One year since going viral (on the site formerly known as Twitter)
What “moving on” has meant for me, and how acknowledging the reality of our “new normal” has empowered me to take care of myself and fight for what needs to change.
[TW: This piece will cover topics and stories including suicide, death, and depression.]
For those familiar with The Biggest Mood, welcome back! For those who may not be, check out my introductory post here. Either way, a quick refresher: Just over one year ago, I tweeted something on a Tuesday evening that went viral over the course of a couple days.
“So, real talk. Is anyone else burnt out in a way after the past 3 years where now the future feels like a void of futile nothingness? With high cost of living, high risk of costly illness/disability, and ongoing climate crises, the new year feels... empty for this single person.”
It’s come to be known (at least for myself) as the “dark tweet,” yet it generated a huge amount of support and positivity. I couldn’t find more than a handful of trolls within the more than 800 comments, almost 3,000 retweets, and almost 30,000 likes. It’s since been bookmarked 1,000 times, which is wild to me.
The entire experience was honestly baffling, in the best way. Going viral is a strange experience, and especially strange when it’s a remarkably positive one. It’s clear that I was not alone in what I was feeling that night, but that didn’t surprise me; what did was the wave of kind words and empathy, not only directed toward me, but exchanged between complete strangers. As it was unfolding, it felt like a giant virtual group hug, as thousands of people acknowledged and held space for each other’s grief, sadness, loneliness, and frustration. Although it wasn’t my initial intention, in hindsight it felt like the social media equivalent of: “If you build it, they will come.”
I’ve since gotten the chance to make new friends, connect with many of the covid conscious community’s top scientists, advocates, organizers, journalists, and writers, as well as become acquainted with absolutely wonderful average people doing their best during such a ridiculous time to be alive. The amount of support I have received, during and since this social media spotlight, continues to move me in ways I don’t have words for, and has restored a chunk of my faith in humanity. It has also continually inspired me to want to give back in some way, to do my small part in a community that has done so much for me.
The funny thing is, going viral once doesn’t change all that much — it’s what you do with it, with the momentum and the opportunity, that creates change. Even though I became a mini internet celebrity of sorts in 2023, and got “recognized from Twitter” a couple of times, I was still just an average person doing their best during such a ridiculous time to be alive. I am still just an average person doing their best during such a ridiculous time to be alive — but that remains a meaningful accomplishment, like my past year has been.
Yet I had already started putting in effort towards my goals, and over the next two months I started to reap the rewards of trying my best — of doing what I could with what I had. I was interviewed for and offered a fantastic job by the middle of February, that would have stabilized me financially and seriously advanced my career in science writing. But it wasn’t an easy decision to make, and in the meantime, despite my efforts, my depression had gotten seriously worse.
Almost every moment of every day that I wasn’t distracted, it felt painful to be alive. I was more suicidal than I’d ever been in my life, apart from two dark moments more than 10 years ago. I called the 988 hotline for the first time in my life, and was connected to a woman back in Iowa (due to my cell phone area code), who, when I informed her that I was safe on my couch and not actively suicidal, asked if I had heard of “meditation.” My ability to feel anger in that moment was a welcome reprieve from the ocean of despair I was drowning in, but what helped the most in that moment was my own acknowledgement of how serious my situation was. By calling the number, I was asking for, and therefore needed, serious help for a serious situation.
I knew I needed stability more than anything else at that time, and there was no way that leaving an employer I’d been with in some form for more than 7 years, starting a demanding new job, and switching health insurance companies, during the middle of a serious depressive episode, was going to be a set of choices that allowed me to recover. While I knew I had made the right choice, when I turned down the job, it didn’t feel good. I felt numb. I felt like a failure.
Only one month after going viral, I was in a remarkably worse place mentally. I told almost no one about how badly I was struggling. As a naturally quite extroverted, goofy, and funny person, I felt like I was living a double life. I kept up a facade for my job (while my supervisors were confused that I had stayed), for new friendships where I didn’t want them to think I was this sad, dark person, and I did my best to hold it all together just for the chance of things getting better.
And even though I couldn’t see it at the time: yes, they could, and yes, they did. I called the Colorado Crisis Line on a particularly bad day the following weekend, and was connected with a “peer support specialist,” who knew exactly what I was going through, asked all the right questions, and somehow was able to say the words I needed to hear so badly: “This wasn’t your only chance, this was just the first. There will be others.” She said it with empathy in her voice, but also like it was a fact that would come true, and I believed her.
A couple of days later, I found a job posting that was more of what I was looking for than the previous opportunity. I applied a week later, and a week after that, I got a call to set up an interview. By the end of March, I had secured a new job working in air quality for a small organization that was going to pay better over time than my current role ever would. I gave notice at my current job, and started the new one in May. In only three months, I had secured a major goal that I was so scared would never happen, and within five months, I was living that new reality. Despite thinking it wasn’t possible, I had moved on.
But just like going viral, I didn’t accomplish this on my own. I had several friends both in person and virtual, both new and old, who were absolute lifelines and cheerleaders during this time. One coached me step by step through negotiating pay and benefits, others held space for me, helped me sit with my feelings, or distracted me and cheered me up. I also had an entire internet community behind me, I was finding and getting involved in covid conscious communities on various platforms, and finally, finally, it felt like things were headed in a better direction. I was moving on up.
And for a while in 2023, things were much better! The new job continues to be the right choice, even though it comes with different challenges. My friendships and connections are better than ever. I’ve made a ton of mental and emotional progress, that while invisible, shows up in how I show up for myself and others every day. In moving on from what was familiar for so long, I’ve given myself the chance to get better emotionally and mentally, and to grow as a person. In moving on from being stuck in fear about the unknown, I’ve gained more confidence and experience in how to advocate for myself and stand up for what matters, no matter what comes my way. In moving on, I’ve proven to myself that I can do hard things.
At the same time, there were many setbacks and things that just plain sucked in 2023. My meager attempt at dating was again a failure, and I had to deal with many unwanted and unprofessional advances from grown men, all in large part due to their lack of emotional maturity and personal accountability, which made me feel like a sexualized meat sack. I gained an uncomfortable amount of weight due to the antidepressant I went on early in the year that helped me through things, and I haven’t lost any since going off of it due to other problematic side effects. My best friend's mom died unexpectedly, another best friend's serious illness got much worse (after a covid infection), and another best friend has been sick a lot this past year since getting flu and covid back to back in late 2022. I was also heartsick a lot in 2023, trying to untangle unreciprocated feelings for someone from separate, old wounds within me that they made feel all too fresh.
The frustrating thing is, after changing so much of my life this year, advocating for myself and standing up for what I believe in again and again, after making tough decision after decision, I'm still often left with this overwhelming feeling of helplessness. I can't stop the people who I love in my life from experiencing pain, from being ill, from experiencing destabilizing uncertainty in their lives. I can't stop my heart from getting hurt again and again. I can't stop a genocide, as much as I call and protest and raise my voice about it. As we enter a major election year, it seems like the stakes have, once again, never been higher for this country, and possibly for the whole world. We also had the world’s hottest year, or saw record low sea ice levels, or something er, not scary at all like that? And needless to say: covid is still everywhere, and we're in the middle of and heading for an even bigger public health, healthcare, and economic crisis because of it.
So lo and behold, at the end of New Year’s Day 2024, as I prepared to return to work the next morning, I ended up in what felt like the exact same spot as the year before. That night, “I was frustrated that while I had been productive over my time off between Christmas and New Year’s, I had barely done anything I wanted to do, as I had only been doing the things I had to get done,” — exactly as I had written one year ago for My Sweet Dumb Brain.
“It's going to be another year of me just by myself, enjoying daily things, working a full-time job, managing my limited money, managing my health issues… avoiding COVID-19 to my best ability, watching the climate crisis get worse, and so on and so forth,” I wrote. “How it’s now year four five of the pandemic and instead of seeing the end, thousands of people are still dying and becoming disabled by the virus each week, and leadership across the world is doing almost nothing about it.”
Ouch. Reading this, I had to ask: Had I really made any progress? Had the world?
I can’t speak for the world, but I can say for myself: yes, absolutely. Like an upward spiral, I had ended up in the same spot in the circle as before, but not all in the same place in space and time.
Three things stand out for me that I want to reiterate and remember:
Acknowledgement of how serious a situation is is the first step to improving it. I would not be where I am now if I had not taken my depression at the start of the year seriously, stopped fighting it, and focused on addressing it seriously instead. Heck, I might not even be here at all. So please, if you are going through something serious, don’t downplay it — you owe it to yourself to take it seriously.
This is also true for the “new normal” of covid in 2024 and beyond: while there is no longer an official “emergency” in most places, it is still a very serious pandemic. It is causing serious damage every day, from killing people and disabling them, to straining the healthcare system, and causing rifts in families, friendships, and communities. We can’t wait around for leadership to fix it for us, while we pretend it’s nothing; we have to take it as seriously as it is in our daily lives, step up for our communities, and show leadership what needs to be done. This is the year that we practice and live our values more fully than ever before, to protect both ourselves and the most vulnerable. The “new normal” of the present moment is horrendous, but if enough of us take it seriously, there is great potential to finally make the changes we desperately need. The good news is that…
Things can change quickly, sometimes by luck, but especially when you put in effort. Things will likely still be tough, but don't underestimate how much can change for better in a year's time — or less — if you’re honest, speak your truth, and put yourself out there. Heck, things can change almost overnight. I experienced both last year, and it makes me want to keep trying this year. Of course it’s not a guarantee, but it's not possible if you don't try. We owe that much to ourselves.
The first week of the year is always going to suck. This is the “new normal” that I’m not going to fight. The awful combination of covid and the holidays, followed by what is supposed to be a “fresh start,” while covid cases surge to the second highest levels in the pandemic is not a recipe for sticking to resolutions and feeling positive about what is to come. And that is OKAY.
I try to remember the ways I cope best in these dark moments, especially in the winter. I try to hold on to the people I love and who care so much about each other and the world despite everything. I try to still make time to laugh, even if it's about the (oh dear god, not again) poop that gets stuck to my cat's butt. I try to make time and space to write things I want to, even if most of the time, they get stuck in my chest and sit on me like a heavy weight. So if the first couple weeks of 2024 have sucked for you mentally and emotionally, it’s not you, it’s because they just do. As Westley says in The Princess Bride: “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”
The Princess Bride got a lot of things right, such as its predictions on masks: “It's just that masks are terribly comfortable – I think everyone will be wearing them in the future,” Westley remarks. Then there’s Count Rugen, who ironically while torturing Westley, advises: "Get some rest. If you haven’t got your health, then you haven’t got anything."
But it’s the moment in the fire swamp for me that somehow stands out, at the start of the fifth year of the pandemic, at the start of a presidential election year in the U.S., and when things feel bleaker than they have in a while (which is saying something). Buttercup says, "We'll never survive." Westley answers, "Nonsense. You only say that because no one ever has."
And guess what? They make it through the fire swap (although slightly worse for wear). The point is that just because you haven’t done it yet, or that it hasn’t been done yet, doesn’t mean you can’t do it or that it can’t be done. None of us have gotten through 2024 yet, but we know that it can be done. So here’s to surviving 2024 and beyond, and the benefits of “moving on.”
Much love,
Kelsey