Meet Camlyn

In my senior year at college, my levels of anxiety reached a high I hadn’t experienced before. I felt depressed, overwhelmed, and helpless for months and months. I went back and forth between sticking it out or dropping out. I did not know if I would make it to graduation. I was seeing a therapist, which helped in the moment, but didn’t do enough to relieve the arbitrary obligations I felt weighing on me. I was going through the motions, but absolutely shutting down. My parents watched me pretty desperately. It hurt them to see me like that, but they were helpless to “fix” it. One night my dad checked in again to see how I was doing. Nothing had changed. He went on to say, “Camlyn, I really don’t care if you graduate. That’s not what’s important. I just don’t want you to fall apart and lose your beautiful mind.” It had never dawned on me that my dad was afraid of the same thing I was afraid of: me losing myself. I thought my parents only cared about me graduating and being “successful.” I had no idea that they prioritized my mental health. As a parent, they may have felt that was obvious and that I already knew that. But at a core, inner child level, I didn’t. I needed to hear them say it and mean it. I needed to understand that they valued my mental health for the sake of my mental health. Not so that I could complete x and y. They cared about me. Not my accomplishments. Not how I made the family look. Not a future that we all expected. That very small recognition shifted the weight and helped me let go of the obligation I had placed upon myself: to please my parents with a falsely-prioritized expectation, even if it destroyed me. My mental and emotional health hinged upon relationships, expectations, and my perceptions. Do you see the parallel here? Years later, I am in my late twenties. I am a teacher. I continue to learn more about myself and how my heart works. I came to understand that I am attracted to a certain kind of heart and connection. The external form will vary, but there’s some kind of internal frequency that I recognize. One day in the kitchen, I asked my mom how she would react if I found that connection with a woman (I identify as she/her). My mother processed for a moment and shrugged. “I don’t know if I can know how I would react. But I guess you and I would just keep talking through it and asking questions.” I was so moved by that honest, real, and fruitful response. She was saying, “Even through uncertainty, let’s just keep communicating. Let’s stay connected. Let’s deepen our understanding. Let’s walk and explore together. Let’s not get too far from one another.” That’s our priority.