23. Big Little Victories

An essay on the relentless and often uncelebrated hard work of recovery and the framework I built to maintain it

Hello Beautiful Human,

I’ve had a bit of a humbling week. My night terrors have been at an all-time high and my sleep deprivation has left my mind and days scattered. Oddly enough though, there is real beauty to my life when it is lived in the wake of night terrors. After waking up in the morning after reliving deaths, psychotic breaks, hospitalizations, and sexual assaults, I find gratitude everywhere. It is infused into each step, each bite, each tail wag, and even each sip of coffee. 

Now, don’t get me wrong; sleep is the best and I am not lobbying for a life of night terrors so that I can live even more profoundly connected to gratitude. But this week, the renewed sense of gratitude I felt after my many night terrors was refreshing, and writing this piece was too. 

Writing this piece reminded me of how far I’ve come and how much work I have put into building this life of mine. This piece shares the framework that in many ways saved my life — Big Little Victories. The framework is about taking credit for the tiny things we do for ourselves — for getting out of bed in the morning, for changing our clothes, for bravely facing our own reflection in the mirror.

Society rarely gives credit for these things (even if they are foundational in recovery) and because of this, I rarely take credit for the breadth of work I did — the all-consuming grit and tenacity I lived with for years to recover beyond disability. But, writing this piece reminded me that every tiny step I took to recover matters. It reminded me that every little thing we do to grow and heal and face our demons counts. And, that when we count each tiny thing we do – when we celebrate each in full and hold true space for the darkness from which we came – the world around us becomes even more beautiful.

All of this to say, everything you do – every choice you make to heal, every fight you tackle with your own mind or this very world – it matters. Even if the progress is slow, the grind is ruthless, and nobody but yourself sees or celebrates the work, it is incredible that you are doing it and whether your work is getting out of bed in the morning or going to a job as you navigate anxiety each day, I believe in you wholeheartedly.

Yes, I believe in you and every single brave act you take wholeheartedly.

And now, without further ado…

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23. Big Little Victories

Legal Aid never got to my best friend Maura’s case but somehow, Maura managed to temper her mischievous, assertive ways and play by the in-patient unit’s rules so her phone privileges stayed intact. While most people wouldn’t even think a weekly phone call was anything out of the ordinary, to us, that call was everything. It was our anchor, our purpose, and our joy. Both our lives revolved around that half an hour – that Saturday afternoon where we got to spend time — TOGETHER — sharing all the stories we had collected throughout the week.

Each Saturday phone call gave me a renewed sense of intention and I rekindled my commitment to showing Maura that I was taking full advantage of my freedom. Amidst daily battles with demonic hallucinations and consistent challenges at work, I set out to prove to both myself and her that I wasn’t wasting my life away. To keep track of my efforts, I built out a master calendar to catalog all my activities. I called them my “Big Little Victories.” 

Big Little Victories was actually a framework I had first invented after graduating from Middlebury. Back then, I was plagued by O.C.D. and hallucinations – the same battle I was still fighting – and was determined to prove to myself that I actually was “doing something productive” each day. My mind distorted everything, so I hung a massive desk calendar on my wall to keep visual track of my progress. I put one Post-It on each day and assigned a task to each month. The first month my task had been to get out of bed, change my pajamas, and get back in bed. The next month, the task was to change my pajamas and then brush my teeth. The tasks were seemingly simple — especially as my peers pursued higher education degrees and professional careers — but they were deeply difficult tasks for me, and this is why I called them my Big Little Victories.

The beauty of this system was not only in the self-efficacy it brought to life. It also offered visual proof outside of my self-loathing thoughts, that I was actually making progress. Every time I did a task, I moved the day’s Post-It note to the “scoreboard” part of my wall. Day by day, Post It after Post It, I learned to get out of bed, brush my teeth, wash my face, and eat breakfast. My progress was slow but the method worked incredibly well. Every habit stuck, and I was eager to try the framework again with a more robust roster of habits and activities to master. 

So, just like I had done years earlier, I hung a massive desk calendar on the wall and covered it with Post-Its. This time, however, instead of just one Post t per day, I upped the ante. I stuck three different colored Post-Its – one for my body, one for my mind, and one for my soul. This method was habit-stacking at its finest but I thought of it without any understanding of such a framework or the well-documented research proving its effectiveness.

That first week I managed to execute an activity for my mind — work — and one for my body — squash — each day. However,  I really struggled to identify one “for my soul.” I had created the category hoping to bring joy to each day, but when it came to identifying activities that brought joy, I fell short. After two weeks of failed attempts at drawing, paper macheé, and baking flat loaves of bread that resulted in more anger and emotional lability than I’d started with, I confided in Maura. In a cascade of tears, I admitted that I didn’t know how to have fun without her or maybe at all — that I didn’t know how to be happy or find joy in my days alone — and that I was doomed to be an “absolute loser” unless we spent our lives together.

I could practically hear her stand up straight and tall as she kicked into her NHL coach alter ego. 

“Don’t you dare talk to my best friend like that! Do you know what a loser is? A loser is someone who doesn’t try. A loser is someone who never takes a chance. A loser is someone who doesn’t begin. You are doing all of that so enough negative self-talk, my bipolar bear!”

Her response had notable wisdom within it and my tears subsided as she continued.

“What you are, Kate, is a beginner. You are a beginner at having fun while you have a real-life professional job and terrible hallucinations. You are simply a beginner.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at her words. The very framing felt ridiculous but she was entirely right. I was indeed a beginner at living like this and giving up at only two weeks in was more outrageous than the distorted thoughts I was having.

We spent the remaining ten minutes of our call writing a list of things to try out the next week. I called it “Activities to begin at!” We also amended my Big Little Victory rules. Success was no longer determined by completing a task or activity. Success was now defined by beginning the task – by showing up and trying.

So off I headed into a new week with a list of dancing, dressing up, baking oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, abstract painting, finger painting, and splatter painting as activities to try for the week ahead. And just like that, before even trying them, I found joy and my first “one for the soul” – a conversation with Maura that held the truth and understanding that showing up really was enough and that I just might be enough too.

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With the weekend ahead of us, I’d love to hear what “Activities to begin at” you are going to try this weekend in the comments below. I think I’m going to stretch a canvas and get out my paints and brushes. Colorful expression always seems like the perfect place to begin at — at least for me.

No matter what you do, I hope it honors you and I hope you know you deserve it.

We love you.

Kindly,

Kate