Best 16 quotes of Anne T. Donahue on MyQuotes

Before talking to my mom about how out of control I felt, I'd spent the night crying alone in the park I grew up going to, chain smoking, because the guy that I liked hadn't texted me back. And even amidst my tears and Camels and repeated utterings of "I'm going to die alone," I knew I looked fucking crazy. I knew if the guy could see me reacting this way, he'd block my number. But I still couldn't stop, and that's what scared me. My emotions had become all-encompassing. Like the night I'd given my landlord notice, I couldn't see or feel anything other than the most extreme version of the worst-case scenario. Because here's the thing: in those polarizing moments of ups or downs, what you're feeling in that moment can't be reasoned with or told to slow down, let alone stop. I looked across the park at the swings my friends and I used to hang out on and wondered what the fuck was wrong with me. Why couldn't I feel the way I used to, once upon a time? I wanted to feel invincible the way I sometimes did -- or better yet, I wanted no feeling at all.

Being jealous does nothing. It turns you into a person who’s unable to feel genuine happiness, and tarnishes every accomplishment when it’s used to measure your sense of worth on a made-up scale. You hear about a friend’s promotion (in an industry that probably isn’t yours) and feel like you will never venture past your existing achievements. You hear someone from high school is getting married and assume that you never will. You discover the guy you worked retail with in 2006 has a new apartment, and you sit wherever you happen to live and actively resent the space you loved five minutes ago. And feelings like will always come up; it’s just up to you to say “fuck off.” So, while I’d like to say you should just decide not to be jealous, and that we’re all in this together so let’s remember that and be best friends, I know that isn’t realistic because jealousy is immune to reason and logic…If I feel myself slipping into a jealousy wormhole when I see someone else shining, I remember that to gauge my self-worth based on someone else’s accomplishments is a one-way ticket to bitterness.

But I haven’t forgotten my misplaced anger either, so I also have to remember to shut the fuck up and listen sometimes. Because if I’m this angry as a white, hetero, cis, thin, able-bodied woman (Polly Pocket: Privilege), I can only imagine how angry women at the intersections of other forms of oppression are. Which means I need to connect to a larger community and movement, to let my voice be one of many, to be a voice that sometimes just amplifies other people’s. Turns out this is great, though – because the only thing better than one angry woman is an army of them.

But I've since realized that I'm fine with my anxious-ass, can't-touch-my-toes life. In my soul, I am not chill, and I do not want to be calm, and no part of me aspires to Zen. Sure, through yoga I learned to take time for myself, and I learned how to deep-breathe through pain, but the most valuable thing yoga taught me was that I'm not built to be a yogi -- and that's the only mantra I need. For anyone who wants to be a yogi but hears the internal cries of "Oh my God, I hate this so much" from start to finish? Fuck it. Oh man, fuck it all the way back to wherever you bought your mat from. There are other outlets for your energy, other ways to carve out some peace. Nobody here needs to force themselves into downward dog when they'd rather be walking super-fast around the mall.

Compared to his experience, I wasn't an alcoholic -- he'd seen a real rinker, and I didn't look anything like that. But the older I got, the more complicated my habit became. I started to drink to fall asleep, to feel confident, to write. I began to drink well -- I learned how to make sure nobody ever really knew I'd been drinking at all. I drank to feel included, and I drank if it was offered. I drank to break the ice; I drank to spark real talk. I drank to hit on boys, and I drank to justify kissing them. Drinking could open a strange gateway to vulnerability. I drank because it gave me the illusion of control. I drank to justify intentional fuckery, knowing I could always circumvent real accountability by blaming it on too much of whatever I'd had the night before. I drank because I could escape from my anxiety and my worries and my hang-ups and everything that held me back. And I drank because I liked it. Because that's the thing: I liked it. Drinking was my favorite pastime and my costume. For a few solid hours, I got to convince myself (and everybody I met) that I was really much better than my actual self -- a shiny, full-color version.

Death is an asshole. Regardless of illness or circumstance or gut feelings, you are never ready to accept never seeing someone again, to have nothing left but last conversations and memories. You are never ready to be left with how sick somebody looked, or the way they stood up and hugged you despite how dizzy and feverish they were. You are never ready to exist without a person you loved and still need. Death is a constant, but you are never ready… But while it’s scary and awful and exhausting and terrible, it’s also comforting to have accepted that death will always be there and will always rip out your heart. It doesn’t get easy, and it will find surprising new ways of debilitating you. But what does get simpler is your awareness of it – the reminder that you have gotten through it before, and you will get through it again, and it will never, ever be as bad as it is in the moment you are battling through. It will never hurt the way it did when you found out, and the ache will never be as painful as when you realize those were your last words to them. It won’t be as painful forever… So, no, we can’t control death. But we can control how we breathe, how we act, the type of work we do. We can control what we say yes or no to, control who we choose to surround ourselves with, control the way we make the people we love feel. We can decide to be kind, to try our best, and to be honest. Those are the things that outlive us. When we’re faced with the harshness of how quickly someone can be taken away, we also see how we’ll likely be remembered: as human beings who are far more than the successes and failures we tend to define ourselves by. After we’re dead, we just get to be people.

I don’t trust a person who hasn’t failed. Failing makes you strong and resilient and wise and interesting. Perfect people don’t exist, and the ones who aspire to be perfect are boring. Failing is how you grow. It’s how you change and learn that you can resurrect yourself, how you learn to apologize, reconsider, and reject a life of self-pity. I have failed at retail work, school, finances, family, friendships, relationships, fashion, and driving my car…I have learned that I don’t know anything, and that I will never know everything, and that I will likely keep on failing.

Maybe my addictive tendencies weren't limited to my zest for things I could drink. Like maybe (I learned while working with my therapist) I had broader issues with control and addiction and using substances to dial down my anxiety. And maybe self-medication is a real dangerous way of trying to quiet the noise of a mental health disorder. And maybe alcoholism also runs in the family.

In less than a year, the magic of being diagnosed had begun to wear off, and my bipolar disorder no longer felt like a story hook. It felt like a part of me I wasn't sure I wanted to sit with anymore. So the further away I got from the diagnosis and all that had led up to it, the more I downplayed the extremes or made them punchlines I could use before anybody else could. I came to resent the head tilts and looks of surprise that go hand in hand with sharing what I'd come to see as a particularly unglamorous part of my life. If this was what interesting was, I didn't want it anymore. I hadn't counted on the most interesting people not being able to opt out. I didn't want to be the woman who does everything despite her bipolar disorder. I wanted to be the woman who has many complexities, her bipolar disorder being just one of them. (You know, a person).

Lessons are learned by acknowledging the grossest and cruelest parts of ourselves.

Nana’s funeral was packed wall-to-wall. And I cried hard and dramatically, completely unable to keep it together despite having known for the better part of a year that she was going to die. Death was the worst, and I hated the way it reminded me of how out of control I was. But the older I go, the more death became a constant. Friends lost loved ones, my family lost friends, and my dad and mom put our family cat down after 17 years. With every death, I taught myself to emote a little bit less, pushing the acknowledgment of loss down as far as I could, desperate for a sense of control over the uncontrollable.

So a guy who actively took pride in treating me terribly? I was up for the challenge. I could be a good enough woman to change for. I could prove I was worthy of someone realizing I deserved respect and kindness and, one day, if I worked hard enough, love.

So just tell your friends the truth. Tell them you're angry, sad, annoyed, hurt, tired, anxious; that you'd rather eat poison than go to a birthday party at a fucking nightclub again, and that you'll just take them out for dinner instead.

With age, I've come to embrace who I am. In my case, I am a person with a fantastic capacity for setting boundaries. More than I love saying yes, I love saying no. I love rescheduling. I love cancelling and being cancelled on. I take delight in declining Facebook event invitations. I love going to an uncool family chain restaurant with a best friend and talking shit for three hours, blissfully aware we will see nobody we know. I love not knowing what cool bands are playing at a music festival I don't care about and will never go to. Ultimately, I love not doing shit I hate. Freedom.

You and your anger are needed. You and your anger are valuable. You and your anger will be the fire that burns it all down.

You favor the part of yourself you need to be at any one time, and you let the others hang back while you figure our shit out. None of us have just one facet. Sometimes I still struggle to reconcile who I am now with the persons I was. But I also know not to worry, since whoever I am right now is exactly who I need to be.