Over and over again, I see waves of desperation and loneliness crash against the shore. I recognize it because I’ve been sitting on that beach for a long time. And I see communities who are ill equipped to help take care of each other, depending on a few to be responsible. We don’t always have social programs to help us. We have people dealing with intense shit trying to push that aside to care for other people while simultaneously trying to take care of themselves. I didn’t feel like I could ask people for help because my problems were not as serious as other people’s problems, because I’m the rock. “Be self-reliant”, I told myself, until I collapsed under the pressure. From my observations, that’s happening to a lot of people.

This article gets really good after the 5 words part.