I remember reading somewhere that the very first memory you can recall in your lifetime says a lot about the direction your life will take. My first memory was waking up from a nap on top of a giant pile of rugs in a sketchy flea market that no longer exists. I really don’t think says anything about me except that I have this uncanny ability to fall asleep in the weirdest places.

My second memory, however, was Furnace Man.

Furnace Man lived in my grandma’s old blue boiler furnace, hence the name. He was tallish, wore a plaid shirt, and had no head. Every now and then, he’d leave the furnace to stomp around my grandma’s house. I always imagined him dancing to a deep, booming beat, like some kind of creepy timpani. Also, he had a name, but whatever it was is now buried in the annals of my stupid brain. I think it might have been Ernie or Tim or something.

Needless to say, Furnace Man wasn’t real. There never was a flannel-wearing, headless being living in the furnace, but that didn’t stop him from being real to me. And keep in mind, I was like, two. Toddlers aren’t supposed to be scared of things. They’re supposed to be dumb and innocent and prone to questionable decisions like drawing on walls or eating Legos. They don’t stare blankly into the dark abyss of a utility room, expecting to see a decapitated hipster Slenderman crawling out of a furnace. I would avoid the room at all costs, or else freak out and cry, and I literally didn’t know the words to articulate what it was I was even afraid of.

I guess this is a good indicator that I was destined for a life of anxiety issues. Furnace Man never died. Not even when I found out years later that “Furnace Man” was just my dad getting stuck in a too-small shirt one Christmas Eve while trying it on in the utility room. My mind took the smallest, stupidest memory and twisted it into something horrifying. It’s almost like my head has this amazing ability to make monsters out of nothing. But isn’t that basically what anxiety is in the first place?

One evening at a particularly intense therapy session, I had an epiphany — I cannot remember a time when I wasn’t afraid of something.

That’s not to say I spent my entire life up until now cowering in the corner of a warm, safe library or something, hiding from the outside world (although that was a good portion of it). In fact, if I’m honest, I take a lot of pride in how stupidly brave I am. Like, heights don’t phase me. Take me to any old theme park and I’ll be the first to get in line for whatever ride everyone else is trying to avoid. I’m still the designated spider slayer at my job, and I’m the idiot who got two feet away from an alligator on vacation in Florida. The point is, all the stuff normal people are supposed to be afraid of are not even concerns of mine.

But that’s not to say I’m fearless.

In fact, in my feeble attempt to peel back the layers of the suck-onion that is my never-ending war on my own stupid brain, I made a list of the horrifically nonsensical fears I’ve dealt with at one point or another. This is not an exhaustive list, even though it definitely freaking looks like it. These are the fears that, for one reason or another, stand out in my memory.

So why am I going through the trouble of writing all of this down? See, this is more than some cathartic exercise. Mental illness is this big, stupid elephant in the room almost everyone notices but never really takes the time to fully understand. The world’s idea of life with anxiety is drastically different from actual life with anxiety. In fact, when I came out of the presumably well-organized OCD closet after learning my official diagnosis, I got a slew of “Oh, I’m going to bring you over to clean my house sometime!” (Pro tip: Do not ever say this to someone with OCD. I pinky-promise it will not end well.) The truth is, nobody actually likes being OCD. It’s not something you’re proud of. It’s not some cute, hipster-girl-with-Zooey-Deschanel-hair quirk that automatically turns you into the stereotypical manic pixie dream girl.

It’s not. It’s a living hell. One where sometimes death itself seems like the only way out.

That’s why I wanted to get my experiences in writing and let the soft, tender underbelly of my mind be exposed to the world. Because if even one person out there realizes they’re not alone in this, everything I’ve gone through will be worth it. Because if I realized I wasn’t alone in this years ago, I would have opened up and sought help sooner. Because you can’t fight this battle alone. Because nothing in this world has the power to destroy a life quite like mental illness.

This is the story of the lifelong love-hate relationship between me and my head.