Words on a bathroom wall
- April
- Apr 19
- 6 min read
I was born in 1964 as the daughter of a rocket scientist. I was the baby of the family with two older brothers. On the surface, everything looked normal. My father was an esteemed member of the space industry, he was a city councilmember, sat on the BOD of the Cameron Park Country Club. My brothers were athletic, fun, and funny and seemed to have lots of friends. I have happy memories of working in the garden with my Mother, playing with our family dogs, learning to ride my bicycle on Yellowstone Court, playing Cinderella with my neighbor Chip, and dolls with the little girls across the street. I remember Kindergarten, having friends, and even details around those times. I don’t remember 1st grade, I don’t remember the day my Father went away, my brother went away, my dog went away. That is what mental illness looks like, “an evil and abrupt storm that swoops in out of nowhere and takes most of what it touches in its wake”. In the movie “The Holdovers” one of the main characters, Angus Tully talks about his father. I feel like it was written about my Dad. “He used to be fine. He was better than fine. He was great. He was my dad. Then he started acting strange, saying all this weird shit. He went to doctors, they put him on medication. Then he got angry. And then he got... physical. That was it. They put him away, my Mother divorced him and I’m afraid that's what's going to happen to me one day”
A few years ago I started on a quest to search for meaning to those “storms” and to find peace. I think I needed to imagine what it must have been like for my Father who suffered and was put away in the Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital in New York for most of his life.
I went to see the film, “Words on the Bathroom Wall”. A stunning theatrical movie that shows a young man diagnosed with a mental illness during his senior year of high school. He was a witty, introspective teen struggling to keep it a secret while falling in love with a brilliant classmate who inspires him to open his heart and not be defined by his condition. I think that is how it was for my Father. He was witty, super smart, talented and I think tried to keep his mental illness a secret from my mother and children. I believe my Father was haunted by unwelcome “internal voices” that whispered cruel lies that clawed at his soul until the weight of the torment led him to end his life in 1981 at the young age of 46. I was sixteen-years old.
In Michael Singer’s “The Untethered Soul” “internal voices and thoughts we experience are referred to as inner roommates. The book suggests that these voices are not ourselves, but rather different parts of our mind. The core concept is that we are not the source of these voices; we are the ones who hear them.”
God has used these movies and books to move me and teach me a little more about schizophrenia and to tell myself it happened and it is ok. God has taught me to be more sensitive and committed to the removal of the stigma attached to mental illness. I pray that this blog helps someone around me and as a humanity, we vow to become more merciful, compassionate and loving to those suffering. I only wish I could reach back in time and tell myself to embrace these things, rather than fear them.
My inner roommate
In the quiet of my learning and coping and learning, I began journaling what I was witnessing and observing. Sometimes, the fragmented thoughts came out on my bathroom wall, like a large cloud. Here is a photo I took this photo before it was painted before the sale of our home in Lakeway:
Here are some of the words I wrote. Random thoughts I could hear my inner roommate whispering:
Col 4:17 practice love
Do what you were assigned to do - I was assigned to love.
Luke 10:27 word of the year.
John 7 the vision for my life. I have a job to do
I am a child of love
I am a student sitting at the feet of my Rabbi. My teacher, my Father watching what he does, reading His letters B.I.B.L.E.
All I have is a hallelujah
My favorite thing to say now is I don't know.
The most popular reading in the Bible is 1 Cor 13.
No matter what, I always come back to love
Jesus’s life exemplifies detachment from worldly norms, prioritizing God’s will. Think about what the world shows. In the case of influencers and news, reels. Who are you listening to? Who are you following? People who are overweight trying to give you advice on weight loss? Authenticity advice from people with fake eyelashes, colored hair and extensions? Or relationship advice from someone who bickers and complains constantly? Or “friends” that gossip and put people down. Spoiler alert, people who gossip will tell your business too. Just sayin. Be wise. This is a Godly principle: You will be known by your fruit (what your life produces).
In these days of revolution, I say let's start one on love! It's supernatural!!!
Don't overthink it
I get it, not to be judgemental, I have been there, pressured and was on very different paths in my 20s and 30s 40s and 50s
When I trace the roots of these scribbles, I find a time when I worked for Google. A time when I felt like a stranger as I walked through meetings and the hallways of ostensible success, I was haunted by echoes of a past I longed to forget - memories of homelessness, of shame, of self loathing, of physical and sexual abuse. Voices from my “unwelcome” inner roommate whispering lies. I had to make a choice - to hush the haunting by echoing what God has always spoken over me. The secret to whole living is found in returning to the ONE who stitches us together in our Mother’s womb, the ONE who carved a heart-shape hole in our spirit that only HE can fill.
Echos from my Father in Heaven:
I am an image bearer. Reflecting Christ with my words and actions. I am empowered by Grace.
I am living my best life in the promises of Christ who guides and directs me. I am a friend of God. I am loved, lovable and loving.
I am in charge of my feelings, full of Joy. I am enough because Jesus is enough. I am worthy of love, I am a victor, I have been gifted for a unique purpose and have fruit that will last and bring good.
I have been chosen as a director of heaven on earth.
My world is round.
Thank you Jesus for giving yourself to me in this way. I love you Jesus. I trust You. I give you my heart. Thank you for bringing me into your chambers and for giving me this picture. I was born to walk with you.
Is that what it was like for my Daddy? Was he in a hospital room trying to process the lies of his “unwelcomed roommate” and did he loose the battle or the will to hush the sounds? Was he overly medicated and lacked the ability to say a salient word? Was anyone merciful, compassionate or lovely to him? Or was he diagnosed as crazy and simply shoved aside in a psychiatric ward to be silenced?
There is no way to fully understand the pain someone is going through, how deeply they hurt and how they will handle that hurt. There is one thing that is certain, God’s love and is our assignment to Love Him and love others Luke 10:27. It surrounds and carries. I pray you feel that today.
I am so thankful to God for His caring ministry, for entrusting me to take up my own cross and assigning me the mission of being compassionate, merciful and loving.
Happy Easter 2025
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