Every Professional I’ve Ever Met Told Me Not to Share This

On my 39th birthday, I’m doing it anyway.

Good morning, beautiful human,

Today is my 39th birthday. And this letter is landing in your inbox at the exact minute I was born—11:59 p.m.

Yup. According to my mom, she turned to my dad at 11:58 and said, “Well, I guess this kiddo won’t be born today.”

And then WOOOSH—she had the biggest contraction and there I was. 8 pounds. 8 ounces of smooshy, exuberance. And wearing a flower on her first day, no less!

Look at those cheeks! No wonder my childhood name was Katie Dumpling :)

I often joke that the way I entered the world is the way I move through it. People tell me what I can’t do—learn to read and write, get into college, graduate college while living with psychosis, survive outside a locked residential psych ward, care for a dog, hold down a full-time job—and my stubborn, oh-so-relentless self smiles mischievously and says:

Oh really? Watch this.

But there’s one thing I haven’t responded to as Fighter Kate.

At least, not just yet.

But today, on my 39th birthday, I am finally going for it…

This year, I’m giving myself the present I have always dreamt of:

finally—wholly, fully—pursuing my dream of becoming a full-time, paid writer.

A writer who does not diminish, romanticize or omit the hard truths I have lived—even though the literary world, the advertising world and the documentary film world have told me time and time again over the last 12 years that I cannot share them if I want to succeed.

Birthday flower crowns with my best girl when she was still earthside. I know she is proud of me for doing this. I know she is beyond proud. And though the ache is acute and the grief will never wane, that truth certainly helps.

I, of course, don’t know where this will lead.

I don’t know whether I can be successful if I share everything that got me locked up in a psych ward 21 times.

I don’t know if the world will accept the level of raw, feral mess that makes me who I am and that made Waffle so damn incredible.

All I know is that this year, for my birthday and for my best girl, I’m going to try.

I’m going to show up here every Friday.

And just like when my mom said I wouldn’t arrive on the 14th, my teachers said I would never write proficiently and my doctor said I would never survive outside a locked residential ward, I’m going to smile mischievously—just like my best girl used to—and say:

Oh really? Watch this.

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And now, without further ado, I introduce you to the newest incarnation of this space:

(un)Mentionable

Sharing everything that got me locked up in a psych ward.

Feral PTSD recovery, unrelenting attempts at survival and the madness of trying to stay sane in this broken healthcare system. Oh, and always, always, dogs + dog stories—because they walk me home.

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I do not take you being here with me lightly or for granted. I am so grateful you are here.

AND

If you would like to support me in this next chapter, here are additional ways you can help:

And before I do, because I am me, I share this with the accompanying disclaimer that I absolutely hate capitalism. AND—we live in it. So I am experimenting with the radical idea that my words, my story and my truth have actual monetary value.

Because after all, if NFTs—which didn’t even physically exist—were worth millions and I can’t believe my words are worth $6 at age 39, then wowza—what were those 22 years of therapy even for?

1. Subscribe for free.

The more subscribers here, the more evidence I can bring to literary agents and documentary film producers that there is an audience for the full, raw truth of serious mental illness—and that I deserve a book contract and documentary deal without cutting away the very truths that make the story what it is.

2. Become a paid subscriber.

$6/month or $60/year

Paid subscriptions directly support my livelihood and healthcare—but I make no promises about my personal hygiene. I am getting better at brushing my teeth these days though.

I share this ask with an accompanying

Paid subscribers receive:

• Full access to Maura + Me—the memoir I serialized here about the unexpected friendship that saved my life

• All seven existing chapters of With Love and Wafflenugget—plus every chapter still to come—the story of what happened after I was sentenced to a locked residential ward and how I re-entered the world with hella grit, a dog named Waffle and people who gave me a chance

• All 12 existing episodes of The Patient Is In—a podcast with my family and closest friends about what it means to support someone living with serious mental illness

• Additional personal essays, memoir chapters and occasional podcast episodes—as they emerge

• My deepest gratitude for sustaining this work, my life + one loud, and joining me in a collective mother-duck-you to every system that survives by silencing us

3. Become a Sustaining Human.

$200/year

Sustaining Humans receive everything paid subscribers receive, plus:

• One hour together: a private, hour-long Zoom during your first year as a Sustaining Human. Not therapy. Not coaching. Just two humans meeting—because getting to know one another is one of the greatest beauties of being alive.

• My extreme, I-will-never-have-the-words-for-it gratitude for putting $200 behind this work—and our shared belief that no human should have to disappear in order to survive.

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Additional ways to help:

1. Share my work—with friends, colleagues, therapists or anyone in your community who might value the lived truth of serious mental illness.

2. Tell me what my work means to you—either in an email that I may quote with your permission or in a public comment on a post. In every professional conversation I’ve had about my work, I am asked for words from my community that show why this work matters—and why I should be given the chance to share truths that have never been considered commercially viable before. If you are willing to share them, your words could genuinely make a difference in those conversations.

3. Comment, like, restack and share my posts on Substack. Substack has joined the platform brigade, so the more you engage with my work, the more visibility its algorithm affords it.

AND HOLY HECK THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR KINDNESS AND SUPPORT. TRULY!

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OKAY. Wowza. How was that for some hardcore— ask for exactly what you want—waffle assertive behavior?

But I’m doing it, little kate. I’m doing it. Just like you and Waffle taught me to.

Thank you so much for being here. That—above all—is my greatest gift.

Little Kate in all her wild glory :)

More soon.

With love.

Kindly,
Kate

I may have swapped my rocking horse for chaps and a chain saw but not much has changed. Not much has changed at all :)

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