It’s The Mental Health Bodyguard On Hard Days For Me

It helps you hold onto hope

I didn’t realize I had a mental health bodyguard until I read an essay in Anne Lamott’s latest book, Dusk Night Dawn. In it she shares a story about a friend who told her that when he first meets anyone new, they meet his bodyguard. They meet the version of him that’s less in the moment because his mind is focused on something more than jokes — it’s using all available energy to scope out the perimeter and decide a space is safe enough to exist in.

Reading this essay gave me a way to label what I have been doing for years on my hardest mental health days. Turns out, I have a bodyguard of my own. It’s my same height and when I look in the mirror, it has my same face, but on the hardest of days, we have different centers. I’m unsettled and anxious and feeling the weight of the bad talk in my head, but my bodyguard she’s standing up tall and ready to lead the way.

Her purpose isn’t always external, even if there are some instances where she’ll help me navigate social anxiety. Her purpose is to help protect me from the internal battle I wage against myself on the hardest mental health days. She protects me from the bad voice in my head and serves the purpose of reminding me that I am not all the things the bad voice says.