What hurt the most wasn’t that I was having a good day. It wasn’t even the content of the texts, which arrived weekly. It was the thought that my sister might be saying these things to our mom instead of coming to me directly. We had just made a promise to work on our relationship.

I was in the shower, shampooing my hair, when suddenly everything went black. Not metaphorically. My vision cut out, instantly, like someone yanked a cord.

“You need help. You need to go somewhere that can help you. Normally this place is full, but someone just left. There’s a bed open.”

A wave of anxiety hit. “Where am I going?”

She exhaled. “Your dad and I can’t keep you safe. We don’t have the tools.”

I started to panic. “Why are you sending me away?”

She just kept saying it.

You need to get better.
You need to go.
You don’t have a choice.

I'm absolutely terrified to write this, which tells me I'm on the right track.

If the words you say are supposed to have depth, truth, and meaning, how deep could they really be, if they never had any depth at all?