I've come to recognize I am not a singular person, but rather two people at odds, yet hopelessly intertwined, but I'm doing my best to change that.

I'm quite fond of the side of me from my childhood. When I slip into that person, I become naive and optimistic, alive and friendly, kind and understanding. I enjoy talking to people and hearing them laugh at whatever nonsense I'm speaking. I find myself being drawn to my sketchbook or instrument and encouraged to create. I feel that the world is a harsh but exciting thing, and everything has a place in the grand scheme of being.

I didn't live in a fairy tale, because those were simple stories, but I lived trying to create one for myself and others, and I liked that.

My other side came to me when I was a bit older. She didn't just show up one day; it started with just her voice. I was laughing with a friend when I heard her say, "Stop laughing. Can't you tell? You're in trouble." I felt my insides twist at this unfamiliar voice and its odd, foreboding warning. Where did that come from? Why do I feel so sick now? What was wrong with me?

I conceded to the voice and remained quiet through the day, suspicious of what was to come.

Nothing did come for me.

Time and time again she would sneak into my thoughts, rile me up with fear, only to sink back into hiding in my mind. I never questioned her, but I wish I had. I wish I had fought her and yelled and screamed and kicked until she became weak and vanished out of my head. Instead, I just lived with her.

And then I started feeding her. Nurturing her to grow from a voice, into a force to be reckoned with. I wouldn't say it was intentional, but I was aware of it. The steady change from fearful whispers to screaming, angry warnings and threats. And then she got stronger. I started to feel her. A shiver sliding up my spine. A hand sliding over my shoulder. Clawed nails digging into my skin. Breath against my ear as she whispered hurtful things that would make me cry late at night when nobody would crowd me asking what's wrong-- she would get even louder when people were around me like that. "I'm trying to help you. These people aren't good. They want to hurt you. They hate you, and you deserve it for listening to me. You're sick."

As the years went on, she started speaking over my thoughts so much that I forgot what I sounded like. Did I like music? It all sounds so bland. Didn't I like talking to my friends? I feel so empty when they talk to me. Who was I? Was I me being controlled by this other half? Or had I become the other half, hopelessly reaching for an old, dying part of myself. I stopped caring. Whoever I was, I didn't like it. What more was there to it?

And then, earlier this year, I met some nice doctors and councilors who told me that they understood how I feel. I didn't believe them at first-- she's was part of me, so how would they know what she's like?-- but then they started talking about mental disorders and symptoms and common beliefs that people suffering from them have and I realized that they weren't lying. It was like they saw her over my back and could her everything she said.

And then I wasn't alone with her anymore.

They asked me so many questions over and over again. Some asked about medicine, while others just wanted to know how I was feeling that day. They threw around words like "severe major depressive disorder" and "severe social and generalized anxiety" and I was so happy to hear this because it meant they had answers. They had medicines and treatments and said that they couldn't make her go away, she will never really be gone, but I will feel better.

I listened to the doctors. I went to the appointment. I did all the exercises. And then one day, as I picked up my viola and started practicing a new song I had heard, I realized my fingers hurt. My callouses had gone away from not playing for so long, but I was playing again now. I was enjoying it and could remember why I loved it so much before.

I could feel the heart of past-me beating again. I wasn't just living, I was properly alive. I wasn't the same me from my younger years. I had grown into something new, but that old part was there and she was so proud of me.

I'm left with these two parts of my being. A side of me that told me who I am, and a side that gave me the chance to grow. I've come to realize that I cannot be one of the two now that I live with both, so I'm learning how to have them co-exist. I've grown from someone who was hopelessly confused about their identity into a person that's recreating them self.

I'm excited to see how this personality project comes together; to see who I am and will be.