These are our neighbors,
and their stories are our stories.
We are all granted a certain number of very good days and a certain number of trying ones. They come to us at random, as if drawn from a lottery, and it is up to us to decide how to handle their arrivals. The good days are easy—enjoy them. The difficult ones? Well, I traveled the country to learn what to do about those.
Waiting Room tells the story of how millions of Americans stay afloat without adequate access to mental health care. This is not an assault on our providers. Therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and social workers pour their hearts into their patients despite low pay and long hours. Rather, this is a roadmap of the United States dotted with the most beautiful, hopeful, and honest conversations with people just like you. Waiting Room is a light in the dark—and I can’t wait to share it with you.
Beginning the project
Trembling, I held the phone close to my ear. The woman on the other end of the static was about to deliver my fate. After surviving a trauma, I needed mental health care. I called her to find a provider to help me. “Great news,” she began. “I found you a therapist. They can see you in five months. In Chicago.”
I do not live in Chicago.
I did not have five months to wait.
I needed help at that moment.
I told her as much.
“Well, I don’t deal with emergencies,” she said, ending the call.
And that’s the last I heard from her.
I figured it was me. I was too broken, too far gone.
And then I learned that there is only one care provider for every 990 people in the state of Alabama. And 69% of people who need treatment in Wisconsin do not receive it. And, in inner cities, entire neighborhoods do not have a licensed mental health professional to serve them.
How do these people cope without access to mental health care?
What can I learn from them while I wait?
I packed my bags to find out.
“Who else is waiting for mental health care and how are they doing it?” I sprawled out on a window seat at the local library researching.
By dusk, the results were clear: everyone in the United States is waiting for more affordable, accessible mental health care. Rich, poor, urban, suburban, rural, Black, Asian, young, old, gay, straight, insured, uninsured. Everyone.
We simply do not have enough providers. Laws do not favor consistent access to therapy and medication. Our culture clings to a stigma that mental health is a barometer of moral character and fortitude, isolating people who need help.
If the problem is everywhere, I vowed to go everywhere to learn how to cope.
I started by tracing my roots. I was born and raised in Appalachia. I come from generations of Appalachian Americans. Surely they know how to fix what feels broken within me. Before long, I traced my way through the Appalachian mountains that stretch from Maine to Northern Alabama.
Full of biscuits and ancient wisdom, I left Appalachia and made my way toward the Midwest where friendly folks live in idyllic towns and cities buffered by stretches of farmland. Places like Ohio, Indiana, and Wisconsin.
In time, I touched the Pacific, the Atlantic, and the hands of farmers and doctors and grandmas in between. Before long, I found renewed purpose and passion.
Choosing the locations
Becoming an author
In the fifth grade, I told my teacher that someday I would “publish my piece.” I’m not entirely sure what I was envisioning, but I thought I had achieved it when I started ghostwriting.
Helping people to understand their story enough to tell it brilliantly is magical work. I got to be a magician. What could be better than that?
Until I approached my mentor and manager about my project. “I’m going to travel the entire country to find out how we’re surviving. What do you think?”
“I think you should write the book.”
And the rest is history.
This is the first time I’m writing a book with my real name. No pseudonyms. No big fancy names that everyone already recognizes. Just little old me. Me, and everyone I meet along the way.
Some, who know me from Random Note Project, think this is a long-form version of the notes we know and love. I happen to agree. This is my love letter to the world.
Building the community
This actually happened:
Scanning a busy plaza in a bustling inner city, I looked for a place to land with my breakfast sandwich and juice. I found only one unoccupied chair and it was next to a kind-eyed older gentleman.
I sat next to him and, within a few minutes, he leaned over and confessed “I’m going to die tomorrow.”
I scanned his face. The way his lips curved like two writhing earthworms reminded me of my own grandfather. His eyes were clear, sincere, striking.
No one tells you they’re dying unless they long to be remembered. I asked for his life story.
We talked for hours. Miracles happened. My new friend opened up and shared beautiful, tragic, compelling, hilarious stories. He unpacked his life there in the plaza, unashamed of the messy bits.
And then he asked about me. In that moment, I realized anew how difficult it is for me to talk about myself. To share. To belong. Even though belonging is the thing I want most in life.
This dying man gave me a gift. He taught me the value of community. He showed me that by sharing our lives we become real, memorable, empowered. (Read the full story here.)
I wanted him to meet everyone else I had met in my travels. I wanted for all of them to meet each other. I wanted a way for everyone to be able to share stories and lessons and support without having to travel.
So, I am launching Waiting Room Community events in towns near you. Stay tuned!
Sometimes we change the world with big, bold changes. And sometimes we change the world by showing up exactly as we are and trusting that it is enough to take us where we hope to be. I hope to see you there!
