Spring 2020: The Health Humanities Journal of UNC-CH

Page 30

28

Attempting to Manage Mental Illness Rachel Carney

1. i don’t want to be sitting in this office that is meant to be comfortable but is clearly still a doctor’s office, surrounded by these pointless knickknacks that are supposed to be calming or interesting or distracting enough to take my mind off of where i really am. i do like this little plushy basketball and so i grab it and spin it over in my hands until i get bored and then grab the neon fidget spinner. it gives my fingers more to do, so i flick it for the next sixty minutes until i get to leave.

2. The blue pill filled my head with cotton balls, slipped in through the ear canal. White space, thick and full, replaced all the words caught at the back of the tongue, stuck stubborn to tonsils. Peeled from the palate, a parapet. Manifest a croak to pass as an answer to a question that can’t seem to bypass the cotton to my brain. The lady with the glasses in the chair across from me cocks my head with one hand & with the other begins tweezing the cotton out, through my mouth, ears, & nose.


Turn static files into dynamic content formats.

Create a flipbook
Issuu converts static files into: digital portfolios, online yearbooks, online catalogs, digital photo albums and more. Sign up and create your flipbook.