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True Colors

My seven year old's relationship with mental health

By brooke vecchiPublished 3 years ago 3 min read
20
True Colors
Photo by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

My son Everett is Blue

Not the blue that always brings sadness

But the blue that creates crashing waves and open skies

He is the blue that turns dark at the end of a long day only lit by the moon

Everett's psychoses diagnosis is red

they are flames that spread and envelop his mind like an unwanted hug

they will not go out but rather burn his entire life

they keep him warm while trying to destroy his world around him

Everett's love is green

ever growing

bringing life and joy into moments between the voices that capture his mind

Everett is yellow

seven years old standing tall on his climbing tree

planning to go all the way to the moon

even if the trip must be taken from a hospital room

Everett's mind is indigo

a color between the lines of others

recognized as something we never expected

Everett is the orange walls he once had in his nursery

Everett is the purple fog that rolls over before the sun shines down on us once more

Everett is Autism

Everett is schizophrenia

Everett is DMDD

Everett is seven years old

Everett is the boy who taught us to see the world in new colors

to experience moments in the colors that bleed within one another

Everett is every color that most his age do not yet get to experience

shades of different colors that do not blend with in the lines

the lines are blurred into the background of his mind and he picks up his brush

he draws the ones that speak to him

gives them shape size and color

the voices in his head have backstories that Austen would not write

the dark moments of greys turn in his heads

and he breaks out in moments of light against the dark background that is his life

Everett is the artist with the mind made of Picasso paintings and the need for Van Gogh's flowers stuck in the painting entitled, "Scream."

He yearns for shades of colors that stay in the lines

and the medications push as much of the ink in as they can

but under the blurs the chemical indifferences

and chemicals move the colors between swirls of the blends society expects

society expects the colors that are shades of grey

that do not disrupt the world but fade into it

Everett's colors disrupt the world in loud hues and demanding tones

and he teaches everyone around him to do the same

In a world that sometimes feels like walking in shades of grey

Everett is the color in every moment of my life

He is the warm hues on cold days

Everett is the splashes of color that make me want to live everyday to its limit

He colors the entire world with one laugh

turning old grey smiles into bursts of orange and yellow

and all the colors fall together

as if the sun only rises to the reds and yellows when he opens his eyes

and the blues of the sky pour out of his own eyes

and the browns and greens next to his irises

fill out the valleys and mountains

and the pink on his cheeks warms up the moments when I fear for his fragile mind

In between the voices screaming in his head,

the fire that burns in his mind shouting commands that envelop him in the greys

I take him in my arms and the last of my color bleeds into him

our colors replace each other on the days when life wants to filter us into monotones

and in the darkest moments we bring color into each other

he teaches me how to bleed color back out into the world

how to appreciate the shades around us

how to find colorful joy in every moment

Everett is true colors shining

Every color shining through

love poems
20

About the Creator

brooke vecchi

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