In The Kitchen
Over the years, I've had many a difficult conversations about my mental health and assorted mental illnesses. Sometimes these conversations were to reassure my family that I wasn't actively suicidal. Sometimes they were a desperate attempt to explain why I was in the midst of a depressive episode. In most instances, I struggle so much with verbalizing my emotions and the heavy bricks labelled "depression" to my family and friends, despite my best efforts.
Where conversations happen
Some of these conversations take place in the car, some in my bedroom, others still out in public. The conversations in the kitchen, almost always exceed my somewhat limited expectations of myself and of my family and friends.
The kitchen is somewhat of a sacred place for my family. Both of my parents and all of my siblings are exceptional cooks, and the kitchen is where their magic happens. They can whip up meals fit for royalty in the span of an hour or so. Cooking is how my family shows love, and the kitchen is a safe place for them as a result. Every time I have had a particularly intense depressive episode, they gift me food.
Struggling to bond with family
I will be the first person to say that my family's skills in the kitchen have not trickled down to me. I struggle with an eating disorder, and I don't like getting my hands dirty.
As I got older, I struggled to bond with my family in certain ways because of my inability to cook. They share recipes, compare positive and negative cooking experiences, and they can work together to create something so much better than the sum of its parts. For the most part, I was unable to join them in that regard.
I almost always find myself standing next to the sink or out of the way, watching them work. There are times where magic happens though, when I find myself speaking openly and honestly about myself as they cook.
Honest conversations about life and depression
I tell them about current stressors, whether that's school, finding jobs, or a relationship in a rough patch. I explain how I lose energy by simply existing, the difficulties in doing basic chores, the constant ebb and flow of despair and hope in depression. The unexplainable suddenly becomes explainable. I can talk freely about trauma, anorexia, being disabled in a world not meant for me to thrive.
Outside of my family, I've had the best times of my life in the kitchen watching dear friends cook. I remember mornings spent with my honorary grandparents, my godmother and her husband, watching them prepare my favorite breakfast as I babbled about school and friend problems. In college, I spent countless nights sitting at the kitchen table or on top of the fridge watching my best friends cook dinners and late-night breakfasts as we poorly coped with academic stress.
Can they really understand what it's like?
I don't know if anyone ever truly understands what I am saying to them. I fear that I am saying nonsense, and depression is so difficult to comprehend regardless unless you personally battle it. Frankly, that does not matter in these circumstances though, because I am expressing myself for once. I can bare my heart and not be judged for it, consciously or unconsciously.
The kitchen holds some very complicated and personal emotions. I hold a great deal of food-related trauma that has proven difficult to treat over the years. As a result, I don’t know if the kitchen will ever be a safe place for me the way it is for my family.
A safe space for talking to family
Even with these difficulties though, it has proven to be a safe place for vulnerability and conversation in ways that I cannot deny. I struggle with vulnerability and emotional honesty, but the kitchen is one place where that is not always the case. I have not run from that honesty, and I am not about to start now.