“I longed to stabilize my core identity and to withstand the pressure of other people's words, behaviors, moods, and perceptions. I wanted to be less easily thrown.” — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“It isn't any particular person I want to lie down with and make my own. It isn't anybody at all. It is the feeling… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I want to say my apartment is no paradise for bachelorettes and would be more accurately described by terms like 'pain clinic', 'wound-care center',… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“My life story is structured by reckless reenactments of panic and flight.” — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“Our bodies made us shiver in fear and disgust. We looked in the mirror and prepared ourselves to be horrified.” — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I thieve love. I beg for it. People want what they cannot have.” — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“In one of the few memoirs of self-injury, Caroline Kettlewell describes her recovery in terms of neural pathways—the “groove” worn into her mind, the… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I know insecurity is unattractive. I hate this side of me. I don't really hate this side of me. I think other people will… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I wade through the rush of neglect and loss and sadness pouring through a hole in my hull.” — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I longed to stabilize my core identity and to withstand the pressure of other people's words, behaviors, moods, and perceptions. I wanted to be… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I bored myself to tears with the daytime television drama of confrontation (I've been wronged!). I winced at sluggish morning half-memories of wearing wrongness… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“I worked through memories like weeping wounds. I wrote tedious accounts of petty conflicts and read them aloud to people. I removed layer after… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
“A personality disorder is not the foreign presence of demonic possession or a cancerous cluster of cells spreading among the internal organs. It is… — Merri Lisa Johnson Copy Share Image
