would run to my parents over the smallest of arguments. If you have an older brother, you understand the complex situation at hand. They humble you, insult you, and say possibly the most horrific one-liners that will haunt you at all the wrong moments. A sibling relationship will hurt you; he is probably one of the only people who has seen the cruelest side of me through our epic screaming matches where we both end up with tears and somehow a larger ego than we had before the match. We have seen each other at low points: he slacked off in high school and lied to my parents, and I have had my fair share of tantrums and selfish moments.

 I could tell a stranger on the street my entire life story from birth and would expect it to be reciprocated, whereas my brother has just started telling me stories from when he was in eighth grade. He’s private and reserved, shy and cautious. I’m loud and obnoxious, simply a younger sibling with a need to be the center of attention. 

For a long time, I longed for an older sister. Most of my friends have sisters and their bond with them seems unlike any other. As I spent more time with my brother over the pandemic and in the moments he was back from college, I have grown out of that want, maybe even becoming jealous of my brother as I watched him from afar. 

I’ve grown up with him, I’ve seen his weird phases of using an absurd amount of gel in his hair and being a bit obsessed with Eminem. But unfortunately for me, through those phases, I always looked up to him. I always believed he was the coolest and had the most eclectic group of friends and interests. When he eventually went to college, it felt as if someone who guided me through parts of high school was gone and I had to create new experiences for myself that would allow me to be half as cool. 

During the separation, we would be the closest we’ve ever been, I would call him crying over a situation while he gave me a brutal tough love speech, which was NOT necessarily what I needed at the moment. When he would call, it would only be to force me to listen to a new album or watch a TV show that would apparently alter my perspective on life. As much as I hate him for it now, most of my entertainment is heavily influenced by him. I have fond memories of us being in my room listening to the BROCKHAMPTON trilogy while he described the details of each of the songs. He has always wanted to share all of his very well-thought-out ideas with me on any topic and I think that’s beautiful. 

After one of our biggest fights ever, which of course I can’t remember what about, we discussed how we would get along for the rest of the summer since we were both home. It clicked to me, and somewhat him, that a sibling relationship is turbulent. It will continue to have its highs and lows because we know that we are always going to be present in each other's lives even when one of us is going through a moody phase; and in all fairness, it would most likely be me.

Written by Julia Maynard

Edited by Lauren Deaton and Elisabeth Kay

I measure intense emotion by way of heartache. In the same way someone might cry from happy tears, sad tears, or angry tears, I ache internally for all these reasons and more. I sit in my room and ache for my 16 year old self. It is a lonely, deeply dreadful feeling. I try watching a show, rereading and annotating an old book, listening to my favorite songs, but to no avail. I start to think I will have this chest pain for the rest of my life, that I am just going to be a girl with a pit in her heart. If I take a second to think about how many times I’ve felt this way in the past, I would remember that it does go away– it always comes back, but it does always go away. 

I feel a bittersweet ache for my family. They will always reside in the largest chunk of my heart. I try to imagine what my parents were really like when I was a child; consider what my memories of running through the botanic gardens on Yom Kippur were like for them. I worry about them constantly. I only wish to know about the good parts of their life. I wonder who they might have been at 19. I think about my brother and how I used to idolize him. I think about how he would dribble his soccer ball down the busiest street in Chicago, walking from summer camp to my mom’s office and how mad it would make me. I ache to think he is the same person he was and that I am the same person I was. 

I am so grateful that it nearly breaks me. Gratitude journals simply aren’t practical for girls like me because it would waste too much paper. Instead I am forced to think about how lucky I am to be alive which makes my body go into overdrive. This heartfelt ache extends to humankind as a whole. Seeing a family playing in the park or a stranger giving up their seat on the train is simply too sweet to stand.

I think about how I want to be loved and it hurts. I ruminate on the people from my past and I might as well be swallowing a wooden bench the way my insides twist and contort. There is a space in me designated for romantic love. I try to fill it with love for my family and friends – which I have an abundance of – but there is always a gap at the top. I wish I could fill it with knowledge, inside jokes with myself or photos on my phone, but it is only suited for one thing. My logical brain knows I’m not worried about its vacancy, but my body feels differently. Instead of being full of feeling like I was with my gratitude or thought towards my family, I am just empty. 

Sometimes I use my rage towards the men who have harmed me as motivation as I run on the treadmill. Anger makes me restless and when I’m restless, I need to understand it in my corporeal form. It is not enough to clench my fists, feel my face get red, and hold back tears. I have to let the rage bubble inside of me. It simply must burn a hole within me. 

My adolescence has been filled by these physical feelings. Maybe I’ll ache for my future self and she will look back and laugh at how foolish I am to know nothing else. Maybe she will feel joy in a different way. Maybe she will experience true love and it won’t be draining. Maybe she will think of our childhood and it won’t feel like a ceramic bowl has been shattered inside our body. No matter what happens in the future, I will never regret feeling my emotions for all the intensity they have to offer. Being emotional or sensitive is often portrayed as a weakness, but it's not. It is empowering to be in tune with your state and feel the fullness of being human.

Written by Clare Vogel

Edited by Diya Aneja and Elisabeth Kay

I am super jealous of people who have perfect skin. 

I started getting acne when I was sixteen years old. The most typical thing I heard was that all I had to do was wash my face. I forced my parents to buy me a Cerave Hydrating Cleanser with Cerave Daily Moisturizing Lotion. I continued this process for a whole year and nothing worked. 

One day, my sister came up to me mentioning a prescription acne medication which is offered over the counter called Differin Adapalene Gel. Typically, you are meant to only put a pea-sized amount on for your entire face. After reading the directions I was surprised. I probably used four pea-sized amounts for my whole face—which led to irritation to my skin leading me to visit a dermatologist. The symptoms were painful! I experienced redness and irritation and it was burning for two days straight. My dermatologist immediately recommended topical hydrocortisone which helped my skin heal up. 

A week later, I went back to the dermatologist asking about my acne issues. He prescribed me Tretinoin and I was using that for a good two years. While I was on Tretinoin, I upped the dosage every six months because it did not seem like it was working for me. And I was still using the Cerave products as well. 

Back in December of 2022, I went back to my dermatologist once again asking if I could do anything different since I was still getting acne. The acne was not necessarily bad, I just wanted to switch things up since I didn’t see any improvement whatsoever. He prescribed me a benzoyl peroxide adapalene mix formula. I was excited to try it because my high school best friend back home had success with it. However, after only two days of using the formula, I woke up in excruciating pain. Imagine the symptoms I got with the adapalene gel but five times worse. Yeah… it was not fun. I immediately went back to the dermatologist to get more topical hydrocortisone and my skin barrier finally recovered once again. 

I think we can understand the cycle here. Before starting my spring semester of college at Pitt, I asked my dermatologist for any recommendations and he told me to try the Differin Adapalene Gel once again. Weirdly enough, my acne started getting worse, so I scheduled another appointment during spring break. He recommended I go on a higher dosage of adapalene gel—but even that was not working. I was getting a little suspicious at this point but I went with it. My mindset was that he was the person who had to go to medical school and do all of this research, trust the man. 

While I was in college, a few people recommended isotretinoin, also known as Accutane, and they said they had so much success with it. It also didn’t seem too bad especially with them telling me that they only experienced dry skin and dry lips. I wanted to give it a shot so I convinced my dermatologist to let me go on Accutane, since none of his other recommendations were working. I know I was being super aggressive, but I gave this man too many tries. He prescribed me Accutane but failed to mention the important details about it. 

After being on it for about a week, I started to get the dry skin and lips I had heard about. A week later, I started to experience super bad joint pain and could feel myself becoming more depressed. All I had to do was just search “Accutane symptoms”, and I found a whole list. Possible Accutane symptoms include dry skin, dry lips, blurred vision, nosebleeds, acne purging,

headaches, joint and muscle pain, and mental health problems. Typically, not everyone experiences these symptoms—I just had the luck of being the guy to experience all of it. It was super hard for me to work out, but the most unfortunate symptom was how severely depressed I had become because of Accutane. I was super rude to my family, coworkers, and even customers working at my local McDonald’s. 

After over two months on Accutane, I randomly woke up with the biggest flair-up ever. Do you remember when I said the benzoyl peroxide adapalene formula was five times worse than the typical adapalene gel? Imagine that, but double. I saw myself in the mirror and immediately cried; I looked atrocious. I went to my mom and told her that I was no longer continuing the process. While I was in so much pain, I did some research on the dermatologist and realized that he had a two out of five-star rating. Apparently, this dermatologist was known for giving a lack of information and not even diagnosing the patients correctly. 

I immediately scheduled an appointment with a new dermatologist that was well-rated online. This new dermatologist gave me more natural ingredients to help my skin like sunflower oil, fish oil, and Cerave PM lotion. Even though it took a little over a week for my skin barrier to fully recover, I was happy that this dermatologist used more natural non-comedogenic products. He prescribed me doxycycline hyclate and niacinamide pills which are meant to be effective with the least amount of irritation. My acne, however, was still coming back. 

Even though these dermatologists went through a minimum of twelve years of training and education just to get to where they are—they do not know me personally. They can’t feel how my skin reacts to different things. So I did some research and reading about what's best for my oily, sensitive skin. 

I was able to get rid of my acne using Cerave Acne Foaming Cleanser and Differin Adapalene Gel. After getting rid of all of my acne, I had numerous dark and red spots from Accutane purging. Even now, they are not even close to being gone. I keep my high hopes with patience using things like Vichy Liftactiv Vitamin C Serum, Paula’s Choice Azelaic Acid, and Hero Cosmetics Rescue Balm. I still use the acne products and Cerave cleanser and moisturizer as well. 

Now that I finally understand how my skin works, it’s something I truly cherish. As a Chinese American growing up with a Chinese mother who believed in using incense on the full moon to elevate the spiritual connection between the full moon and my emotions, I never believed that wishing something could actually make it come true. I cried internally asking for help with my skin at this point. My skin eventually healed up, but I still personally do not believe in burning incense on the full moon. Yet, I truly feel great affection from my mother for making me do this every full moon. I think it is a good way to practice what you want in life and work for it no matter how long it takes. For half a decade, I was struggling with inflammatory acne. To finally say that it is gone, is so relieving. 

To anyone who is currently struggling with acne, I just want to say that you are not alone. It is a struggle and I am still to this day jealous of people who have perfect skin. The biggest advice I can give to you is to treat acne like getting your first pet. Do your own research and see what is best for you. Do you need to exfoliate? Do I have rough or smooth skin? Patience is key and I promise you, you will see progression. My heart goes out to all of you who are currently struggling with acne.

Written by Justin Pello

Edited by Meagan Meyer

Sexism, homophobia, racism, body-shaming, extremist conservative conspiracy theories—you name it, I’ve heard it. In seventh grade, my parents pulled me out of my public school and enrolled me in a small Christian school in central Pennsylvania. When I first arrived, I honestly really enjoyed my school. I was a middle schooler with new friends and a fresh start, and I didn’t care much about politics. However, when I got to high school, I started to see the problem. 

It was my freshman year when I discovered feminism and what it truly meant to be a feminist, and I was proud of it. It was also my freshman year when I had a teacher tell me that male privilege does not exist and made us watch a video in class to prove their point. 

It was my sophomore year when I started a new job which introduced me to new friends who were part of the LGBTQIA+ community—a community I had little to no exposure to. It was my sophomore year when I realized that these new friends would absolutely not be welcome at my school, let alone allowed to even attend it. 

It was my junior year when I returned from quarantine and the Black Lives Matter movement was a focal point of the media. It was my junior year when I found out that one of my teachers had said explicitly racist and vile things to a student. 

It was my senior year when I finally felt confident in my political standings. It was my senior year that I was singled out in classes for my beliefs. But it was also my senior year that I pushed back. 

How could a place that preaches so much love be full of so much hate? My experiences at school were truly life-changing for me. I began retaliating in any way I could, reporting teachers, starting an Affinity club with my friend, and trying to educate any chance I got. While I made little to no change within my school, I can easily say, it had an impact on me. Through my time there I have become stronger in my beliefs, or maybe even a raging liberal, as they might say.

Written by Jaci Marks

Edited by Madi Milchman and Elisabeth Kay

Since the age of four, I’ve thrown a plaid jumper over a white collared shirt five days a week. When I entered fifth grade, I traded the jumper for a skirt—a sign of growing up, entering middle school (though middle school was just the second floor of the elementary school building). I left the knee socks in the back of my sock drawer, trading them for crew socks, and subbed out black ballet flats for Sperry’s. In high school, the bright red pullover sweaters became black fleeces, and the skirts had been rolled up a few more times at the waist. In these uniforms that never seemed to fit me like a glove (even though I tried to style them in every way I could), I learned the ins and outs of trends, puberty, girlhood—you name it.

         In fifth grade, I transferred from St. Sebastian, a one-story elementary school and parish that got most of its funding from their annual festival, to Divine Child, a two-story elementary school on a joined campus with a high school, parish, and newly built three-million-dollar football field. This campus change also brought a change in people and my awareness of what was “cool”—I was quickly begging my mom for Sperry’s instead of my scuffed pair of flats, Lululemon headbands that had absolutely no business being twelve dollars, and anything with a brand’s logo on it. I’d fallen into a friend group that promised nothing pleasant, and that promise was fulfilled—by the end of seventh grade, I had my “best friend” telling me that I needed to find new friends because it was apparent that no one in the current friend group liked me all that much. I couldn’t pretend I didn’t see it coming; I sat at the end of the lunch table, practically hanging on to it for dear life trying to lean in just to hear a smidge of who they were gossiping about that day (the way I leaned probably caused a lot of the back pain I experience today). It was evident they were only friends with me for things they admired about me: when we went to Pink during the summer of our fifth-grade year, giggling about asking for bra fittings, their mouths were agape at my measurements coming back as a C cup at the age of 11. But the size of my boobs didn’t outweigh the fact that I simply didn’t fit in with these girls—my dad wasn’t the president of the local country club, and most of the clothes I’d worn outside of my uniform were hand-me-downs from my cousin.

         During the summer going into eighth grade, I truly became the girl I am now. I lacked friends from my new school, but I had those from my old. My childhood best friend Emma was one of my rocks during this time, with the other being my sister. I let my nerd back out; I became obsessed with everything Broadway-related, ditching soccer practice for singing lessons. I joined the theater department at my school, and despite its quirks, I found the people who I truly found solace in while finishing out middle school. One stuck with me all the way through high school—Ella. Emma transferred to the same high school as Ella and me, and we quickly fell into a comfortable friend group, finding our platonic soulmates in each other.

The three of us attended the biggest co-ed Catholic high school in Michigan, where we found ourselves in situations so uncomfortable they became laughable. A few years before our freshman year, our school lit up national news stories for mandating “Modesty Ponchos” for prom dresses that didn’t fit the dress code—too much shoulder, too much midriff, too much chest, too high of a slit, you name it. That situation was just a precedent for the years to come. It became a joke that every year, the school would be involved in at least one scandal. My freshman year, it was our campus minister doing a guest speech in our theology classes about respecting your body, which turned into a preachy speech about women “asking for it.” My sophomore year, it was our priest’s homily comparing Black Lives Matter protestors to terrorists. My junior year, it was our morality teacher getting fired for being Islamophobic towards a student (in Dearborn, the city with the highest Islam population in the United States, may I add). But I think it was my senior year that really threw me for a loop.

         We were sat in the Church, the wooden pews as uncomfortable as they always were on Tuesday mornings. I, like 90% of the students and faculty there, was prepared to daydream into a dozed state for the next hour. However, plans changed as a young male guest speaker stood at the altar, claiming he was going to talk about abstinence. He spoke for fifty uninterrupted minutes about his past addiction to masturbating, stating, “Spring break photos were the worst time for me.” He claimed he was saved because he would go to confession every time after—however, he warned us that if we indulged in anything of the sort, we wouldn’t be forgiven so easily. As we were dismissed back to classes that day, the Church roared louder than it did during responsorial or celebratory hymns. Every student and faculty member, including our campus minister, agreed—his speech was absurd. But this absurdity brought the students together, as the numerous stupidly offensive scandals Divine Child found themselves in always did. I’d talked to classmates I didn’t remember the names of as I walked back to class from the Church, laughing at jokes being made about the guy who’d just taken up our time talking about his sex life in front of the Tabernacle, where the body and blood of Christ is supposedly held. I searched for Emma in the hallway on the way to our apology assembly put on by our campus minister later that day, jumping in and out of conversations on our way to the auditorium.

It’s things like this that I remember the most from Catholic school—nothing taught in a theology class, nothing about the New or Old Testament, nothing about the Ten Commandments (though I could probably recite them if you asked; the Beatitudes is a different story)­—but about the sense of community that can come from such absurd moments, or about friendships made from ashes of old Lululemon headbands.

Written by Elisabeth Kay

Edited by Lauren Myers and Kate Castello

The other day I was having a conversation with my dad about my debilitating tendency to strive for perfection in everything. My family is VERY aware of my obsessive need to live life without any flaws. Being a perfectionist sounds like a positive thing, but actually, my desire for perfection is time-consuming and a trigger for my anxiety. I struggle when things don’t turn out the way I expected them to. Sometimes I get so upset about the outcome of something that I planned or created that I either become irrationally angry, start crying, or both. I know that may sound childish or silly, but it can be difficult to deal with my emotions when all I’m ever worried about is whether or not something will go wrong, or how to fix something, or why the people I care about didn’t say anything about my new art pieces or good grades.

One of my majors here at Pitt is Studio Arts. For some people, that may sound laid back and simple (like, why don’t you do it then?) but it really isn’t. A lot goes into creating any piece of art: planning, trial and error, class critiques, constructive criticism from professors, lots of

experimenting, and long hours. I mean, yeah, I don’t have to study for big exams, but I get

judged almost every single day based on my talent. In class critiques (our equivalent to exams),

you show your class your work, and then they all judge you and tell you if they think it’s good or not. For someone who feeds off of artistic and academic validation, in my mind, I need to be better than everyone else in the room. And being the best means everything is perfect. I have thrown away drawings that took me around 10 hours to make, the night before a critique because something about the piece wasn’t good enough. I’ve then had to redraw the entire piece from scratch before my class at 10 a.m. the next day. Even after I did all of that, I still wasn’t completely satisfied with the result. I basically set myself up for failure every single day because I hold myself to such impossible standards. My therapist tells me that I have an “all-or-nothing” mentality about life which means that everything is either completely perfect or completely awful, and it only takes one small thing to derail my entire day. My need for everything to be perfect doesn’t just apply to my art classes and school, however; perfectionism is a dark cloud looming over my head all day, every day. 

And it’s exhausting.

When I was in elementary school, I used to do this thing where I would “reset my life.” It means that whenever I said something weird, sat down in my chair awkwardly, answered a

question in class wrong or set my pencil down in a weird way, I would give myself a clean slate and start over. Usually, I would shake my head, and then the thing I did “wrong” was gone. After I did that, I would say to myself, “1..2..3..Go” and every mistake I made up to that very moment was erased, and I could start fresh. I am now very aware what I was doing—and a lot of the things I continue to do—are symptoms of OCD. Recently, I came to terms with this

information, and although it was difficult, it makes a lot of sense and explains my constant

anxiety regarding failure.

Failing in life is probably my biggest fear. My anxiety and perfectionism are not only a result of the fear that I have, but also from a sense of internalized pride. I don’t like not being the best at whatever I’m doing: which is unreasonable. I only hold myself to certain impossible standards because I selfishly think that I’m the only one who could possibly ever meet those standards. If you ever wanted to know a good way to lose friends, thinking you’re better than everyone else will help. I guarantee you that a majority of the other people in my studio arts courses don’t enjoy being in class with me because they can probably sense that I think I’m better than them. They can tell by the way I present my work in class exercises and by the way I comment on their work in critiques. The other step to losing friends is to completely shut down when things don’t turn out the way you expected them to and blame everyone else for what happened, which I do almost every other day.

Being a perfectionist affects almost every single aspect of my life. I can’t keep friends, I have bad time management skills, I can be a little selfish, and I’m really tired. But I’m also responsible for the stress that I put myself under. I think realizing these things about myself has been eye-opening and helpful, so I’m choosing not to beat myself up over the person I’ve become. I don’t think I’m a bad person. I don’t want people to think that I’m mean, a bitch, or someone with a big ego. I really just want people to think I’m kind. And I really want myself to know that my good is good enough.

Written by Maggie Knox

Edited by Naomi Bastiampillai and Kate Castello

Since I was a kid, helping people has been my specialty. I learned about empathy at a young age from my neighbor in the apartment next door, the green one with all the magnets strewn about. She was my safe haven and still is. I could talk to her about anything; she understood me and made me feel like an equal, despite our sixty-plus-year age difference. She was objective in her listening, making sure to understand everything from my perspective without just telling me her opinion and what to do. In her position, she could’ve told me what to do and I would’ve listened, since I knew a little twelve-year-old wouldn’t know better than the wise Elva. And yet, she empowered me, making sure I felt as though I could tackle the problem myself. She gave me the strength to do whatever needed to be done. She taught me how important it is to care about people other than myself. This concept was revolutionary to little old me—who would’ve thought that everybody around me had their own problems? As an only child, it was a bit hard at first to understand that the world didn’t revolve around me. But as time went on and I grew older, I not only understood that everybody had their own perspective, but it became the first thing I tried to understand before thinking about my own.

When I was twelve years old, I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life. The only clue I had about what my future career would entail was helping as many people as I could. This initially led me to education, but after I started seriously pursuing it in college, I realized that it wasn’t where I was meant to be. I loved the feeling of tutoring my peers, but it was much more exciting to see that I was making a difference, not just repeating content. It was the empowerment that moved me, assuring my peers they had it in them to do well on that exam or to write that essay that they were struggling with.

During my sophomore year of college, I stumbled upon social work. It fits me like a glove. I feel at home taking all of these classes. It feels like I’m standing in front of that green door with all the magnets, knocking and waiting for Elva to open the door. She may not have been a social worker, but she taught me the core values before I even knew what the word meant. I learned about service and empathy, and how to truly understand other people’s struggles even if I hadn’t experienced them myself. The dignity and worth of the person are so valuable. It doesn’t matter who the person is, they are still a person and deserve to be treated like one. Elva never treated me like a kid, she treated me like a person. No matter how silly the struggle I brought her, she was always eager to help. With social work, I get to do what I’ve always wanted—help others. 

I’ve never really struggled with any of the concepts involved in social work, except one. Self-care. I care so deeply about the struggles of other people, and yet when it comes to myself, I have not a single drop of empathy. I put others’ needs above my own and I always have. And yet, my mind blanked when my professor asked us about our favorite forms of self care as an icebreaker.  One of my love languages is quality time, but it's always quality time with another person, never myself. Is it really self care if it doesn’t involve me alone?

I used to love reading as a kid—I’d hide books in my desk during class and read while the teacher taught spelling. Now, reading has become a form of isolation, lacking that same warm feeling I now yearn for. Listening to music is self-care, right? Not when I only listen to music while doing something else or to mute my thoughts as I walk to class or go about my day. I used to love crafting, but now I simply don’t have the time or resources to start or even finish a fun project. 

All of this leads me to question the necessity of self-care. Is it truly necessary to care for myself if I can still find ways to care for others? Sure, self-care is important for other people, but if I’ve survived this long without it, why should I even start? Where would I even start? It’s especially difficult when there are so many guidelines on the dos and don’ts of the job as a social worker, yet no instructional section on how to take care of yourself. 

As of right now, I don’t particularly have a go-to form of self-care when I probably should. Social work is the business of helping people, and as my professors always say, you can’t help others until you help yourself. But what if helping others is exactly what I need to help myself? I’ll get there. For now, I’m just going to say my favorite form of self-care is surrounding myself with the people that make me feel loved. And I’ll try my damn hardest to make sure those people feel loved too.

Written by Inessa Kiefer

Edited by Bella Emmanouilides and Kate Castello

You would think that the body, for the most part, is the only truly free thing there is.

 After all, barring any preventative disabilities, people breathe, sleep, and move on their own. Yet, our bodies are never truly our own. There’s a term for this in academic rhetoric: the bodily “home”: 

“The body as home, but only if it is understood that bodies are never singular, but rather haunted, strengthened, underscored by countless other bodies.” 

We are what others see us as. And, more than that, we change ourselves to fit into the mold that we think others want to see. We are impressionable bodies who want nothing more than to blend into the “mainstream”. To not fit in is to feel like we are wrong. This is, without a doubt, the worst feeling we can experience: a sense of not belonging that leaves us isolated and alienated. In this way, we are trapped by others’ expectations and views. 

“The body as home, but only if it is understood that place and community and culture burrow deep into our bones.” 

We assign value to our bodies based on cultural understanding. Whatever the media tells us the body should look like is what we strive to be. To say this is a form of peer pressure is an understatement. It goes beyond what people say to us, or what the people around us look like. Instead, it extends to the entire world and can be observed through any medium (social media, film, literature, advertisement, etc.). In this way, we are trapped by the world’s expectations and views. 

“The body as home, but only if it is understood that language too lives under the skin.” 

We define ourselves based on language. Unconsciously or not, we adapt the phrases, slang, and tone we use to fit in with others. To not do so, again, creates a sense of distance from others. Even if these words seem foreign, the jokes confusing, the lingo incomprehensible—the alternative is far worse. In this way, we are trapped by language’s expectations and views. 

“The body as home, but only if it is understood that bodies can be stolen, fed lies and poison, and torn away from us.” 

This may be the worst one of all. Even if we hide ourselves away from the world desperately trying to keep the oppressive expectations of others, media, and language away from us, we can still be stolen and ripped away from ourselves. Our bodies are mere puppets, never fully our own. We can be controlled in any number of ways, thereby stripping us of our ability to define, own, and care for ourselves. In this way, we are trapped by the fear of our bodies being out of our control. 

“The body as home, but only if it is understood that the stolen body can be reclaimed.”

After all of the trauma we endure through societal pressure, language, and hostile takeovers, we can fight our way back to ourselves. A dim light in an otherwise dark reality. For, while we can ultimately reclaim ourselves, that doesn’t take away from the fact that we lost ownership of ourselves in the first place. This is a disheartening, frightening, and horrible reality. However, it is our reality nonetheless. All we can do is be aware of these dangers to try and help us preemptively and proactively shield ourselves. So (try to) ignore others, (try to) ignore society, (try to) ignore rhetoric, and (definitely) ignore those ominous, masked puppeteers. We are our own homes, and we should fight to keep it that way.

Written by Teagan Chandler

Edited by Emily Russell & Kate Castello

I had wrestled with the thought for weeks and I kept losing. 

It was a constant battle of who I was pretending to be versus how I felt on the inside. Nightly, I was living through a bad dream—and that bad dream was liking guys. In social situations, I would only turn on the part of me that liked girls, and even if I rarely talked about liking anybody, at least I was being perceived as straight. 

A part of me thought that I would single-handedly blow up the Earth and, more importantly, blow up my family’s life if I told anyone. I was raised in the most suburban, middle-class, churchgoing, family-portrait-on-the-wall household and I was scared. I was worried that coming out to my mother and father meant that they wouldn’t accept me, or worse, disown me. A cousin of mine had come out when I was a child and it was something my family did not take well. I watched family members who always said they would love us no matter what morphe into judging strangers consumed by their own ignorance. I was only a child watching this situation play out, but I knew deep down I’d never have the guts to come out to them. This fear placed an imprint on my sexuality as something I needed to hide from everyone, because if my parents wouldn’t accept me, who would? The idea of coming out to my friends felt even worse; my friends have no obligation to accept me as there is no blood between us. What would my friends do when I told them? How would they react? Would they reject me too? I had come to the conclusion myself that I was already not going to be accepted by anyone and that kept me up at night. With constant anxiety and self-sabotage, I resorted to grinding my teeth together and biting my nails until there was nothing left to bite. 

In grade school, I felt like I was always trying to prove myself to guys, and always trying to hide my sexuality. However, it somehow worked its way into the conversation anyway. Whether it be the simple question, “Are you gay?” or the whispers of slurs thrown around the hallways, it followed me around like my shadow. He was constantly taunting me, pushing me deeper and deeper into the closet and I was powerless to stop it. Before then, I hadn’t actually thought about my attraction towards men. I wanted to keep that part of me as separate as possible. I couldn’t even admit it to myself. 

A few weeks ago, I was talking to a friend of mine whose brother had come out as gay. I was curious, “How hard was it for him to come out?” Silently I hoped the answer was so impossibly hard that it was not worth going through the trouble and I could just hide my sexuality from everyone, including myself. However, she told me it didn’t matter if I came out to my friends or my parents because I didn’t owe anyone anything. I was shocked. My biggest hurdle wasn’t going to be coming out to my friends or family, but to myself. 

Before I went to bed, I put my phone down, stared at the ceiling, and just lay with my thoughts, which were mostly consumed with spiraling anxieties surrounding my sexuality. However, a new thought seemed to occupy my mind. I kept thinking about what my friend told me, about not owing anyone anything. I kept tossing and turning over the thought of not placing what people might think about me on how to live my life. I thought, I want to please everyone and I want everyone to be happy. Subconsciously I asked myself, what was in it for me? What was I gaining by letting anyone have that internal control over me? For the first time, I was not ashamed of my sexuality. Rather, I was happy and comically giddy about the idea of liking a guy. I felt like a middle schooler infatuated with their first crush. I rolled over to the other side of my mattress and realized I had won. I wasn’t fighting with my shadow anymore—I finally pinned him down to the mat and walked out of the closet. Most importantly, I wasn’t scared. I wasn’t scared of what anyone would think or what anyone would feel, because it was never about them. It was always about me.

Written by Will Beddick

Edited by Sophia Chen & Kate Castello