madeofpatterns:

I don’t think that there are things that are me and things that are mental illness. I think that everything about me is the real me, including the parts of myself that I don’t like very much.

I want to grow and change in many ways. Recovery doesn’t feel like a good model for that to me.

I don’t think that there’s anything to recover. There is no way back. There is no real me underneath. There is no getting back who I theoretically would have been if I hadn’t been hurt or hadn’t gone crazy or whatever.

There’s no way back and there’s no underneath, but there’s a way forward. I’m not trying to recover. I’m trying to figure out how to grow and do the right things and be the best person I can be.

To me, that difference is important.