Lisa Marie Basile

The fact of the matter is that content mills are dangerous and personal essays are a different beast. And there’s a vast level of discrepancy between a phone-it-in XYZ — and a Here’s What It Feels Like piece and other essays, where the language sings and the story is backed up by reportage. I’m aware of this. But there is also a middle ground.

If you’re an empath, you probably easily absorb the emotions of others and need time alone to decompress. If you're like me you're one exhausted empath!

In this column, I talk about things other people think or say, but not out loud, and certainly not in public. No one wants to say, “People either love me or hate me” because it sounds ridiculous and arrogant and icky.

My happiness is what undid me, ironically. I worried so much about being OK with the happiness that I fell apart.

Please know that us flakes usually are dealing with something more than being lazy or disinterested. Flakes are usually ashamed and angry at themselves for not being able to speak out or address things “properly,” so a little love can go a long way.

I grew up knowing my family always had its very own black cloud. Like a backyard pet that comes and goes when it pleases, a room locked but filled with things we weren’t allowed to look at or set free. And it was all passed down to me like some broken heirloom — my ancestor’s weaknesses and fears, swirled into DNA’s mad ritual. Does the body sometimes take into itself — take from its creators — what it cannot heal from? Sometimes, yes.

Remember that your body is you, it is not separate. Treat it, yourself, with love. You’re a body of magic.

Like a lot of people with chronic illness or autoimmune/autoinflammatory disorders, I went through a dead-end labyrinth to get my diagnosis.

When the spread was published, all the girls in the shot were small — small enough to notice their not-bigness. It was the first time I felt “othered,” the first time I noticed how some versions of thin weren’t thin enough.