Sam Dylan Finch

You can swear up and down that you meant it some other way, but the reality is that “crazy” and “insanity” refer to a lack of sanity, which will always circle back to and affect mentally ill people, especially when it’s used in ways that diminish or sensationalize our experiences.

I spent many sleepless nights worrying that being transgender meant that I would live a troubled life.

One thing I’ve noticed about mental illness is that it’s a mess of contradictions. It tells us one thing, urges us to do another. We have one desire, but then act totally to the contrary because… reasons.

It would’ve been a whole lot easier if the writing fairy had dropped out of the sky and told me what to do, instead of wasting months and months trying to figure it out. So I’m writing this with the hopes that I, your writing fairy, am saving you a hell of a lot of time by giving you this advice upfront. Here are some pretty basic tips that have helped me to improve on my craft.

Everyone, whether they have a mental illness or not, knows what it’s like to be in total despair and have no idea what to do about it. You’re curled up in bed, you don’t want to move, and you desperately wish you knew how to make things better.

Imagine a scenario in which these highly-evolved dinosaurs, instead of destroying an entire village and kidnapping women (SNORE), were actually gentle giants that brought sexual liberation to a village of patriarchal, shitty human beings.

Dating while trans is scary, especially when you’re starting to “pass.” What are his expectations for my body, if any, and what if I’m not what he had in mind and he rejects me outright?

A thousand Bach violin concertos swirling around my crib, imprinting those melodies on my brain, had not changed the fact that I was meant to be a cellist. And a thousand “she’s,” beginning from the moment that I was born, had not changed the fact that I had grown up to be a “he.”