We all want control in our lives. Whether it comes from always being the leader, being fake to control what people think or even telling lies to manipulate the truth, people want control, and it’s when that control is taken right from us, that we are thrown off course.

My sister suffers from a chemical imbalance in her body. Very little of what she says and does comes from the rational part of her brain. Many times I find myself laughing at the hurtful words she says because they are not who she is. Seldom does she choose what to say because her words and actions come from a place in her body where she is constantly struggling and hurting. The hurt is so deep that she can’t even fathom being happy or going on with her life. Emily lacks control in dealing with her depression and scary as it is, its part of her everyday life; its something that someone not as strong would die trying to deal with.

My sister is my hero. She goes through more insecurity in a day that I have my entire lifetime. She muddles through the dark times, as best and she can because she can’t do it any other way. Just being in such an unpredictable house sometimes makes me breakdown; I can’t imagine living her life. My life is so full of control that a lot of the time I find myself organizing my friend’s bedroom because they are too cluttered. I have color coded my make-up just to find some sense of control and order in my life. My sister doesn’t have that luxury. No matter how perfect her clothes look, inside, she had no control over her feelings. If her psychiatrist puts her on medicine, her medicine controls her moods; she doesn’t.

Although she is the exact opposite of me – messy bedroom, make-up all over her bathroom sink – I fear that one day she is going to wake-up and see how little control she actually has. I used to think that people had absolute control over how they felt and acted. I thought that they could wake-up and decide if today was going to be a good day or a bad day; living in a house with some one suffering from bipolar disorder and depression has taught me differently. There are some things in life that can not be explained or organized. Feelings are not always controllable.
What scares me the most, is that maybe we, as a society, deceive ourselves into believing we have control, when we really don’t. So much of our lives have been predetermined by genetics and fate that just like Emily, we have no control.