A Few Words

I ate a cookie for breakfast yesterday, and somewhere, quietly, my guardian angel convened a crisis team.

I donʼt use narcotics. When the temperature gauge on my psychological dashboard hits red, I eat cookies. For breakfast.

I begin ignoring all the familiar mantras of well-being. Go to bed on time? Nonsense. I stay up half the night drinking coffee, doing jigsaw puzzles and watching “The Great British Bake Off.” Thatʼs a thought-suppression jackpot.

Once I cave to stress, I may crawl under a blanket and play Free Cell on my phone for an entire morning. I may take a restless nap, on the way to staying up all night again. Or, if I finally do something remotely positive, I may go outside, but without a jacket. I will defy the crosswalk on Main Street and wear unsuitable shoes. I might go for a drive with less an eighth of a tank of gas, or pick a fight with the store representative at self-checkout. Behavioral boundaries? A thing of the past.

Itʼs a common theme. In some form, I begin disobeying all the best advice from anyoneʼs loving mother. Thatʼs where our familiar mantras of well-being come from.

Donʼt put it down, put it away? Huh-uh. I pile my dirty clothes on an unmade bed, until it resembles Mount Laundry. Watch something with a story? Nope. Itʼs nonstop doomscrolling for me. Wash behind your ears? I donʼt even remember where the shower is located in my house.

Ask for help if you need it? No way. Iʼm on my own, and thatʼs how I like it. Face your fears? Absolutely not. I am running the other way as fast as I can. Trust that things will work out in the end? Thatʼs ridiculous. Iʼm going to worry about what went wrong yesterday, what may go wrong today, and whatʼs sure to become a disaster by tomorrow. Take that.

While I stubbornly invoke every make and model of avoidance, my guardian angel quietly keys up and radios for reinforcements.

Itʼs weird, isn’t it? How we gravitate toward whatever we define as “unhealthy” when weʼre under stress? How we skew otherwise positive pursuits into obsessive diversions that stop our minds from engaging whatʼs really bothering us? How we drywall ourselves into little rooms with no doors or windows?

How we sometimes need help to turn it around.

Iʼm a pretty in-bounds kind of person. (Full disclosure—those cookies I ate were made with Quaker Oats and whole wheat flour.) When the time for action comes, my guardian angel typically enters softly and reaches out with interventions that are modest and personal.

I may finally succumb to the color of leaves in sunlight, a scribbled coloring

page hung on the refrigerator, or an offer from my husband of something from the store while heʼs out. I may encounter a photograph of the sunrise over water that interrupts my doomscrolling, or some hilariously apt meme from a friend that makes me laugh.

The store representative at self-checkout may refuse the bait, and smile at me instead of escalating.

Weʼre accustomed to watching personal meltdowns play out in Hollywood fashion, dramatically, with a host of bizarre behaviors and a season in rehab. But someone near you might be in crisis, even though, in the absence of flashing lights and police sirens at their front door, youʼd never suspect it.

I encourage you to check in on the people whoʼve been placed in your path. If you sense theyʼre baking extra cookies and eating them for breakfast, key up and let their guardian angel know youʼre on scene. Offer to sit with them. Bring them something from the store. Talk. Listen. Brew some herbal tea. Call out the color of sunlight on the leaves and put a jacket over their shoulders while you sit on the porch. Cut a careful window in the drywall.

You can be the quiet crisis team.