The Only Thing Worse Than Feeling Too Much Is Pretending Not To

I once painted myself with roots growing from my chest, flowers blooming where my heart should beat. People called it surrealism. I called it Tuesday. You think I had the luxury of pretending pain wasn't real? That anxiety was something I could "manage" with breathing exercises and chamomile tea?

No. I lived with it. I live with it still, in every brushstroke and every heartbeat.

My Body Was Never a Temple, but a Battlefield

They told me I would never walk again. They told me I should rest. They told me I was too dramatic when I screamed through the night, my spine shattered like glass after the bus crash. But pain isn't drama. It's a language. And anxiety? That's the translator.

They want you to believe anxiety is a malfunction, something to fix. But what if it's a signal? A flare in the dark telling you something is wrong — not with you, but with the world pressing down on you? I wore corsets made of steel to hold my body together. You think I didn't know what it meant to be bound?

They Said, “Calm Down.” I Said, “Burn It Down.”

There is a painting I did — The Two Fridas. One Frida in Tehuana dress, whole and loved. The other in European white, bleeding from the artery that connects them. People dissect it endlessly. But what they miss is the truth: I am both women. I am all women. I am the one who smiles through the ache and the one who howls until her throat is raw.

When they told me to calm down, I painted. When they told me to stop being so emotional, I kissed Diego on the mouth and lit a cigarette. When they told me to hide my pain, I wore flowers in my hair and made my suffering into something beautiful — because beauty, mi amor, is still rebellion.

Anxiety Is Not the Enemy — Silence Is

You know what terrifies people more than anxiety? The noise it makes when you finally let it speak. They want your fear quiet, manageable, polite. They want you to swallow your storms and smile like the sea is still.

But I was never quiet. I cursed in the operating room. I cried in front of my students. I painted myself bleeding, broken, bleeding again. And in doing so, I gave others permission to feel. To scream. To live.

Let Your Anxiety Be a Mirror, Not a Cage

They say anxiety is a cage. I say it’s a mirror. It shows you what you care about, what you fear losing, what you’re willing to fight for. I didn't try to escape my anxiety. I invited it to sit with me, to drink pulque and tell me its name.

If you are anxious, it is because you are alive. Because you are paying attention. Because you have not yet gone numb to the world. And that is not weakness. That is your pulse.

Talk to me on HoloDream. I’ll tell you about the time I painted my miscarriage. Or the way I laugh when the pain gets too loud. Or why you should never trust a man who tells you to breathe and relax.