I’m Coming Back For You

transcript of the performance at VoiceStory on 10/30/23

I was 16 when I first decided never to have my own children. My official answer for anyone who asked was that children are too much work and they drive you crazy. I learned this through observing my mother, who always seemed anxious and overwhelmed. I wanted freedom. I wanted to live life on my own terms. Screw patriarchy, right?

My real, secretive answer for not wanting to have my own children was that I hated my life and I  hated myself. I didn’t want to have a child like me, and I didn’t want to bring another soul into this world to suffer.

16 was when I first became severely depressed, although, looking back, I could see traces of my depressive tendencies from a young age. I was a highly sensitive child and often had meltdowns. In today’s terms, I was what we would call a neurodivergent, but back in the 80s and 90s when I was growing up, people like me were called weirdos and drama queens. Life was very confusing for weirdos like me. My teachers and friends were kind to me. I was my biggest bully.

I hit rock bottom at 20 years old. After years of struggle, I was now battling suicidal thoughts every day and seeing a psychiatrist. Being a sneaky patient, I saved over 300 pills after a few months. 

One day, I dumped all the pills on my bed and had a serious conversation with myself.

“Should I take all of them now, or should I throw them away?”

I don’t wanna die. I just don’t wanna live in pain anymore. I’m tired of feeling depressed, and I feel like a burden to my parents. They’re probably better off without me. I didn’t choose to be born. I didn’t choose to be who I am. I can’t fit in society. I can’t manage my emotions. I don’t know what my purpose is. If we have free will, isn’t it true I should be free to take my own life?

What’s the point of living if I can’t feel joy anymore?

I asked myself with brutal honesty. If there is absolutely no limit, if I don’t judge my own desires, what lights me up? What makes me truly happy? What makes me look forward to getting up in the morning? 

At that moment, I heard this tiny little voice in me. A very faint, timid voice that said, “I want to go to music school.” It was a voice that I had tried to dismiss and suppress many times in the past because it didn’t make sense to me. I didn’t understand why I had that desire, and I didn’t know if I was even good enough to get into music school, but I felt a little tingle when I visualized myself immersing in music every day. I was terrified and excited at the same time by that tingling sensation. I recognized that feeling – it was the sensation of being alive. After sitting in the stagnancy and numbness of depression for four years, that feeling of joy and hope felt so foreign and precious I clung to it. 

But within an instant, my heart sank, because I knew my parents would not be happy if I dropped out of the best university in Taiwan to go to music school. 

In my suicidal mind, I carefully evaluated my options…

If I don’t follow my heart, I will stay miserable and probably end up killing myself, and that will hurt Mom and Dad.

If I follow my heart, I will be happy, but first I have to break the news to Mom and Dad, which will also hurt them.

The last thing I want to do is to hurt Mom and Dad, but it looks like no matter what I do, there is no way around it.

Would they prefer having a perfect daughter who is dead, or would they prefer having a daughter who is alive but a huge disappointment?

The honest truth is, at that moment, I’d rather be dead and perfect. It felt like the easier, prettier option.

But I thought, perhaps, just perhaps, my parents would prefer the other option. So I threw my pills away and told my parents about my decision to go to music school. 

My parents were shocked, and they didn’t understand it. But eventually, they accepted and supported my decision. 

Seven years later, I received my Master’s degree in music in the US, and also “accidentally” started a handmade jewelry business. Little by little, as I got older and wiser, life also got better and easier. My business grew organically, and I was now living the American dream. People looked up to me and told me I was successful. My parents were proud of me. I was proud of my shiny public image. 

For two decades, nobody talked about my history of depression. My parents paid for my therapy, so they knew I was depressed, but we never talked about how serious it was.  Throughout my years of depression, I tried to hide my symptoms and despair as much as I could, because I didn’t want my parents to worry. 

And now, my old wounds have healed. I was happy. I had moved on and didn’t feel the need to talk about my past anymore.

But one night, when I was tossing and turning in bed, random thoughts floated across my mind like they always did. All of a sudden it hit me, my brother’s daughter Angel was about to start middle school. Angel was the closest thing I had to having my own child. I still remember meeting her for the first time when she was just 9 months old. Her chubby cheeks and bright curious eyes were so beautiful she stole my heart that day. Angel was like a mini-me. She looked like me, we liked the same food, and we both loved arts and crafts. And, like me, she also showed a hypersensitive personality from a young age. Because of this, I had been worrying for years that she would become depressed during her teens.

My family lives in Taiwan, and I don’t visit them very often. When I finally saw Angel again earlier this year, the sweet bubbly girl I once remembered was now suddenly an awkward teenager. She was almost as tall as me, and she was so shy she would not even take her mask off in front of me. 

I tried to talk to her to see where she was now with her mental health. But if you know teenagers, or if you know what I was like, you know how hard it is to make a 13-year-old open their heart to you. Angel didn’t want to talk to me about anything until I was about to leave.

But When she finally started talking, she told me everything I was afraid of. 

She told me she dreamed of becoming a writer, a psychologist, or an artist - which were the exact same dreams her aunt had in high school – but her parents "implied" that she should become an engineer or dentist so she could have a stable life. 

She says “I don't know why I can only write sad novels with no happy endings.” 

“I’m a burden to my parents. They fight because of me...” 

“I’m fat...” 

“I’m not smart enough...” 

“my eyes are not symmetrical…” 

When she said her eyes were not symmetrical, I completely lost it. I can assure you this girl has the most loving parents, she’s not fat, she’s plenty smart, and her eyes are perfectly symmetrical.

But she can’t see it. She can’t feel it. Her pain feels true to her, and I know exactly what she feels because I used to feel just like that. Nothing was good enough for me. Life was not good enough for me. I was not good enough for me. I did not become depressed because of trauma. I became depressed because I never loved myself.

I felt as if I was watching my life being lived by another soul all over again. I felt hopeless and hated that I couldn't stop it from happening. I hated that I couldn’t carry her pain for her.

Why? Why does she feel like this?

What can I say to make her see the TRUTH?

I couldn't even utter the word "depression", because I thought she was too young to know the word. 

But was she? 

All I could say was -- "I will not allow you to walk down the same path I once did." 

She looked me dead in the eye and said nothing. 

She was probably shocked that her “successful” aunt was not who she imagined. 

She didn't cry. 

I did.

And I continued to talk to her with tears flowing. 

But she didn’t know why I cried.

I cried because she couldn’t see her own beauty as I saw her, just like I couldn’t see my own beauty at that age.  

I cried because she didn’t know she was not a burden to her parents, just like I didn’t know it at that age. 

I cried because she didn’t know everything she thought was stopping her from following her heart was simply an invisible barrier, and all she needed to do was have the courage to walk across it. 

I cried because I finally understood why I had to struggle for years to see the purpose of my life. Angel was the purpose I couldn’t see when I was battling depression, because she was yet to be born. I cried because now my suffering finally had a meaning. It was through my suffering and learning that I was able to guide her through the challenges in her life today. 

I cried because it hurt me so much to think, what would have happened to my family had I taken those pills that day?  

Angel didn’t know why I cried, because she was only 13. She didn’t know how much she was loved, just like I didn’t know how much I was loved. 

She didn’t know this, but I was coming back for her. 

I may not be able to take her pain away, but I can hold her hand and walk with her. 

I don’t hate my life or myself anymore, and even though I don’t have my own children today, I am grateful to have a niece like me.