‘Dear Amelia’: The mental health initiative that might save you from yourself
Therapist: And what do we do when we’re sad?
Me: ADD TO CART.
Therapist: No.
“Write hard and clear about what hurts.”
— Ernest Hemingway.
Shhh! Come closer.
I have something to tell you, but I can’t tell anyone. Except for Amelia. I trust her utterly and completely.
So, I’d like to introduce you, and especially your angst-ridden teen, to Amelia: the one and only person I know I can trust, and so can your offspring — with my deepest darkest secrets — knowing with 100% certainty Amelia will never tell a soul.
The fact that Amelia is actually a P.O. box — which we will get into — certainly helps. If you are a worried parent of a teen or young adult, please introduce them to Amelia. For a P.O. box, she can be a pretty awesome companion
At present I am, apparently, keeping 13 secrets, five of which I haven’t told a soul. According to scientific research, you too are keeping 13 secrets, five of which you have kept to yourself.
Meanwhile, I’m thinking about taking a vow of silence…for the rest of my life! Why?
The average female cannot keep a secret for longer than 47 hours, this study of 3,000 females aged 18 to 65 suggests.
To be even more precise, females — at any age — are overcome by a burning desire to share gossip almost immediately. In fact, they often spill the beans to at least one other person precisely within 47 hours and 15 minutes…no matter how personal or confidential the secret was. (Me trying to think who I talked to 47 hours and 15 minutes ago.)
Apparently, us females peaked in high school, where gossip is a weapon of revenge spreads like a California wildfire and has the potential to isolate teens from their peer groups. In case you forgot what high school is like, it’s where gossip can change quicker than a woman who’s just arrived home (being braless is everything amiright?).
Gossip is responsible for so many of our children’s friend spats — like getting booted out of group text chats for something as benign as a comment about a fashion choice, or as malignant as sexual escapade rumours.
Many so-called experts tell parents they should be talking about this unsavoury rite of passage. But…we were all teenagers once. And although some teens are open with their parents, most teens rarely tell their parents about their angst.
So, how are teenage angst, mental health, and Amelia connected? Who is Amelia? Well, as I mentioned, she is a P.O. box. But she is also so much more.
First, a bit of background:
This summer, my best friend’s daughter — a singer/songwriter who goes by renforshort (wait, is this a secret?) — announced her debut album “Dear Amelia,” which includes the single We’ll Make This OK, featuring Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker (and husband of Kourtney Kardashian. Scroll back to watch this. Beyond!).
But along with the release of her debut album and announcement of her headline tour, one of the biggest — and maybe most important — parts of the launch of her album is her “Letters to Amelia” initiative, where her young fans and followers (and those who now know about this) write down everything they’re feeling and mail it to Amelia.
Wanting to open up but not knowing how or who to turn to is the inspiration behind Amelia, the fictionalized person/P.O. box to whom the album is titled and dedicated, says the 20-year-old Torontonian, who spends most of her time in LA these days.
“All of the letters are discarded for anonymity, but it’s a great way to get these things off your chest — sort of like a warm-up for therapy and talking about your issues. I felt so much better in terms of my own mental health after talking about it. And I know it’s not going to cure the problem, but collecting resources and having a support system is just so good for you,” says Ren whose last live performance I saw was at her bat mitzvah. (Did I mention her mother is my best friend? But don’t tell anyone.)
“Amelia is a lot of people — she’s basically the personification of parts of my brain. I put a lot of stress on myself because I’m not good at communicating my feelings outside of music and tend to bottle them up until I’m at my breaking point. At that point, I can’t even understand those feelings myself,” Ren shares. “So, [the album] is basically an analogy for being open about your feelings and not keeping it inside because that’ll really destroy you. [Amelia] is also based on real people in my life that I’ve lost to suicide. She’s like this two-in-one character, but I feel like we’re best friends.”
“Amelia” is presented to fans as somebody to confide in, prompting Ren’s “Letters to Amelia” campaign, in which people could write letters addressed to the fictional girl as a form of catharsis.
And yes, all of the letters received are burned and left unread so that renforshort’s audience could “experience the same catharsis” she felt when penning the album and discussing her feelings with her inner self.
When asked here how this 20-year-old would you like to see the conversations surrounding mental health go, she responded,“The first songs I ever wrote were always about [mental health] says Ren. “Growing up, the most constant feeling I had was thinking that there was something wrong with me — that there was something different about me. Meanwhile, it’s so common to struggle with these issues. All of my projects have been about mental health, so it just felt right to continue that idea with this project. That’s my ‘thing,’ that’s my topic. Over these last few years, my mental health has taken a massive decline, which I didn’t even think was possible. This is so present in my life right now [that] I really can’t write about anything else without sacrificing authenticity.”
Every song on Dear Amelia has been described as disarmingly detailed and honest, exploring themes like toxic relationships, mental illness and even suicide. “It’s a reminder to take care of yourself and not be scared of opening up,” Ren emphasizes. “It’s hard for me too, but it’s the right thing to do for yourself.”
[Amelia] is also based on real people in her young life that she’s lost to suicide. Ren knows this will strike a chord in others. “With each track, it’s getting worse, it’s getting worse, it’s getting worse. You go from songs about surface-level relationship troubles like, ’Ouch, they hurt my feelings’, to ‘I just want somebody to tell me that I’m OK because I don’t know if I am. I don’t know anything about myself anymore.’”
She also says here how “Every song was basically addressed to Amelia like a letter, and you write this letter, drop it in a mailbox, and forget about it. Once it gets to the PO Box, we just dispose of it. You get all this off your chest…”
She compares it to how it feels for her to write a song, how it feels to write in a diary but not risk anyone going in and seeing it. “It's one step closer to being able to talk about your feelings. It's kind of a practice, which is really cool. Super cathartic, which is nice.”
In this digital age, handwritten letters are becoming less and less common, and even considered old fashioned as keeping a physical address book. After all, why send a letter when you can send a text in a matter of seconds?
Putting pen to paper to feel reconnected to those we feel close to — even if they are not exactly real — is probably the most emotionally healthy choice you can make to deal with issues you are holding inside, spilling emotional wounds on the page, as many female teens are by writing to “Amelia.”
Ren’s fans are often those who feel the same way and have the same struggles — looking for someone else to relate to. Their lives are filled with constant connection to devices that ultimately make them feel disconnected and alone. There is no way for them to truly get help without being labeled a snitch and suffering repercussions. They brave the young adult world every day, many for fear of not being accepted.
“You can make Amelia anyone,” Ren explains. “To me, she’s a part of myself. I’m talking to her on the album from a place where I’ve bottled up my emotions so much that I’ve reached an inevitable breaking point.”
Writing letters can be extremely therapeutic and can help to relieve anxiety. The motion of putting pen on paper provides clarity and peace.
When someone sits down to write a letter, they allow themselves to write it unedited. Just say whatever you have to say to the person, and say all of it. Remember, no one will never see this letter.
Writing to Amelia can help teens and young adults feel freer, to be real in their feelings, and most importantly? Let it all out.
“It happens to a lot of people. This character of ‘Amelia’ is kind of symbolic of that. At the end of the album, you lose her because you’ve put her under so much pressure that she can’t take it anymore,” the 20-year-old shares.
To renforshort, Amelia is a personification of the stress and anxiety of life that persists despite wanting it any other way — that all-too-familiar feeling of dread that lives in the back of her mind.
ren’s heart-on-sleeve honesty in her music has drawn fans with similar emotional wavelengths: young people wanting to feel their feelings vindicated in music.
“It’s weird knowing I have these people who just, like, care about me?” Ren considers. “We don’t necessarily know each other, but they care about me and I care about them. It’s a very cool, interesting relationship. A lot of them are my age and I feel like we could be friends,” she says.
“I’ve learned through talking to people and through my music, I get a lot of messages about how my songs have helped people or how they didn’t know other people went through these things. And that’s the goal, you know, if it helps one person or if it helps a million people, it’s like job well done.”
Interestingly, the majority of ren's team is female. “There were like two men, but it makes such a difference. My last tour was all men and I love them so much but having these women on the road with me gave me what I needed, and I said that after the tour. I said, ‘I need women on my tour.’ It's so empowering. We’d go into venues and some of the venue staff would be like, ‘Oh, are your husbands playing tonight?’ and we're like, ‘No, no, we're doing the thing — this is my tour manager, this is my father, this my merch lady, this is me,’ like, ‘We got this, we're doing the thing.’ So people are like, ‘Well…’ and that was hurtful. It's like, we'll show them.”
ren believes having women in her circle made her feel more comfortable. “I could turn to them and be like, ‘Hey, what's going on here?’” she says. “It's like having a friend on the road, so I know now for future tours to always surround myself with women.”
ren’s goal is to continue to make music for the rest of her life. “That's definitely a goal. I would like to play in an arena and I would [like] to help as many people through music and selfishly kind of help myself, in a way. You know, just from that catharsis of making the music and getting that off my chest and having people resonate with it. I think it's helpful for others too.”
Again, all of the letters to “Amelia” are discarded for anonymity, but it’s a great way to get these things off your chest — a warm-up for talking about your issues. “I felt so much better in terms of my own mental health after talking about it. And I know it’s not going to cure the problem, but collecting resources and having a support system is just so good for you.”
Even if that means writing a handwritten letter to a mailbox. BTW, you can print out a special “Dear Amelia” template here!
"I know what people need more. The songs about mental health are sometimes the more uplifting songs." She hopes that when people listen, "they're like, I relate to this. That's what I really see. Like, that's my job, that's what I want to do,” she shared, adding, ”I'm a person like anyone else is, and what I want to do is make music for people that need to hear what I want to say or what I'm saying. And I think that it's not so much responsibility as it is like…it's tough, because I feel like it's my duty, in a way. Yeah, I have a platform. I'm going to use it for good."
Until next time, flip your hair and flip the page! (And don’t worry, out of the 13 secrets I’m apparently keeping right now, I’ve only told two people. And they promised not to tell anyone, so…)