But Wolf? No.
“I would think if anyone could fail to be surprised by my name it would be someone named Journey,” he told me.
“I know, right?” I said. “And yet, here we are.”
The silence was long as he studied me, hand on his chin.
“I’m like, ‘Aaaah, don’t eat me!’”
This silence was longer. His brows creased, he gave me a confused look, and I felt like an idiot but kept talking because, well, that’s how I roll.
“Because you’re a ‘wolf.’ Never mind. Wow, this is awkward. So yes, hi. I’m Journey. I talk nonsensically when I’m nervous.”
“You’re nervous?” he asked.
I was. My palms were damp, my pulse a gallop.
“My track record with psychiatry is not good. There was the time I saw Dr. Shaw and he was like, ‘You’re crazy, take these pills,’ and I was like, ‘Oh, okay.’ After that I went away and tried to kill myself. So then there was Dr. Anglin, who was like, ‘Here are some new crazy pills,’ and I was like, ‘Maybe I’m not crazy?’ And she was like, ‘Yeah, no, you wouldn’t be here if you weren’t,’ so I was like, ‘Oh, okay, thanks.’ And that, friend, is it.”
Long, silent pause.
“I don’t think the pills are working,” I told him. “The lithium. I still have all these . . . unwanted thoughts. I’m tired all the time. Also look at my hands.”
I held them out so he could see how badly they shook.
“Maybe we should try something else,” I said.
“I don’t prescribe pills,” he said.
“Oh?”
This was news to me. I squinted at the framed degree on his wall. “I thought you were a doctor?”
“I am a doctor,” he said. “But I don’t prescribe pills.”
“Oh.”
I wasn’t sure where to go from here. Was this the kind of doctor who wanted me to talk about my feelings and my mother? I glanced behind me and noticed the leather couch, although it was covered in loose papers, books, folders, envelopes. Another slob, a kindred spirit.
“When was the last time you stopped and focused solely on your breath?” he asked.
Well, this was not what I expected. The answer was never, really—not on purpose, anyway. In fact, sometimes as a kid I had stopped and noticed my breathing and it had terrified me. Because it never ended. It kept going. And if I started focusing on it it’s all I could think about. I told Wolf this and he smiled.
“Sounds like you were a little Zen master without realizing it,” he said. “Essentially, you were practicing mindfulness.”
“I want to get away from my mind,” I said. “Not get more full of it. Mindfulness sounds like a nightmare.”
“But is it your mind that bothers you, or your thoughts?” he asked.
Hmm. I pondered this deeply. So deeply I swear my brain hurt. Or my mind? Or me? Where do my thoughts and big feelings end and where do I begin? Are we one thing, intertwined? Or am I a separate entity afflicted by my mind?
“You’re a different doctor than the others,” I said.
“I consider that a compliment,” he said.
Now that I looked around, I noticed all the Buddhist books on his shelf, the Gandhi quote needlepointed and hung in a frame. It made sense why my dad was so excited about me going to this appointment today.
“I’m going to assign you homework,” Wolf said. “You up for it?”
“Goody,” I said. “Just what I need.”
“What if I tell you it just requires you sitting with your eyes shut for ten minutes a day?”
“That sounds like some homework I can get behind.”
So here I am, seated on my bed cross-legged, eyes shut, world dark, alone with my breath—that rhythm I always carry with me and never really stop to notice. That roar of ocean in me. That relentless heart throb. Inhale, exhale, up, down, in, out, full, empty, round, round again. A voice keeps trying to talk in my head—my voice. And it’s annoying the crap out of me.
This is dumb, it says. What’s the point of this? What’s the point of anything? I want to call Jonah. Why hasn’t Jonah called? I hope we can get back together. I’m so sad. I’m so angry. I hate this homework. Nothing matters.
But I do my best to drown it out by inhaling, exhaling, up, down, in, out, full, empty, round, round again. And for a short, blissful period of time—I don’t know how long—that annoying voice in me shuts up. I only realize it after the moment has passed and it starts up again.
Dad’s is easy. Just us and a lot of takeout and TV. But then the weekend comes, eight days post-suicide attempt, and it’s time to face my mom, Levi, and my sisters.
Mom’s cheerful—dare I say, too cheerful? She brings home fancy sandwiches for dinner. We eat around the table. “By the way,” she whispered to me when I first came home today, “I haven’t told the girls or Levi the full story yet.” She told them all I had food poisoning last weekend because she thought it was a private thing I could share with people in my own time.
Um, no thanks.
Also . . . what?
I don’t understand my mom’s logic sometimes. She acts like mental illness and bipolar disorder and pills are totally acceptable, but then she wants to pretend the natural conclusion of it all never happened. I guess she’s just really committing to this everything is fine schtick. Like right now, she sits at the dinner table and chatters on about her nemesis at work with the same name as her, Amanda, who looks eerily like her, too.
Apparently Amanda B. has been playing music with swear words in it in the café and flirting with customers. The nerve.
“Actually, Mom, Amanda B. sounds pretty cool,” Ruby says.
Mom let Ruby dye her hair black, but only some crappy dye that washes out in six to eight washes, so Ruby’s once-blond, then-black hair is now the color of a bruise. Her sandwich has been eaten, but all the vegetables remain untouched on her plate.
“She is not cool,” Mom says. “Amanda B. is the bane of my existence.”
“You’re so dramatic, Mom,” Stevie says.
Stevie’s adult teeth still seem too big to fit in her mouth. She’s at the stage where she can still wear pigtail braids without looking ridiculous. Consensus of the world is she’s adorable.
“You’re eating well for someone who had food poisoning this week,” Levi says to me.
Oh, if only you knew, Levi.
“Right?” I say.
There is a balled-up sandwich wrapper on my plate, nothing more.
“That’s how I do it,” Levi says. “Get kicked off the horse and climb back up on the saddle again.”
Levi is an embarrassing well of cowboy metaphors. Also he dresses like a cowboy. And he owns a boot store. He even has a twang to his voice. I was down with all that until I found out he grew up in Burbank. He’s not mean or anything. He let us all move in with him in his big house up the hill. He gives us rides places. I just think my mom could do better. Mom swears up, down, and all around she and Levi didn’t start seeing each other until after the separation with Dad. I’m not great at arithmetic, but that timeline seems dubious. The Levi thing happened as fast as my parents’ breakup and stung as bad. Mom promised initially she would never date a man until us girls were ready, but when I called Levi a rebound and told her to slow down, she replied that she was happy now. A week into her new arrangement, she was ordering furniture and they were visiting dog shelters. I wasn’t ready. I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready.