It Happened to Me: I Had a Mental Breakdown at My First Suburban Block Party

But I hadn’t jumped in the lake with my clothes on for a whole year!

I have some oldest-daughter control issues.

I heard about the annual October-fest-style party on our new block before we even moved here. “Your street has the best block party!” someone in the local moms' Facebook group told me.

This was in June 2023, and I was in our sublet in Brooklyn, searching for future friends in our future suburb of Chicago. 

A few weeks later, my family arrived in this quaint little place, followed by our ginormous moving truck with a New York Yankees logo splashed across it. We chose our new town for the progressive education in the schools, the public access to nature (beaches, forest preserves, lagoons, hiking trails), and to be close to family. (My family. I grew up around here.) 

I was also packing a full load of New Yorker-level “I didn’t come here to make friends” attitude. I told myself, “I’m not going to be fake or whatever to try and impress you perfect-looking people.” My Brooklyn friends rolled their eyes. “Of course, you're going to make friends,” they told me. I mean, I guess I am kinda fun? 

But I was skeptical about connecting to anyone in this place. I was simultaneously intimidated by and judgey of the moms who got dressed up for pick up, had their hair blown out always, and smiled as they loaded their kids in and out of minivans. My Brooklyn crew was a little more, “We wear joggers and no makeup to pick up and then drag our screaming kids down the dirty sidewalks while talking shit about our boss/husband/in-laws/whatever person is bothering us today.”

During that first summer, I met a few of my new neighbors. I was surprised to find they were pretty cool and down to earth — far from the prim and primped snobs I’d imagined. I wanted to connect with them, but, I was so bone tired from packing, moving, and unpacking twice in six months (I even fell ill with exhaustion Ballerina Farm style) that I wasn’t much fun to be around.

The other side says HOME OF THE NEW YORK YANKEES! in the most unsubtle way possible.

Summer also ushered in a series of humiliating dumpster fires — my son telling a lovely, well-connected mom that he got “kicked in the balls” at tennis camp (they don’t say “balls” here) [I know the town Corynne is in, and she’s right, they don’t. -Charlie], me jumping into Lake Michigan in front of all the townspeople because I thought our daughter was drowning (she may or may not have been, depends on who you ask) and then finding out after it was way too late that the shirt I wore to the school meet-and-greet was totally see-through. I was ready to crawl into bed, never to be seen again. 

Yet, one year later, I was dead set on attending My First Suburban Block Party™.

This time, I felt confident. I hadn’t jumped in the lake with my clothes on for a whole year! And my kids were making real friends. Maybe I was, too? 

Fitting in is not something that has ever come easily to me. Ever. In high school, I once got a note in my locker from a friend saying she couldn’t talk to me anymore because a popular girl thought I was a loser. I was always the weird kid. The crying kid, the dysregulated kid, the annoying kid. Then I was the weird adult, the dysregulated adult, the crying adult. The annoying “I have a question in a meeting” adult. Jane knows. [I do. And I love you for it. -Jane]

34 years of therapy have diagnosed me as “a highly sensitive person with social anxiety.”  But my biggest problem (and believe, me there are very, very fucking many of them) is that I crave social connection. And also everything about being human hurts so much. I am a walking raw nerve who loves to party but gets super overwhelmed in large crowds. To top it all off, I’m a Capricorn. (I’m convinced that if I were a Libra, I would be the most beloved human on Earth, but a Libra would never even think that, let alone write it down.)

I also have some oldest-daughter control issues. If you’re reading this, and have ever been to a birthday party that includes both me and a piñata, then you know what I’m talking about. I will start manning that piñata situation. It can rub people the wrong way.

But when it came time for the big day, this Cap was feeling good. I had a plan to mitigate my massive crowd anxiety: I would put a rolling wine cart on our driveway, set up some chairs with our neighbors, and let the block party come to us. Boom. Cool and fun Corynne is heeeere. 

Then, the night before the party, one of my neighbors (I fully adore her and will tell anyone who will listen how she is the nicest human to have ever lived) sort of asked and sort of told us very sweetly, “We’re thinking we’ll put the bounce house in front of your driveway. Do you have an outdoor outlet?” Something about extension cord lengths and it being too far away from the food last year, I don’t know. My mind was already humming with this is not the plan.

“Um, isn’t that going to be a really high electric bill?” I tried to ask, looking over at my husband, hoping he would tell her “no” since my entire life depended on it. She assured us it wouldn’t cost much. That everyone had taken turns hosting the bounce house. My husband said it wouldn’t be a problem. 

HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. HAHAHAHAHA. HA.

Behold the bounce house in question. Looks fun, right?

The next day, I noticed everyone setting up My First Suburban Block Party™ without me. “Can I help?” I asked, worming my way over. “We’ve got it!” they chorused. I’m still not sure if I was being intentionally excluded or if people around here are just really A-Type (more A-Type than me?!) and not good at accepting help. But the high school clique trauma was brewing.

“Hey, real quick, maybe we can move that fuckin’ bounce house down the street?” I asked, practically begging this time.

“Nope!”

I was given a reason. My brain heard, “Another mom (who lives one street over — on a whole different block!!) is the decider and we have to do what she says.” Suddenly, I was looking at that note in my locker again: “You’re a loser.” I’m sure the real reason was something like, “We don’t have time to fight about this, we decided as a small group, can you please just make this easy for everyone?” 

My brain went full Gretchen Wieners. Why should Caesar get to stomp around like a giant, while the rest of us try not to get smushed under his big feet? What’s so great about Caesar? Hmm? Brutus is just as cute as Caesar. Brutus is just as smart as Caesar. People totally like Brutus just as much as they like Caesar. And when did it become okay for one person to be the boss of everybody, huh? Because that’s not what Rome is about. We should totally just stab Caesar!

And, Were they really my friends? Or had I been deluding myself all along? Listen, I never expected to meet anyone here that I even liked!! And now, here there they were. So likable. And I wanted them to like me. And I wasn’t sure if they did. 

I also knew enough to know that we were still in the setting-up portion of this party and I was already going a little woo-woo. So, I took myself inside, into bed, and shut my blinds while my husband walked up and down the street with our dog and played some football with the boys from the block (I think?). He’s normal. I put on one of the Japanese lavender eye masks my Brooklyn friend Jenny gave me (she knows how I can get) and did my deep breathing. The block party didn't start for another hour. I had time. I could still be very cool, very fun, very chill. 

Usually, these work really well when I need to calm down. Not this time.

Here’s how that went.

I got out of bed an hour later, completely fired up. I was going to be included. I was going to be in charge of something. I stomped down the street with my rolling cooler of wine nobody asked for and sort of shoved it alongside the rest of the party stuff in a “Here, I did something” kind of way. 

One of the moms, the one I am probably closest with, found me and — bless her — really tried to calm me down. I told her how stressed I was feeling. I blamed it all on my kids crying and not being able to locate my husband. She smiled at me sweetly. She gave me a nicotine pouch to stick in my lip. (I don’t even smoke anymore but if there was ever a time to need a cig … ) Let’s take a little shot, she suggested and we poured some small whiskeys. This woman was truly doing her best to get me to just fucking disassociate already. It wasn’t working. 

(For most people I know, Klonopin would be an answer for these types of situations. But the one time I took Klonopin I felt an immediate addiction and decided I should never, ever touch that shit for as long as I lived. And I haven’t.) 

When I walked back to my driveway, there it was. That fuckin’ bounce house. Deflating. With kids inside. So I did what any mother and adult would do at a party. I stomped over to the bounce house filled with big kids and baby toddlers and screamed, “All you big kids need to get out of there when the little kids are in there!!” One dad nodded at me in agreement. A few others gave me major stank eye.

With a Vince Vaughn-level crazy person smile plastered to my face I walked past them with one mantra: I WILL BE FUN!

I called my barefoot daughter over to meet a neighbor. However, I failed to notice the dad with a broom telling me about a broken vase. (Self-diagnosed auditory processing disorder.) She came running over to me, her tiny feet just barely missing the shards while my neighbors looked on in horror.

Shoes back on said child’s feet, I continued my tour de crazy, floating from person to person, trying to act like a demure girl by letting all my “inside thoughts” into the outside. At one point, I told two very nice neighbors, named Kate and Laura, “It’s hard for me to remember everyone’s name here because there are so many Kates, Katies, Lauras, and Laurens!” (I then tried to save myself by saying everyone in Brooklyn is Sarah, Jen, or Jenny. I don’t think it worked.) I told a mom from book club (and her husband!) that the upshot of having a stage five clinger for a child is that my son now knows everything there is to know about the menstrual cycle. 

Fuck. Me. 

Perhaps the last time my street will see these. Thanks to me.

And yet, my disassociating emotional support human did not give up on me. (Writing this makes me realize I had a ride-or-die friend right there the whole time. Not my husband — who was thankfully chasing my children around and stopping them from stepping in glass or whatever — but my bad-ass shot-taking neighbor.) She showed me cute pictures of my daughter bobbing for apples. Another mom showed me a video of the girls dancing. Somewhere, fun was being had! Here was proof! 

I did get close to relaxing for a second, thinking I could watch the man with a guitar play songs and sort of disappear into the background and maybe nobody would notice I was the craziest person who had ever lived.

Then it happened. “Did you get a turn at the piñata?” I heard a parent ask a child. 

This was my thing! I was needed. I beelined to the piñata circle. 

“Back up!!” I yelled. I could see a big kid with a bat in front of a line of little kids, about to cry, because they knew what was about to happen. They knew a big 7-year-old was gonna break that thing, and all the other bigs would get all the candy while they got nothing.  Um — hell no, buddy! I don’t care if you’re technically also a child, everyone knows the little baby toddlers go first in piñata and everyone gets a turn. “Back up!” I yelled again. “You don’t want to get hit by the bat, do you?!” The kids looked at me, alarmed. Their parents looked disturbed. I did not feel the love.

Now that my very fun, very cool, very chill self had successfully: rolled up and aggressively parked my cooler of wine; yelled at some big kids in the fuckin’ bounce house; lured my 6-year-old to walk over broken glass; insulted my neighbors’ names; and yelled again at more children (or perhaps the same children?), all while listening to my own my kids scream and cry on and off for two whole hours, My First Suburban Block Party™ was coming to an end. 

Some people started to go home. Some people gathered on another neighbor's driveway for a fire pit. It looked fun, but everyone still hanging out had secured some form of childcare, which we had not. My husband took our daughter home and I followed with our son about 30 minutes later. I could almost hear the sigh of relief as I walked away. 

Evidence of a time I possessed chill. (Notice I’m so alone I had to take the photo of myself.)

My husband tried to convince me it all turned out fine. Sure, our kids cried, sure it was a little overwhelming, but everyone had fun! I needed to move on. I did not do that. I texted this group of hard-working, fast-moving ladies:  “Next year, please don’t put a bounce house in front of my house without asking me or involving me in the planning.” 

They apologized. They were nice. They complimented my wine cooler. So nice. Jesus. One said she probably won’t plan anything next year because it’s a lot of work and a lot of people (assholes like me) just complain. Great. Now I’m the girl who got the world's best block party canceled. Very cool. Very chill. 

I woke up before dawn the next day and did some serious cleaning up of the street as a sort of secret apology for being bonkers. Then I cried for three days.

I cried because everyone is always doing things so quickly and not thinking about everyone else. I cried because we live in a culture where women are constantly feeling like they have to prove how good they are at everything. I cried because I was so, so mad at myself for trying so hard.  (Not to sound like a pick me but my best guy friend in Brooklyn once told me, “You’re just not a try-hard girl.” And it’s true. I’m not. Trying hard never ends well for me. I do my best when I’m giving no fucks.) I cried because while I was feeling like the whole world was against me and I had no friends, I had upset my actual friends. Why. Am. I. Like. This?!

I’m going to get back to not trying so hard. In the meantime, I want your thoughts. 

Would a block party where nobody is in charge, but everyone is included, work? Should we ban piñatas? Would the world be better if we didn't try hard? Or should annoying people like me leave town for the next Block Party that’s probably canceled because of me anyway? 

PS: I am currently accepting recs for non-addictive drugs that mimic Klonopin.