Not Crazy

When I picked up Headcase: LGBTQ Writers and Artists on Mental Health and Wellness, I didn’t expect to find myself nodding along quite so much. As a sex therapist, I often sit with clients who carry a double burden: the stigma of mental health struggles and the shame of feeling “abnormal” in their sexual lives. Time and again, I hear the quiet confessions: “I don’t feel like I deserve pleasure.”

What I love about Headcase is that it takes those very fears and flips them into stories of resilience and humanity. Reading it felt like sitting in the therapy room with some of my clients. The authors tell their stories with humor, raw honesty, and a refusal to gloss over the messy parts. It reminded me of a client who once laughed mid-session after describing a deeply awkward sexual encounter and said, “If I don’t laugh, I’ll cry.” That blend of humor and heartbreak is exactly what this book captures.

The authors don’t separate mental health from sexuality, and that’s what makes the book so powerful. So many of us have been taught to compartmentalize: fix the “head stuff” first, then you’ll be “ready” for intimacy. But real life doesn’t work like that. Our minds, bodies, and relationships are tangled together, and healing means acknowledging that knot, not trying to cut it apart.

What I found especially moving was the way Headcase reclaims pleasure as something everyone deserves, not as a prize for being “well enough.” In my work, I see how liberating it is when someone finally says, “I don’t have to wait until I’m cured to enjoy touch or pleasure.” This book gives that same permission, loudly and unapologetically.

For me, Headcase is a book I wish many of my clients could hold in their hands to know they’re not alone, and that their sexuality doesn’t need to be put on hold while they figure everything else out. It’s messy, it’s funny, it’s tender, and it’s exactly the kind of storytelling we need.