Melany Heger Author and Psychologist, Manila (2026)

12/03/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 Good Company by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney

Finally, I met my classmate from graduate school, Mark. Surreptitiously, this book I finished recently—and was about to give away—is called Good Company. 📚

Shout out to Marky… you are the best gifts I received so far in my PhD journey.

I bought the book because of the cover. Isn’t it lovely? 💖 And the blurb said it was about friendship and marriage. All was well, pero di ako na-satisfy sa ending. It was open-ended. So now, after all those pages, what happens to the marriage of Flora and Julian?

Some people like novels that do not answer the main question, but I am not one of them. If I would hazard a guess as a therapist, I could say Flora takes him back. But she is in the US, and divorce is a palatable option in their world—that’s a big factor pushing this toward kaput. I did see how it was going to negatively affect their kid, though. Although being a teenager, she may be more resilient to the changes.

Read the book if you like lots of words about New York versus Los Angeles, as well as stories of struggling American actors’ lives. It was not a super good read for me, but there are worse ways to spend nights wide awake with perimenopause insomnia. ✨

10/03/2026

The interviewer sat across from me in the Zoom meeting, looking intimidating. What I saw was a woman around my age, with a short hairstyle that was all business, eyebrows microbladed to perfection, wearing non-corporate attire but radiating an aura of respectability.

Well, I thought, even if I don’t get hired for this position, she’s got something to teach me. Gen Xer to Gen Xer. 💬

I was interviewing for a locum position as a well-being coach, a job I did a year or so ago with a Knowledge Process Outsourcing company, a kind of BPO. I was keen on it because most of my clients are online and part of the clinical population. Working with the so-called normal population, and in a face-to-face setting, helps balance my experiences as a psychologist and as a human being. I want to heal all sorts, not just the badly bruised. And so there I was, being questioned by this formidable woman.

She straightened out the timelines in my résumé. I made some paltry excuse about being in a hurry to get the dates right, but I concurred. When the interview was over, I immediately fixed the issue. 📝

We talked about being an expert in the field because of experience, not only academic training, and I couldn’t agree more. Like me, she values being on the ground. She has been with the Business Process Outsourcing industry for twenty years. Even without a license or a master’s degree, I know she’s on top of her game in this profession.

We ended with a book she’s currently reading to enrich her knowledge of psychology and certifications she has taken from Harvard University Online. I promised myself I would check them out.

Overall, as far as interviews go, it was humdrum, the usual. And learning from experience, this ain’t my first rodeo, expecting a callback is folly. It’s tempting to think, “Let it go, go with the flow,” but every time I do that, it drives me nuts.
So I did what I advise my clients who have high anxiety and control tendencies, like me: take the power back. 🌟

True, they have the say-so on if and when they call you back, or if they ghost you, which they usually do. But you take the power back by giving yourself a deadline. I do it like this: “By next week, if they don’t reach out, I’ll assign all their emails to a folder called ‘Applications.’ Out of sight, out of mind. Case closed.”

This is how I practice internalizing the locus of control instead of externalizing it.
There was one deeper lesson I took from this encounter with Ms. Matray na Interviewer. I remember thinking, “You don’t need to like me. I like me now,” with a softer tone on the second phrase.

But I do know this: I slept better than the nights before the interview. And when I closed my computer after the call, I felt peace wash over me. “It’s okay, Melany. Even if they don’t like you, I’ve got you.”

A few months later…👉

I realized I have been ghosted by Ms. Matray na Interviewer company. They were already in the verification and background-check phase when they dropped me. They didn’t even bother to say I was dropped, like most companies these days. I try not to take it personally. Even if my paranoid brain is a-whirling.

So what’s with this pic? I bought this outfit in preparation for my debut in that company. But I guess I’ll just wear it for myself, for some other purpose. Di bale na. There will be other chances.

For now, what can I do? Just accept and move on. Every negative or ambivalent experience has a purpose. Maybe this one is simply telling me the timing isn’t right yet for a part-time corporate job. I’ll give myself a pass. 💖

05/03/2026

If you’re Batang 90s writer, you know this feeling.

There was dial-up internet (no Wi-Fi), but there was no demand to respond live.

Gen Z, I’m talking to you.

Imagine not being the slave of your notifications from WhatsApp, Viber, Facebook Messenger, Microsoft Teams… should I say more? Just naming these platforms, pina-panic attack na ko.

So how did you read stuff then?

Your choices were simple. One: browse the few public libraries, or your school library if you were lucky enough to have a decent one. Or two: go to a bookstore and sit for hours on the carpeted floor, wishing staff wouldn’t shoo you away—or that Lady Guard wouldn’t give you that look. (Powerbooks of yore, ehem.)
If you were an aspiring writer and wanted to be published, you submitted a manuscript and waited.

You sent your work through the post office with stamps so thin that if you licked them, they’d come off—so you had to buy that compulsory paste in neon green tubes for one peso fifty. You sent to magazines like Liwayway, Philippine Graphic, and if you were really dreaming big, some international ones. (Goodness knows I tried. Radio silence.)

You waited for Mr. Postman with his big blue PhilPost bag.

When email came, you waited too.

Wala pa bang reply sa Yahoo email account mo? Hayst.

But with all that waiting, many good things happened.

You talked to interesting people for hours. You got smashed in concerts. You wore makeup, experimented with fashion, attended face-to-face writing seminars—eh anong magagawa mo? There were no other options.

More importantly, you had the mental space to think.

You wrote with fewer distractions. How tempting could a newspaper or a book really be, even if it was beside you? You couldn’t look everything up (unless someone hangs up the landline phone).

Forced to good to tap into imagination, or memory, you wrote for hours, it seems. Sometimes you move your butt and go to the library. But if you’re very introverted, X na yan.

More often than not, writing looked like sitting still typing, clackity clack clack, to the demise of whoever lived with you. “Ang ingay! Ano ba yan, type nang type!
As a writer, I miss the systems of that bygone era. That writing life, that writing and publishing world.

It was slow, yes. But the boredom it bred pushed many of us to bloom quietly, like strange, beautiful, slightly ugly mushrooms growing in the dark.

As a writer, I the systems of that bygone era, that writing life, that writing world. Slow it was but the boredom it festered pushed a lot of us to bloom in the dark, like some beautiful but ugly mushrooms.

It’s not just the pacing. It’s something else I still can’t quite put my finger on. If I could work inside those systems again, I would.

Things like:
• Looking for new books in bookstores
• Looking for new books in libraries
• Reading newspapers and magazines — remember those glossies?
• Having a manuscript accepted by a publisher
• A publisher I can meet face-to-face
• A literary agent
• The Big Five publishers, or even a large local one like Anvil
• Getting interviewed when invited, and having that interview broadcast later

Basically, what I want is to live in the 90s in terms of how I use technology—and its pacing.

There’s no stopping tech now. Accelerated pa with AI. But I miss a time when creativity wasn’t about metrics—how many likes you have (or hearts, ugh), or slaving away for TikTok (double ugh).

For some people, that’s energizing.

For others like me, it’s just plain exhausting!

I wish I could bring back from the 90s and early noughts:
• Discovering things to read WITHOUT algorithms
• Reading newspapers, magazines and books for more then ten minutes
• Watching interviews on TV or radio with no subscription fees and skip ad buttons

But deeper than nostalgia, this is about imagination.

Imagination needs time. Without the relaxation response we can’t access the unconscious, where so much creative material actually comes from.

A writer’s imagination needs long stretches of uninterrupted thinking. Then, the ideas generated need time again—to ripen. (Sharing optional.)
Back then, the pace was more forgiving—like yellow low-watt light versus harsh white LED.

Now, slowness is counterculture.

Bring it back. Please.

Maybe that’s why so many writers—and artists too—feel creatively drained. This tempo is unsustainable.

So yes, this is a Batang 90s post.

But more than that, it’s an invitation.

Let your own voice and pacing reign supreme. Turn inward first. Check with the world later.

Because too much noise can pull you off course, sail you away from your true destination, kill originality, and bury the most authentic parts of you.

And that would be the real loss.

Full Blog Link: https://melanyheger.com/thinking-led-writer-performative-age/

03/03/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 One Moment, One Morning by Sarah Rayner

This book advocated le***an rights without being too preachy. One of the protagonists is Lou, who, even in Britain, had a hard time coming out to her parents. I thought being a first-world person changed things for LGBTQ people, but they have it the same as us third-worlders. Stigma and old mindsets are not so different, huh? 💬

My daughter, who is a teen, is bi-curious. I noticed her being attracted to the same s*x as young as ten, if I recall correctly. I love, love, love my daughter. And unlike Lou’s mom, I accept her whole, whatever her s*xual/gender orientation. I will also open my heart to what she finds out about herself in her journey, as she is an adolescent and this is still the years of early discovery. 💖

This book is also about the sudden death of Sarah’s spouse, Simon. When I read the first chapters, I was wincing. See, like Sarah, I am also a long-term spouse of twenty years. The conjured sight of him keeling over because of a massive heart attack was almost too disturbing for me, but finish the book I did.

I seldom put books on DNF, or the Do Not Finish list. The last time I did, it was a nonfiction. Stories—I like to know how they end. That’s my “J” (Judging) bent there, the last letter of the MBTI or Jungian cognitive typology, exerting itself. 📝
If you love soft drama and personal-insight books reminiscent of Hallmark movies back in the early aughts, this book is for you. It calmed me down even if there were heavy topics. And I have not even mentioned the alcohol addiction that one of the characters has. 🌟

28/02/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 Where They Found Her by Kimberly McCreight

A hundred pages into this book and I realized—crap! I have read this book before! 💬

In the middle of the night, in yet another episode of I-woke-up-because-of-my-perimenopause-insomnia, I breezed through the remaining parts. Because I already knew the plot, I just needed to refresh my brain about it.

It is still a very good plot, and a very well-written novel about postpartum depression. 🌟

In the clinic, I have counseled a few people with this disorder, the most recent one in distress because she could not reconcile being a caring mother with her perceived failure. Postpartum depression saps one’s energy and erodes one’s self-esteem even more. The longer it drags on, the harder it is to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

What helped my client? She had buried a mountain of emotions underneath—emotions from childhood, from a burdensome past. Yep, there was a trauma background, unresolved wounds. 📝

Read this book if you want to be entertained by a high-school-memories flashback mystery. If you are a mom like me, you’d be dying to know the identity of the pregnant woman who miscarried. Truly an engaging read. 📚

26/02/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 Confessions of a 40-Something F # by Alexandra Potter 🌟

When I first saw this book, I simultaneously wanted and did not want to buy it. If you asked me then why, I would have just said, “It cuts too close to the bone.” Now I can articulate it more clearly. In this novel, the heroine finds success after being a self-proclaimed failure in her 40s. She became a success when her podcast becomes viral. I am (still) insecure about that. I compare myself to her, hence the avoidance. 💬

Insecurity—this is the core of the problem for me, and I suspect for a lot of people who grew up with adverse childhood experiences (i.e., trauma or abuse). Constant pain at a young age causes you to question your worth, mostly because children feel compelled to blame themselves for whatever is happening to them. “I got punished because I was bad.” This is a statement that survivors often believe but rarely utter.

Taking my insecurity out of the scenario, I read the book anyway—after buying it and letting it sit for a while. I sat with my discomfort too, I guess, until my curiosity emerged. What can this story teach me? my curiosity asked. The answer: plenty enough.

Nell, the protagonist, does end up being a viral podcaster, but that is not my route. Not everybody needs internet fame to feel successful and fulfilled. Notice I said “feel successful and fulfilled,” not “be successful and fulfilled,” because that sense of “I made it” is ultimately subjective. What defines your success or fulfillment? Go ask yourself. It boils down to self-belief, self-definition. The Self here is the key element. Do you even know who you are and why you like the things you like—without the stupid self-doubt and insecurities? 📝

As a psychotherapist, I read this book like a very well-written gratitude journal. Every chapter ends with a list of things Nell is grateful for. Well done, Ms. Author. She has done well, this Alexandra Potter. I can do well too, in my own sphere. Podcasting is not my thing (maybe not yet—IDK, I may need external support for that to happen). I’ll take a page from her book and say this: I don’t always know what I am doing with my writing and psychology career, but I will keep showing up anyway. That is my superpower. 💖👉

Nell is portrayed as a writer skilled, trained, and immersed in the communication industry, and the combination of these elements got her ahead. I wonder what ahead looks like for me on this path.

24/02/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan

I read this book for the first time when I was a teen, in my college’s library. I did not finish it because I was distracted by one thing or another. I read it again recently. Sadly, I have either given my copy away or it was one of the casualties of the Philippine floods.

Anyway, this book is narrated by Bibi Chen, who is actually dead. She tells the story of her friends who went without her to the edge of China and what was called Burma in the days of yore. I was entertained by this book, but more importantly, now that I have read it as an author myself, I gained several valuable insights.

I’ve been taking a deep dive into Jungian Cognitive Typology theory as part of my clinical approach. If you’re not sure about your MBTI type, go check it. It can help you understand yourself and why you sometimes struggle with how you work versus how the world works.

For a long time, I thought something was wrong with how I wrote. I kept trying to get into literary workshops, but I either got rejected or became so discouraged that I didn’t submit in the first place.

I do not naturally write from raw emotion, but it turns out this is literary workshop fodder.

When I write, I play more thought-centric than feeling-centric. The longer I practiced both psychotherapy and writing, the more I realized that this is my core.
When I understood what an INTJ (Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, Judging) writer is, a lot of things became clearer.

INTJs lead with Introverted Intuition (Ni) and support it with Extraverted Thinking (Te). As a writer, that means I tend to:
• Write to make sense of things
• Look for patterns
• Create frameworks
• Clarify ambiguity

In contrast, many writers who thrive in workshops and literary institutions tend to cluster around Feeling-dominant types. If you are a feeling-dominant type, you’re usually a/an INFP, ISFP, ENFJ, or ESFJ. Here is a more detailed explanation:

INFP – Introverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Perceiving (The Dreamer)
INFPs write from their inner emotional truth. I married an INFP. He is not a writer, but I am a firsthand witness to how they value sincerity over structure. They get into literary workshops and perform well because their drafts are seen as vulnerable, authentic, and values-driven. INFPs are very okay with feedback, so they don’t mind being corrected for the service of the craft.

ISFP – Introverted, Sensing, Feeling, Perceiving (The Artist)
ISFPs are especially attuned to sensory experience. They are drawn to aesthetics like bees to honey. It’s no surprise people of this type are literally called “The Artist” because of their exquisite tastes. Your girl who just has an eye for beauty? That’s an ISFP right there.

ENFJ – Extraverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Judging (The Teacher)
ENFJs write with an audience in mind from the very beginning. I was surprised “The Teacher” popped up in my research, but actually, it makes sense. These are the journalist-academicians—remember the likes of Krip Yuson of the Philippine Inquirer? The Teacher takes up noble causes and virtues; naturally, they align with institutions that are supposed to champion their advocacies.

ESFJ – Extraverted, Sensing, Feeling, Judging (The Caregiver)
ESFJs write as the social justice warriors that they are. Their stories come from lived social reality. They have an ear out for injustice, and they will fight with valor for it. Practitioners of the ethics of care in literary spaces, they write about community, humanity, and peace. Their literary pieces usually get awards because of their relevance to world events.

Writers in these feeling-dominant MBTI molds love first drafts, authenticity, social justice, and love to say, “Show, don’t tell,” as well as “Make me feel it.” The energy comes from showing the writer’s vulnerabilities in a manner that connects with the audience and stokes their feelings.

But if you’re a Thinking-dominant type like me—eek—you sort of crumble just trying to write the thing in a feely way.

Kung baga sa kotse, and primero ko ay Thinking. Feeling yung sa other writers.
I write from a point of vulnerability too, but by the time it hits the page, it has already been processed by my brain. The act of thinking buffers the pain, makes sense of it so it stings less. It’s my unique way to survive it. It’s a way to make sense of experience so it doesn’t overwhelm me or the reader.

If you are a thinker-oriented MBTI type writer like [help here to name other MBTI thinking writer types aside from INTJ]… your natural impulse is different.
If you are a thinker-oriented MBTI writer like me, your natural impulse is different. Aside from INTJs, thinking-type writers often include individuals classified as: INTP, ENTJ, ESTJ, and ISTJ.

These types don’t write primarily to express emotion. They write to create order, explain, and make things clear.

To illustrate: INTPs are called “The Logicians.” ENTJs are “The Strategists.” ISTJs are “The Historians.” With alt names like these, di ka magtataka why they’re not the darlings of literature.

A story, for me, is a means to an end. It’s like the car that will take you to the ultimate destination.

In Amy Tan’s Saving Fish from Drowning, the twelve adventurers get a misadventure instead of their ideal trip. The inherent message is that people are complicated, and when they go on trips, they discover disowned parts of themselves. Amy Tan takes you on a ride; the details of the tale take you to the lesson. But a thinking-type writer like me sees the story itself as décor.

Hence, thinker-writers tend to gravitate toward nonfiction, essays, criticism, psychology, philosophy, or hybrid forms. I am in form when I write academic essays and research papers, like I was born to do it (well, maybe I am!).

Carl Jung once said, “It is a privilege of a lifetime to become who you truly are.”

And so, I can embrace my thinking-type writer self instead of resisting it. I can accept that my cognitive style is in sync with my writing style. Hopefully, with this acceptance, I become calmer and stop swimming upstream. Instead, I can relax and go with the flow—my writing and creative flow.

So if you’ve ever felt like:
• You’re too analytical for creative writing
• You think in philosophies and theories, not just feelings
• You want meaning, not just mood or vibes
• And your writing centers on these things instead of the story itself, then

Then you might not be a bad writer—just as I am not a bad writer.

You might simply be a Thinker, not a Feeler, in Jungian Cognitive Typology (often referred to as MBTI).

Know thyself. Accept who you are.

Because it really is a privilege of a lifetime—to make art as the precious being you were born as.

21/02/2026

In my quest to find out what writer I want to be, moving forward with 2026, the year of the Fire Horse, I learned a lot about the way I think.
In this essay, I want to share with you how understanding the way you think can lead to self-acceptance and peace. Yeah, that means letting go of your self-assumptions.

I discovered that the way I think, when analyzed through Jungian cognitive typology, explains a great deal about where I am holistically, not just as a writer. This understanding also gave me some clues as to where I will be heading. Maybe my insights can help you realize something too.

It began with Jungian dreams. Perimenopause means my estrogen levels are all over the place, so perhaps that explains their recent occurrence. No matter—the dreams have been revealing.

One of them involved following a woman in a white lab coat named Lyra (the constellation where Vega, the North Star, resides). She led me along an unfamiliar path, skirting the edge of a place that felt known yet strange. I was lost there, grasping at whatever might dispel the dark, until I noticed an opening. A shaft of sunlight revealed a door that looked like a giant window. When I entered it, I was transformed.

The message that was transmitted was simple: do not resist. Almost immediately, wu wei (无為) came to mind—the Chinese philosophy that necessitates an attitude of surrender and receptivity. As in go with the flow. Don’t over-plan.
Wu wei reminded me of a quote from The Guardian, a UK newspaper I read while ago:

“Stop planning your career to the exact detail… The modern career is all about adaptability, information and making connections.”
Oh, Melany! Brilliant! Maybe the answer is to not have a plan.

As an INTJ (Introverted, Intuitive, Thinking, Judging, in the Myers-Briggs typology), I am big on plans. Plans helped me survive CPTSD, plans help run a household with two teens. But perhaps the plan I need to implement with my writing career is to let go and let be?

To understand this tension better, I did what I always do: I researched. I went back and forth between ChatGPT and my own Googling, consulted a published hard-copy book on the MBTI, and cross-checked everything. That process turned out to be the real gold. It didn’t hand me a career roadmap, but it answered a more essential question: how I am wired to create. (I won’t paste everything I learned here—you can look it up if you’re curious)

The vibe of the upcoming Fire Horse year is dramatic change. Imagine a wild horse galloping with furious momentum—eyes bright, charging toward its object of desire. The Fire Horse year is notorious. Known as the 丙午 year, it was once so feared that couples in ancient times avoided conceiving children during it. A Fire Horse Lady was believed to be too free-spirited, too unruly—ultimately unmarriageable.

But I like the sound of that runaway horse energy. I have been waiting too long for this kind of wild ride. Fiery Horse Power take me away! However, this year, I will not seek adventure on purpose. I will stay true to my path and allow the change-maker—person, event, or insight—to find me. May I recognize Lyra when she arrives.

The dream I described had Vega in it—If I stay true to my North Star, does that mean I will be more open to the powers of fate? Why not give this approach a try?

The biggest reason why I feel lost as a writer is my writing style.

I’m so happy I found Jungian cognitive typology, because it helped me explain why the way I write clashes with the “show, don’t tell” and “make me feel it” crowd. Artistically speaking, I am closer to a hammer than a chisel. Literary critiques often say my essays “explain too much” or that I do not “let the image breathe.”
I write to explain. To discuss. At worst, I sound like a preacher-teacher or an instruction manual. At best, like a copywriter convincing you to buy something—usually an idea.

But is that really so terrible?

I recently read about an artist, Tehching Hsieh, who labored for thirteen years before presenting his work publicly. He is now in his sixties. Imagine thinking that long-term. Imagine having the discipline not to chase visibility, immediate recognition, or followers. Imagine fidelity to your own psychological truth. Imagine that kind of patience.

Much literary critique assumes that feeling is the primary carrier of truth—that emotion is the highest proof of meaning.

I argue otherwise.

I believe coherence is a carrier of truth. Understanding is not inferior to feeling; it is simply a different mode of knowing. I write in order to figure things out, and then I try to connect what I’ve understood to my readers’ lives. When I arrive at an epiphany, it comes through my thinking mind, not through my five senses.

Pagod na ako sa drama. Ayoko nang magpanggap. I am losing interest in apologizing for this orientation or diluting it to fit someone else’s aesthetic. Perhaps I am just getting old.

If, like Tehching Hsieh, I remain unrecognized for quite some time, so be it.
Do you, like me, experience emotional catharsis only after you have processed the mess in your head? If so, we have something in common. Let’s meet and have a chat, because it can get lonely as a writer with this orientation.

Taking inspiration from the Fire Horse energy this coming Chinese New Year of 2026, I will not resist myself too much anymore. You shouldn’t either. Let’s prance unbridled into our passions and our true selves. Let’s see what happens—what an adventure to look forward to.

With more confidence than I have had before, I want to say this is who I am as a writer in 2026. This is where I am going. Whatever comes next, my cupped palms are open to catch the gifts.

Blog link: https://melanyheger.com/fire-horse-year-2026-writing-life/

19/02/2026

📚 Books and Being 📚
✨ Book reflections from a psychologist & author
📖 My Name is Anna by Lizzy Barber 🌟

This is a mindless, but joyful read. The story revolves around Anna, called Emily, before she was abducted at age three by Mary. Mary is a kinda complex character, referred to mostly as “Mamma” in this book. She is depicted as OCD and religiously zealous throughout. Because of the book’s large text, it was easy on my eyes. Thank goodness, as I have been having two classes per week for my PhD.

Anyway, Mamma kidnaps Anna-Emily because her first daughter was killed by a cult leader. This cult leader exploited her when she was a young eighteen-year-old and brainwashed her into submission, until her real daughter died in his hands. After that, Mamma fled, randomly drove past an amusement park, and snatched a child who resembled her dead daughter.

If I were handling the cases of Mamma and Anna-Emily, I would have my work cut out for me. At the end of the story, Anna-Emily meets her real family. She calls herself not by her real name, Emily, but by Anna—because that is all she has known her whole life. She is rescued at eighteen, already an adult, so Mamma and her religious upbringing are an indelible part of her identity. 💬

Who would have been the more challenging case? I’d hazard a guess—it’s Mamma. That one is CPTSD through and through. And then there is work to be done with the family who lost Anna-Emily and found her again. The other narrator in the book is Rosie, Anna-Emily’s biological sister. From her end, you can see the toll of all those years of being hounded by the press and the notoriety a child kidnapping case entails. 📝

Oh well. On to the next book.

Note: About the oat milk in the pic—I don’t really like non-dairy milk except soy milk, but I’ll make an exception for this one. Malasa yung pagka-kape niya. Recommended. 💖👉

17/02/2026

In my mind’s eye, a vision of the seventeen-year-old me arrived. Teenage Melany, dressed in goth garb, is seated at the back of the car, along with my seventeen-year-old son and my thirteen-year-old daughter. In this vision, I am driving, even if IRL, I do not know how to drive.

In this vision, she perfectly belonged with the rest of the kids under my care. For this is what the current essay is about how to take good care of your inner teen. I have neglected her for so long, saw her as a nuisance. But her time has come.
How about you? Where is your inner adventurous, unsophisticated teen? Do you let her flourish?

Methinks this vision came along as a deep unconscious reaction to my son turning seventeen a few weeks ago. Seventeen was the age I entered college, broke my mind open with Big Ideas like feminism and egalitarian values. Seeing my son blow out his birthday candles reminded me, a bit painfully, of the past I could have had if I had the parents I am now, as the present-day me, with my spouse. We would have encouraged Teenage Melany to go pursue her passion—just finish a college degree, whatever it is you wish, susuportahan kita anak, then do what you will with it as an adult.

Seventeen-year-old Melany wants to be a writer; she does not yet know what that fully means. If she were transported to the present time, she would be agog at all the writing opportunities a world (seemingly) without boundaries has to offer. She would be astounded by the number of creative writing opportunities available.

Teenage Melany is into poetry, so she would be fangirling Lang Leav, following the famous poet on Instagram. Maybe Teenage Melany would be drawn into the world of social media, share her content there too—creating videos and short-form content, becoming a rockstar in her own right.

At this point in my vision, I would also see Adult Melany, in the driver’s seat, turn around and talk to Teenage Melany. She would say to Teenage Melany, “Oh, poor girl. Recognize that our father, because of his crazy sh*t—he is narcissistic and bipolar—made us not so normal. The emotional torture made us feel like we had to justify our existence every day. And being born a girl in that misogynistic Chinoy environment (circa ’80s–’90s), where being a firstborn daughter is a crime, we slid into the easy arms of anorexia nervosa. Some emotionally damaged teens hurt themselves by cutting. Melany, you did it by extreme dieting. But you are already past that. I see that your weight is okay and you are okay. I just want you to heal more. And so, to do that, let’s explore what you like. So—what do you like?”

Teenage Melany would have probably rolled her eyes and pretended to ignore me, like all teens do. But I know that she listened. Acknowledging her pain is key, I think, to motivating her.

Teenage Melany, transported from the nascent technology of the aughts, would have been overjoyed to be given an opportunity to blog. Her jaw would drop if you told her that a person could take thousands of photos in one hour. She would surely think of ways to use those photos in service of her writing. Pexels! Unsplash! Pixabay! “Oh wow! You mean I don’t need to post pictures of my face?” she would say. Because Teenage Melany, same as Adult Melany, hates having her likeness taken just for exposure’s sake.

In addition, Teenage Melany would revel in opportunities for writing fellowships, writing contests, and online publications. I would urge her to keep submitting her pieces—not to please anyone, but to learn. To learn what kind of writer she wants to become. To test her theories about her creative writing in the real world.

Because reality is like a rock, and her intellect is a hammer. She has to chisel her art with effort. And like all art, sometimes the rock is unyielding, or the tool is not the right one. The artist can become dispirited and give up. In those moments, I would keep cheering Teenage Melany on. Because I am her mother, and that is what mothers do. I’ll keep on saying, “Melany, I believe in you!”

At this point in my vision, Adult Melany finishes the drive and drops Teenage Melany off at campus. Here, the vision merges with reality. In 2026, the merged Melanies enter a school where she is training for her doctorate in counseling. The integrated Melany is still sometimes taken aback, still asking: how did I end up here?

I tell my teenage self, reassuringly, “I did not betray you.” Because I didn’t. I evolved. I did the best I could after the opportunity to study literature was taken away from me as a teenager.

I continue speaking to her: “After I was forced into a degree in business, with psychology and human resources thrown into the mix, my life trajectory changed. And then—boom—before I knew it, I was in my forties, trying out being a writer for the first time. Overwhelmed. Outpaced. Wanting the slow tech of the ’90s and early 2000s while living in the 2020s.”

“I also learned that the way I write is not what the Literary Gods of the Philippines desire. Not artistic enough, in their sense. Not cinematic enough. ‘Describe the scene, make me feel it!’ they kept saying”. Hay nako. Ayoko ng ganyan, ang drama. We’ve had enough drama in our lives to last a lifetime. We’d rather be sober.
As we pass the guards with the ID checks and enter the classroom to meet the professor, I continue speaking—to her, and now to myself.

“Forget your disappointment about videos and photos. Your body dysmorphia, born from the eating disorder, guaranteed the queasiness you feel about images of your body and face in public. You can make peace with that. The (forced sorta) photos of yourself in your page, treat them as documentation! Think journalism, candid photos! I am not holding it against you that you almost never use a filter, and you do not put on makeup.”

Because Teenage Melany and Adult Melany love reassurances, I reiterate: “I did not betray you. I grew. I stopped wanting other people’s approval to exist—as a writer, as a mom, as a psychologist, as a woman. Nobody will think better of me than I do.”
Then—me, in my body, carrying both Adult Melany and Teenage Melany—we take notes in class. We finish the lecture. We book an Angkas ride home.

We go home to ourselves.

Full blog here: https://melanyheger.com/healing-integrating-inner-teen/

Melany Heger Author and Psychologist

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