I was just vaguely aware of Vincent van Gogh’s life and was more familiar with his paintings.

Until tonight.

I read up on him the entire night (for some reason) and learned about his loving relationship with his younger brother, Theo. I felt his struggle with his mental health and his desperate need to paint because that was the only way to quiet his spirit and ease anxiety and depression (oh how painful it would have been without modern medicine!).

His anxiety deepened as he felt his dependence on Theo’s generosity is weighing on the future of his nephew–his namesake–and Theo’s wife.

He knew he was not getting better. He could no longer contain the pain.

Gun to his chest.

His brother died heartbroken six months after Vincent died of gunshot wounds.

Although I may never know how a bipolar felt, I could understand his need to paint and paint to draw out the pain from his body. As if painting numbs you. As if that’s the only way to silence the raging emotions within you, the pain of emptiness that envelopes you.

I wanted to cry for Vincent. It wasn’t his fault he was sick like that.

The last time I drew and painted was when I was 17.

Until I had an “episode” (as my doctor called it) in February this year—when I received J’s painting and had learned about the the truth that I didn’t want to discover—I have never produced something passable as art. It’s that pain of hollowness, that depression, that inexplicable feeling of wanting to be free from something unseen that drove my pencil and brush. Only my hands could express all of those because my keyboard suddenly became bereft of words.

Now I understand
What you tried to say to me
How you suffered for your sanity
And how you tried to set them free
They would not listen, they did not know how
Perhaps they’ll listen now

For they could not love you
But still your love was true
And when no hope was left in sight
On that starry, starry night

Vincent by Don McLean