Lisa Marie Basile

When we think of foster care or wards of the state or orphans or homelessness, we hear poor. We hear the forgotten. We hear hopeless. We hear other. Let’s face it: we hear classism, trash, bad parents, drugs. The stigma cuts through the room, through the world, through the news reports we don’t read — and through our bodies.

So let’s get this out of the way now: Imagine not coming from a relatively typical family background, not having enough money to go on school trips, and knowing the structure of an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting and watching your mother at the podium. Imagine going from homeless shelter to foster care, and imagine your main source of support as a teenager wasn’t your mother or father, but your social worker or your foster parent — a stranger, for all intents and purposes. Imagine keeping all of this quiet, because there’s no way high schoolers could ever understand. This was my life. Now you know.

Anxiety disorders — PTSD, OCD, and Panic Disorder, to name a few — are the most common mental illnesses in the United States, with about 18% of the population struggling with one. No one wants to be put on blast for their weaknesses or wiring issues. I just wish there was a way to better understand the silent majority — the people who suffer every day.

How much energy does it take to be jealous? Hint: Way too much.

It can really take a toll on you when you have to parent a parent.

What do you do when your workplace is so toxic that it makes you sick? How do you take action then? What happens when you have nothing left to give?

Is there a certain quality to letter writing or diary keeping that inspires the confessional? I believe so.

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

When you hear about a person with a chronic illness working or not working or considering quitting a job, these decisions were not made lightly.

Some grief is inert. Some grief is an engine. Sometimes actively participating in grief, I’ve learned, is one small way we can learn to escape its riptide.

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