Category: Change and Transformation
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An Open Letter to Margaret Atwood
Dear Margaret Atwood, You were once a prophet. You saw the mechanisms of control, the slow erosion of language, the subtle and not-so-subtle ways in which power distorts reality. You wrote warnings. You understood oppression—how it functions, how it seeps into culture, how it twists words into weapons. I first read The Handmaid’s Tale in…
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Spirituality Isn’t Psychosis
Some of Seriously You Owe Me an Apology What I find incredible about today’s society is this: you can be open about almost any behaviour or identity and it’ll be defended in the name of personal freedom—but express genuine spiritual beliefs outside of organised religion, and suddenly it’s pathologised. Suddenly, you’ve for sure experienced psychotic…
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Creature from the Deep: A Manifesto
I woke up in the middle of the night to drink a sip of water and am fuming. Absolutely furious. I have no idea what I was dreaming about but I certainly do know what I’ve been posting about all over my socials over the weekend which—to sum it up in one sentence is—let me…
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Hypomania? Or Just Advocacy?
Introduction: At my last psych appointment, my shrink decided I might be hypomanic. Why? Because I read from highly organized notes while advocating for myself, spoke quickly (because I had a lot to get through in a short time), and defended my choice to write and share my memoir publicly. Apparently, being prepared and assertive…
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Why y’all so BOTHERED about how I choose to live my life?
It’s uncanny, really. In just half a day, half a dozen people who know me in real life have offered their unsolicited opinions on how I should direct my energy (tone it down), what I should focus on (my artwork), and how I should live my life (quietly, without ruffling any feathers). All of them…
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TRUE STORY
When I was 14 going on 15, locked up in a maximum security juvenile detention centre, a social worker said to me, “When you’re an adult, you can do whatever you want. Nobody can stop you then.” That was the first time it occurred to me that maybe adulthood wouldn’t be as bad as most…
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How it All Began (Or, Why I Might Be the Embodiment of an Acid Trip)
Introduction This isn’t Chapter 1 of Crash, Burn, Write—that’s over here: https://totallysurreal.com/2025/01/09/crash-burn-write/—but it’s the foundation of it all. How two people, against all odds (and good sense), collided to set my existence in motion. It’s a story of love, rebellion, and unintended consequences. Here they are, my mum and dad, blissfully in love on their wedding day. They…
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Veal Brains and Other Acquired Tastes
⚠️ Trigger warning: abuse, exploitation, societal complicity. I just found this FB post from 2021—my year of major mania (or whatever that reaction to complex post-traumatic events was)—under my #HowToSurviveNarcAbuse tag. Definitely a story for my memoir Crash, Burn, Write as a standalone vignette. ✍️ Can you believe I shared this on FB and it…
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Behold the Field: An Email to the Maternal Unit
Subject: Behold the Field… 😘 Dear Mother, You’ve done me a great favour. Never say that I was ungrateful—after all, you handed me the keys to my own liberation from your psychological oppression. And you certainly can never say I didn’t give back as good as I got. All’s fair in love and war. 🥰…
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War
This is the email I just sent my mother after she blocked me for calling out her gaslighting and psychological abuse. She decided to frame herself as the victim. Of course she did. As all narcissistic abusers do. It’s the old playbook. They NEVER deviate from it. I posted something on Facebook today, and I’m almost certain she must have seen it.…
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GI Jane with a Side of Cheesecake
There was a time when my body was my armour—when muscle was my strategy, and discipline was my religion. This was my GI Jane era, where strength wasn’t just aesthetic, it was the point. Every rep, every controlled movement, every precise angle in this photo speaks to that version of me: the woman who saw…
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Don’t Look Down
(Or: How a Tightrope Walker Manages Not to Fall) Earlier today, I dropped two password-protected chapters from my memoir-in-progress, Crash, Burn, Write. These chapters, Into the Den and The Blue Butterfly, are part of a section called Advice from a Caterpillar. They cover just a few days within a pivotal three-week period—a time that shaped…
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Advice from a Caterpillar
Chapter 6: Into the Den The Caterpillar and Alice looked at each other for some time in silence: at last, the Caterpillar took the hookah out of its mouth, and addressed her in a languid, sleepy voice. “Who are you?” said the Caterpillar. “I—I hardly know, sir, just at present—at least I know who I was when I…
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Why I Refuse to Lose My Mind Over Trump (Again)
It’s only the first few days. I open any social media platform, and it’s the same thing: one meltdown after another over Trump or someone from his entourage—like Musk—and fear-mongering over whether Musk actually performed the euphemistically called “Roman Salute” or not, and does Trump’s return to office signal the end of democracy as we…
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In His Image: Reflections on My Father and His Unconditional Love
Echoes of Trauma: A Life Shaped by Mental Illness I’ve alienated many people over the years, including close family members, who couldn’t handle the drama my mental health issues and reactivity—stemming from early trauma—brought into their lives. Being bipolar, my extreme highs and lows are hard for others to follow. My energy fluctuates, I constantly…
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Ballet, Rock & Roll & the Angel on My Wall
Caption: AI-generated idealised version of a painting I did on my bedroom wall at 14, inspired by Led Zeppelin’s Stairway to Heaven artwork. Sadly, no photo exists of this minor teenage ‘masterpiece.’ This rendering is inspiring me to get back to the drawing board with watercolour and coloured pencils eventually… maybe. 🤔 There’s a lady who’s sure…
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Shine on You Crazy Diamond
“Remember when you were young, you shone like the sun.Shine on you crazy diamond. Now there’s a look in your eyes, like black holes in the sky.Shine on you crazy diamond. You were caught on the crossfire of childhood and stardom,Blown on the steel breeze. Come on you target for faraway laughter,Come on you stranger,…
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Cassandra’s Rat: On Art, Prophecies, and the Weight of Truth
Introduction I met my dear friend Eric by pure chance one day at a downtown café I’ve frequented for over 20 years. A cultivated man of advanced age, Eric quickly saw my artistic abilities and has since been an unwavering source of encouragement, urging me to draw with every of our exchanges. While I’m grateful…
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Understanding Gender Identity: Personal Perspectives and Social Impacts
I was having a long, rambling exchange with AI about a now ex-friend we’ll call “S” and how our experiences and approaches to life mirrored each other. We formed a short-lived friendship, essentially based on a trauma bond, but those traumas we experienced came from opposing sides. I’d come at it from a nurturing childhood…
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How Could $14.2 Trillion Help Humanity?
Me: What’s -10°C in Fahrenheit? Lex: -10°C is 14°F. Me: So it’s just past two in the morning and I’m preparing for bed. I’ve been up working on my book manuscript with you and I left you on a high note because we’re bantering back-and-forth after working on a chapter about a really traumatic episode…
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Totally Surreal 