Mormor bajs gås

Leaving the Room

Growing up, I knew I had quirks.

Numbers mattered—on my alarm clock, on the stereo volume. I ate two of the same snack at a time so they wouldn’t be lonely in my stomach. I told the truth compulsively so I wouldn’t go to hell. I performed small religious rituals at night to keep myself from dying in my sleep—and to keep my family safe.

Before karate tournaments, I had a very specific routine: a hearty breakfast of Coca-Cola and beef jerky, thong underwear (because it was going up my butt anyway when I kicked you in the head), and absolute certainty that everything was just right. I packed for every possible weather event, despite living in California. I lifted my feet over railroad tracks, even when it nearly cost me my driving test.

I forced myself into phone-heavy jobs as a teenager, pure exposure therapy before I knew the term. I drew matching patterns on each finger and across my palms—over and over—so they would feel congruent. As a child, I remember worrying my hands might get bored.

Those are just the ones I remember clearly.

Later came more: handwashing rituals that had to be redone if I thought about dirtiness. Increased symmetry. Watching my children walk fully through the school gate before driving away—ensuring their safety (what I want to write is so they wouldn’t die, but typing that feels like an exposure in itself, and I hate that I typed it… but undoing it would undermine where I am today).

To this day, I say “drive safe” to my husband when he leaves. I say “I love you” when leaving a room—something I created and now do without thinking. I check the door, lock it, and make a special memory of locking it. I shrug away intrusive thoughts. I touch the blade of a knife to be sure I won’t cut off my fingers. I tap my forehead near cabinet corners so I won’t bash my head.

I write, read, reread, and reread emails and texts—sometimes for forty minutes or more—to ensure every word is exact. I plan exits everywhere I go. And eventually, I could no longer drive over bridges.

That was my last straw.

In 2018, I lost the ability to drive over bridges. I had always hated them, but I could do it—white-knuckled, rigid grip, breath held. Until suddenly, I couldn’t.

My grandmother couldn’t drive on highways. She could barely ride as a passenger.

When I was about eight, my sister was six, and my grandfather was driving us up a mountain highway to visit his sisters. My grandmother sat in the passenger seat wailing—crying, yelling, pulling at his shirt—as if pleading with him not to send us tumbling to our deaths off the mountain road.

I remember sheer terror. The edge felt close. The drop felt real.

But my little sister was sitting beside me, looking at me.

I don’t know what she remembers from that moment. We’ve never talked about it. But I remember calm coming over me as I reassured her that we were fine. She buried her head into my side, and suddenly, she was all that mattered. She became my focal point.

I loved my grandmother deeply. She taught me to write by making dotted letters for me to trace. The first word I learned—before my own name—was poop. P-O-O-P. I wrote it everywhere. On mail. On newspapers. I followed her into the bathroom just so I could keep writing it, because I thought it was hilarious.

She listened to me for hours. Truly listened. I don’t even know what I talked about—but she responded as if I were the most important person in the room. When we traveled to Sweden when I was eight, she spoiled me endlessly. She championed me. Encouraged my questions. Made space for my voice.

I loved her with my whole heart.

I learned to say “Mormor bajs gås”—which translates to Grandmother Poop Goose. This made perfect sense to me, and it delighted us both.

In her later years, my grandmother’s world grew very small. She mostly stayed in her kitchen when I was young. Then only upstairs. Then only her bedroom. I married in June 2006, and aside from Christmas that year, it was the last event she attended—with my encouragement.

She lived with undiagnosed PTSD, agoraphobia, and likely OCD.

She died in September 2008. Her last words to me came through instant message. I sent her my ultrasound—my daughter—and she replied, “That’s our girl.”

I was diagnosed with OCD in 2018.

Fear still lives in my mind most days. Some compulsions remain—ones I can live with. And strangely, I am fortunate to say that many of my obsessive thoughts and behaviors have served me, perhaps because I was constantly doing my own exposures long before I had language for them.

But when I think of my grandmother—of my love for her, and the hope I carried that she would come out of that room—I know one thing with certainty:

I can never stay in the room.

I live my life with the intention of leaving it. If I am afraid of something, that is the thing I will move toward. Not recklessly. Not without compassion. But deliberately.

At the end of my life, I hope I can look back and see a life well lived—not because I was fearless, but because I was courageous. Even when the courage was small.

Bravery is not the absence of fear. It is the presence of fear—and the decision to keep going anyway. Sometimes bravery looks like waking up and facing the day.

And on those days, I say: It’s enough.

Mormor bajs gås, I love you. I miss you every day. Thank you for loving me, believing in me, and teaching me—without ever saying it—that the room is not where life happens.

Let it be simple. Let it be kind. Let it leave the room.

🌱 Good Beet Reflection: Leaving the Room

Take a breath before you begin. This is not a problem to solve—only a truth to notice.

Where in your life does “the room” exist right now?

(A habit, a fear, a pattern, a story, a silence.)

What has the room protected you from—real or imagined?

What has it quietly taken from you?

Notice one fear you have learned to live around instead of through.

What would it look like to move toward it by one small, human step?

What is something you already do—daily, instinctively—that is actually courage in disguise?

If bravery today were allowed to be enough (not impressive, not heroic),

what would it look like in your body, your schedule, or your choices?