These transcripts deal with themes of mental illness and trauma
This conversation took place in Cassandra’s living room in Chicago. Cassandra and Viola met several months ago at a mutual friend’s party.
So please state your name, your age, and your gender identity and presentation.
Um, Viola. I… am 21. Yes. (both laugh)
Have to think about that. The questions are only going to get harder, I have to warn you.
I’m 21, I’m turning 22 soon. Okay, cool. Uh… I’m… I identify as female. I present that as female with my female friends. I’m very androgynous with my guy friends usually.
In terms of like clothing or like demeanor or what do you mean?
In demeanor. Yes. I think I also tend to dress in a neutral way, like jeans and sweatshirt vibes.
Um, so we’ll talk more about gender soon (both laugh). But first, have you been officially diagnosed with a neurodivergence and if so, with what?
Yes. Major depressive disorder and generalized anxiety.
Do you feel… how do you feel about those diagnoses? Do you think they’re like pretty accurate? Do you think that cover all the symptoms?
Yeah, I would say so. Um, I don’t really know if I have anxiety-anxiety or just social anxiety, but… depression pretty covers… pretty much covers it. (Cassandra’s cat jumps up on the couch) Oh my god, she’s so fluffy.
I like how she’s just circulating between us to get the maximum number of pets (both laugh) So this is going to be a very broad question and people have spent like… two minutes on it and people have spent two hours on it. So there’s like… you can take however long to answer this as you want, but what’s your personal history with depression and anxiety? Sort of like from the time in your life when symptoms started to manifest till now, what have been the major turning points? How has it changed? Write me the story.
The story. Wow. Okay. (both laugh) I feel like one day I’ll write it and it’ll be much longer. However, the sparknotes version is that… I think I started having symptoms manifest in middle school where I was crying a lot and then they sort of like… blew up my freshman year of high school where I was… I started to be suicidal. And so my best friend goes to my English teacher and was like, “I’m very concerned about Viola”. And so the school called my parents who… were not very happy with this. Um, both of them rejected the possibility that I had anything to be depressed about. And my mom said some very unpleasant things, which I will probably say at some point, but not during this interview. So I think for most of high school, I knew something was wrong with me, but I never dealt with it because I didn’t know how to deal with it and it just happened. High school happened.
And your parents didn’t really want you to go seek the care or like…was that a part of it?
Yeah. So it was persistent through high school. And I think a lot of people around me thought that it was like a manifestation of me living at home and not like an actual problem with me. I mean… I don’t want to say it’s like a problem with me, but I don’t think anyone treated it like an illness. As opposed to me just overreacting to my parents. So I got to college, which was very different than high school and I had to live with someone and I don’t like living with people most of the time (both laugh). Sometimes it’s okay, but… at some point my RH who is also depressed and he also no longer lives here was like, “hey Viola, why don’t you go to student counseling?”
Consider: seeking treatment
Consider seeking treatment, consider talking to someone. Um, so I went to student counseling and that kind of helped because that was when I was… wait, no… no, that was second year when that happened. So I went to student counseling just talked a bit and I was like, okay this is fine. And they were like, “I think you have probably have depression or anxiety and/or both”. And so I guess that’s the first time I started to think about it as something separate for me that I could deal with. And then second year it also like… blew up again and I was very, very, very depressed and I went to student counseling. I still to this day cannot afford therapy. So… student counseling was like… a resource I had. And then I got put on medication, which is not a fun experience.
Anti anxiety or antidepressant?
Both. Um, I kept the antianxiety medicine. Antidepressive medicine made me like… physically ill so I stopped for like four weeks and my psychiatrist was like, “Viola, you’re having like an unusual overreaction to this medicine so we’re just going to stop”. And so… I was not on meds for an entire summer and then third year was… I really don’t know how time works (both laugh). Third year I went to her again and I was like, okay, I really want to start functioning and being able to do my work for my classes, so can we try again? And we tried a different medicine and it makes me dizzy in the mornings, but it’s fine and I’m still on it.
Which one?
Lexapro.
Okay. What was the one you were on before?
Prozac.
Interesting. Usually people start… go the other way around.
Yeah.
But Lexapro is okay?
It’s pretty good, honestly, surprisingly.
But okay, so that’s about where you’re at right now?
Yes.
So I guess like when you first… when they were first like, “hey, like you might have depression or anxiety” were you like, yeah, “that makes sense” or were you resistant to it at first or…?
Um, so really rationally I was like, yes, this makes sense. I demonstrate symptoms of both of these. And then when I was talking to my friends about it, I was like, wait, will they think I’m overreacting? Will they think this is not a thing? Will they be like my parents and go, “Viola’s just crazy”. So yes. So like… deep down I was worried that it didn’t make sense to anyone but me and my doctor, but rationally… So kind of felt the need to justify it to people.
Um, in all that time, like dealing with depression and anxiety, is there a thing that you’re proudest of?
Well seeking help first of all, staying alive has been the biggest struggle. Uh, also just being able to convey some of what it feels like to my friends to a point where they can like… deal with it and understand… at least intellectually what I’m going through.
Did you communicate about it in high school or is this more of a recent thing of being like…?
It’s a recent thing.
Okay. Is there any specific thing that you’re struggling most with right now? Because I feel like different parts of it affect us at different points in our life.
Um, I don’t really know how this relates to depression. But I feel like really… out of the water right now.
Okay. In terms of…?
I just, I feel like all my friends like… have this Viola sized box in their life except I don’t quite fit into those boxes right now. And I feel like they all have like expectations for my interactions with them that aren’t happening. I mean they are happening because I’m like forcing them to happen, but I don’t feel comfortable interacting with people in the way they want me to interact with them.
Is there any like specific discrepancy or…?
Well, I guess the most specific one is I feel like a lot of my friends treat me as like the advice and comfort person. And I’m like, I can’t advise and comfort people because I don’t know what I’m doing and I need advice and comfort, but I don’t know where to get that from.
So… so people like asking you to be the caretaker when that’s not necessarily a position you’re super comfortable with?
Mmmhmm.
Yeah, that’s fair. (whispered) And also gendered (both laugh). Just…
Ominous sound in the background.
Music starts playing… foreshadowing! (both still laughing) So… people have different ways of describing depression or anxiety and like different metaphors that they use. And I think that’s always really helpful because I think it shows how people… position themselves in relationship to it. So, uh… whether through use of a metaphor or not, like what does… what do these things feel like to you?
Well, I really like metaphors.
Okay, perfect!
So I think I’ve told you that I have snow metaphor for depression where, you know, when I’m really depressed it feels like there’s a blizzard going on inside my head and it just won’t stop. And… I don’t want to go out in the blizzard and deal with it, but it’s there and it’s happening. And I’m like, oh my God, I need to shut myself in a corner until it stops. And then some days it’s like… a flurry and I’m like, I’m really sick of snow, but you know, I can walk, I can do things. And so, yeah, I think that… is one way I describe it. The other way I would describe it for … me going about my life is… I don’t know. Sometimes I have like a headspace where I escape to where everything is … like magical and I like to escape to there, but then I come back to real life and I feel like a fairy with its wings cut off or I don’t know a mermaid out of water. I don’t feel like I belong anywhere.
Yeah. Um, is it the same for anxiety? Like do, do you think these metaphors work for both of them or is that mostly depression?
I think the second one works for anxiety. Where I’m like, very at peace in my mind, and I come out and everything’s crazy and I feel like I’m missing something that I need. It’s not there.
You did not find the crucial object to carry with you on your quest
Yes, exactly, I left the magic sword somewhere in the 2000s (both laugh)
That’d be a good short story to describe anxiety. Um… so… are there specific things that tend to… trigger the worsening of either depression or anxiety? You said for anxiety it’s kind of social?
Yeah. So I feel like… when I was coming over here, I like turned my phone off to get ready and make breakfast and turned it back on and I had 10 messages from people when I was like, I’m going to shut down, I can’t do this (both laugh)
Too many people, all screaming at me, I scream back, “No!”
I don’t scream back. I just refuse to talk.
I hide (both still laughing).
I hide. So I think that’s a trigger for… anxiety.
Is just generally like being overwhelmed with the need….
Like meeting other people and also like schoolwork. Schoolwork is just always there.
Um, and then for depression?
Depression, well I guess one, feeling like I’m really out of place. And two I feel like personal relationships that happen really trigger it. So like… relationships with my parents, relationships with friends, relationships where I am like… very into a guy and it doesn’t go well.
Is it just like… anything going wrong with these relationships? Are there any like specific types of things that are more upsetting than others?
I guess feeling that a relationship is worsening or disappearing.
Um, what are sort of like… actionable things you do on the day to day that make you feel better?
Drinking tea. Playing with cat (Cassandra laughs)
Oh, you mean the two things that are happening right now?
Yes. Precisely that (Viola laughs) um, drawing, playing guitar, escaping into my magical head space
For um, with more artistic things, what do you feel like the relation… because like some people it’s like the content specifically kind of relates to their… their mental illness. And so for some people it’s kind of more just like the process of creating, like what… what is the connection for you about why that makes you feel better?
I think for music it’s the process of creating and also just being able to put my emotions into something that’s not me. For writing and drawing, it’s… I can like create worlds that are not my world that I can pretend that I live in.
So it’s possibly for music, it is like.. the content of it is relating to your emotions. Whereas art, it’s like creating the world… it’s created in a world that you would prefer to live in?
Yes.
Okay. Um…in theory, I have all these questions memorized, but my brain is just clearly not doing the thing today that supposed to be doing
I feel like this is where you’re supposed to switch to gender, but I’m probably also wrong.
I have at least three more questions, so I’m going to ask those questions and hope that I didn’t have any more questions (both laugh). Um, which is, so how much did you talk to people around you? It seems like not your parents, probably.
Definitely not my parents. Um, so in high school I just talked to my best friend who also has depression and anxiety. So… we get along very well. I think in college it’s very… like first year we had like a group in my house and then I had my first incident of going to student health and I just got really stressed and upset and then I distanced myself.
That’s stressful.
It was stressful. I still have some of those friends, however, I’ve lost many of the others. Um, so I guess first year I felt like I was telling a lot of people about it, but I wasn’t really telling them, telling them I was just like, I have depression. And they were like, “okay, cool”. And there was no conversation about what that meant. Second year I started… (Viola laughs) I have cat hair in my mouth.
I’m sorry! It’s just everywhere (both laugh).
That’s okay. Um, second year, I started like evaluating the content of what I was telling people because I realized that it was starting to affect my relationships
In what way?
So there was a guy that I was into and he thought I was angry at him all the time and started avoiding me. Except then I was like, I’m not angry at you, I’m depressed (both laugh) I’m moody and this is why and I don’t hate you. And so that happened and I was like, okay, I need to… explain to people what me being depressed might look like and how I don’t actually hate them. So… that happened. And then I think… third and fourth year I just got frustrated with everyone cause I was like, hey listen, I’m dealing with this and I can’t also deal with you all the time 24/7. So a lot of my recent conversations with people have been like, hey, I’m having a really hard time right now and I know that it is hard to understand but I just can’t deal with…
So trying to establish boundaries?
Yes. Yeah.
How… how people been responding to that?
Um, uh… some of them have been good and some of them have been like not understanding because they’ll go, “I’m also having a really hard time right now”
Which is like, “cool, okay. Yes, yes, that’s true. So they don’t quite get exactly what it means for you to need to be like… take a step back?
Yep.
Okay. What reactions in general did you get in the more abstract conversation of like, “I’m feeling depressed”… that was not… that was not coherent question, um… (both laugh) Um, I guess like… well, like, um, when you’re first meeting people, do you like… are you fairly open about it? Like at what point do you start to tell people?
I have no idea because sometimes I meet someone and I’ll click with them and then I’ll tell them like a week later that I have depression and sometimes I meet someone and I’m like, I really like talking to you, but I’m just not going to bring this up ever.
Just gonna… avoid it
Yeah. Um, I don’t know if that has to do with like… how I see them react to things and how I think they’ll react to it or if it has to do with like where I’m at. Maybe it’s both.
Then so like how do people… interact with you either knowing that you have depression or like seeing the symptoms of it?
Well, some of my friends try and be careful not to like overburden me with things.
Okay. Good friends.
Good friends. Some of them are like, “oh, I will just continue treating her the exact same way and hope that it works”.
Okay. And I guess like there was the, the guy that you liked kind of like… seeing the symptoms but not really knowing… Is that kind of like something that… is that like a sort of thing that has happened more than once or is that like…
Well, I think that was like the worst occasion of it because normally people are like, “hey, is everything okay?”’ And he was like, “Viola’s mad at me, let me just avoid her”.
You know what would be better? Communicating (said jokingly) maybe (Viola laughs)
Yes.
Um, and so in terms of like… the way that it affects how you interact with people, is it kind of like when it’s getting worse, you’re more isolated or…?
Yeah. I think sometimes I also isolate myself because I don’t think people want to be around me because I am depressed. I think this is the… there was a question about like intimacy and romantic relationships? Okay. So yes, sometimes with friends I’m like, I can’t talk to everyone. Everyone’s going to leave me. And I’ve had like… I think that’s partially because I’ve had multiple friendships that have ended because I am too depressed for them to deal with and they can’t understand it.
(piece omitted)
Um, so I guess the next question is like how do you interact with other people with mental illness which it seems like…
I ask them how they’re feeling and ask if like… what I can do to like navigate our interactions to like… so it varies. Like some people I have… some friends I have who are depressed like to talk when they’re depressed and then I will talk to them and some people are like, “I need space, I can’t talk to anyone”.
Um, so now we’re going to switch gears to gender. So same way you gave a personal history or mental illness, can you give a personal history for gender? And so I kind of see there… there as being two sides to this. The first is kind of the… uh, internal identity, um, and what that has been to you, um, over the course of your life. And the second one being the big, how people treated you because of your gender? And I… I realize that sometimes these questions come across that I’m like… looking for like the big sexism answer, which like… obviously I do think there’s a lot of sexism in the world, but also if you want to say positive things about being a woman, I don’t want to discourage anyone because there are positive things (said laughing).
There are positive things about being a woman. And I will say that inside I identify as a girl. I am like, I guess, you know, I am very soft and whimsical in certain spaces and I feel like I’m like that with my girl friends. So yes with them, I am myself and I am sweet and whimsical and then I realized that none of my guy friends would describe me as either of those two things. And… I think that is because I am in STEM, and in order to have like stable relationships with guys in my classes which are very male dominated, I have to be considered one of the guys. And I don’t know if I coded myself that way out of a survival instinct or they coded me that way first, but I feel… like with most of my guy friends who are in math and physics, they don’t really think of me as a girl. They just think of me as like Viola, who’s not a guy, but also, “why would we think of her as like a girl when we could, y’know, treat like someone that we would just talk to about math all the time”.
What do you think… like what…how would you qualify the demeanor that you project forth?
I feel like… well, one, I dress pretty androgynously.
It’s like… it’s even like the physical?
Um, I think part of that is also just me in general not wanting to draw attention to myself because I’m really self conscious about my body and looks. So… that’s part of it. And then the other part of it is like I very much just need to… it’s like I don’t want to be treated like I’m one of them, but I need to be treated like I’m one of them. In a way…so I won’t talk about things that I want to talk about. I will talk about math and more math and all the math…
All the math.
Um, in return they will talk to me about math and more math, all the math (both laugh). And it’s very just like blunt. I don’t know. I don’t know what the word is to describe like the interactions I have.
It’s very… it’s very centered around these things?
Yes. But it’s also not… like, I don’t know how to explain like the difference between how a guy friend in math would treat one of my girl friends that they meet as opposed to how they treat me. Um, like… trying to explain this… words…
Words, words, words.
Right. So… I guess examples… examples are good, both in math and in real life. Um, so I guess a guy that I’m friends with in math might describe one of my girl friends as being very funny or very sweet or like and ask to be introduced… very something positive. And when they talk about me to other people and they’ll be like, “oh yeah, Viola’s in two grad classes and she helped me with this PSET” So I guess I feel like an object… that is there. I thought… that’s the wrong phrase.
Do you feel like they value your intelligence?
I feel like they value my intelligence but nothing else. Which… is weird because a lot of girls have the opposite problem, but… yes.
But it’s like… you just become like this floating brain?
Yeah. That is what I feel like.
Um, so… this is possibly the hardest question, but what does it mean to you to be a girl? Like… how do you define it for yourself? Not a universal definition, but for yourself, like what are the qualities in yourself that you attribute to that? Like… yeah. What does your femininity look like? (Long pause, Cassandra laughs) Blank stare?
Blink, blink, blink, blink. Oh Lord (Viola laughs). Just as a note: I say, “oh Lord”, very frequently, but I am not religious in any way, shape or form.
That’s fair
Um..I don’t know. Is that an answer?
That’s fine. That’s totally fine. If you think of the answer later, you can always type it into ye old transcript.
I feel like society has created a box for what it means to be a girl in terms of what they’re expected to do and I feel like I mostly fit in the box except for a few corners here and there.
Um, next question is, um, have your experiences with your gender affected the way that you approach intimacy at all? Whether platonic or familial or romantic or physical or emotional? I can keep listing…. different forms of intimacy.
Um, yeah. Well, right. So with my guy friends in study groups, I feel like I have to tone down… my girlness, whatever that means. So I feel like I can’t approach them romantically if I’m into them because otherwise I will lose the…. respect
You think if they were to look at you romantically, they would stop respecting you?
Uh, I think that… a lot of guys I’ve talked to… so they do not want a girlfriend who is smarter than them. (Cassandra sighs, Viola laughs) Separate issue.
All right. Um… (both start laughing). For the record, Viola’s currently getting slapped in the face by my cat’s tail. Um, so yeah. So there’s… there’s that. Do you feel like it’s affected any that other forms of intimacy?
I think my friendships are fine. It’s just really the romantic ones where like.. I can either get boxed into like, “I talk to this person about classes and math” or I get boxed into the like romantic interest box, but I can’t have both. Um, friendships are fine though.. Family I think would not be fine if I had a brother, but I have a sister.
What do you mean would not be fine if you had a brother?
I think that the society my parents were raised in has like a lot of expectations for like girls versus guys, except my parents don’t have any sons, so they just put all their expectations onto us.
Ah, for better or for worse…
For better or for worse.
Okay. Um, so this is a leading question, but it is also the thesis of this project, which is… do you feel like there’s been an intersection for you between gender and mental illness?
Yes. Um, yes.
Please elaborate (said laughing).
Um, I feel like… things that make me depressed or insecurity, which I feel… is huge because of the way that guys treat women and… I guess struggling to be respected in the things that I do and I guess struggling with like insecurity about my looks and body or whatever. And I think so… I guess coming back to like what it means to be a girl, like not a guy and… so therefore guys judge you based on how they judge girls, um, so that’s part of it. I think the other part of it is in relationships that have suffered because I… I don’t know if what I’m saying… Does… does like…like who you’re interested in romantically count as part of gender identity?
I mean…in that like heterosexual relationships are often times gendered.
Yes. Um, yeah, that.
Like the dynamics that exist…
The dynamics that exist when I’m interested in someone. And then that goes really bad.
And it’s oftentimes been in a gendered way, you feel?
Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. Um… so obviously everyone has lots of different identities, so… um, are there other identities of yours that you feel have interacted with… either your experience with gender or your experience with mental illness…
Being a STEM major.
Being a STEM major is a big… Yeah.
I’m sorry that I’ve talked about math for like 50% of this interview.
But that’s like… it’s relevant to your experience.
Too relevant, one might say.
Um…what’s the culture around mental illness in India?
I guess it depends. Yeah. Actually I think that… being Indian has a lot to do with why my parents will not accept that I’m depressed and I also think that they both suffer from depression of some kind, but… in a similar way they will not get it treated because that is not what it is done.
Yeah, I feel like it’s both a very cultural thing and a generational thing. There’s just a lot of like… weird things everywhere about mental illness. Um, do you feel like their being depressed has interacted with your depression in specific ways?
I think that their being depressed causes them to manifest that in ways that are harmful to me, which in turn led to me being depressed.
Fair enough. Um, yeah. Is there anything you want to say that hasn’t been addressed in these questions?
Probably, but I will probably add it later when I think about it.
Okay. Um, so it’s important to me that these are more like conversations than flat out interviews. So I want to give you the chance to ask me any questions if you want to. You don’t have to, but it’s just, um… if you want to turn any of these questions back around on me, if you want to ask me something about the project, just so there’s a little bit more of a back and forth because I’ve just been sitting and asking you questions. But yeah, so if you have any– you don’t have to though. That’s okay.
Asking questions is fun. Did any of it resonate with you?
Yeah. Um… it’s… it’s always so hard when people ask me things about the interview because I’m usually focused on like, okay, how do I like… take the things that they’re saying and now like, respond to them and ask follow up questions. I’m focused on that, that I like exit my own body, if that makes sense (Viola laughs).
I really like the snow Metaphor. I know I’ve heard it before, but I still really like it. Um… I’m now pondering through all the ways that you’ve… that you’ve answered. Yeah, I mean I think… more and more… most of my friends are not neurotypical people, but I think when they were, I was running into a lot of… similar issues. Um, I’ve… I’ve been lucky that like, thankfully a good number of my friends have still been fairly understanding, but I know that like second year when I was super depressed, um, and it was like a… one of those like many month long things, yeah, like I think in the beginning, my friends were like, “oh, she just went through a breakup. She’s sad”. And then like fast forward four or five months, they’re like, “she’s still sad. She’s still crying every day”. And I was like, (makes screaming noise)
It’s not just that I’m sad about this guy. It’s everything.
Yeah. I think that was the thing… is that both my ex and my friends were like, “why are you not over this yet?” And I’m like, it’s not just… (Cassandra laughs) I don’t know how to explain to you that like while it’s kinda like fixating on this breakup, that’s not… that’s not the thing. That’s not the actual cause of this. It’s just the…
Yeah. I feel like especially when I have guy issues that like trigger depression, people are like, “oh, just get over him. There are other guys”. And I’m like, that’s not the problem. The problem is that I feel like it’s my fault and everything is my fault and it just won’t go away”.
Yeah. It’s like… yeah, it’s really… because people are like, “oh, that’s dumb reason to be depressed”. And it’s like, yes, he is such a dumb boy, but it’s like…
It triggered like every depressed feeling inside of you (both laugh)
Exactly. It’s… depression is like herpes (Viola laughs), it’s just latent inside of you. And then… actually I don’t know how herpes works all that well… (Cassandra laughs) but I’m assuming that maybe some things… maybe like a lowered… I think a lowered immune system probably… Yes, I’m going to pretend that I know things about this. I’m going to say that a lowered immune system causes an outbreak and I feel like it’s that.
Yes, exactly.
It’s like… the lowered immune system wasn’t what caused the herpes in the first place.
But the breakup lowered your immune system.
Exactly (still laughing). Yeah. Imperfect metaphor, but that’s fine.
It’s okay. I think taking bits and pieces of different metaphors helps. Can I cover it with that metaphor?
The Cassandra Transcripts 