Shirts That Say What You Can't (And Why That Matters)

I want to tell you something I've never written down in one place before.

Self-Care Shirts didn't start as a business idea. It started as survival.

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2021

In 2021 I got out of an abusive relationship — one that ended the way it started, badly, in a city I didn't know, with someone who had shown me exactly who he was and I had gotten myself out as fast as I could. I flew home early. My sister was supposed to pick me up from the airport.

My father was in the car.

The entire ride home he lectured me, shamed me, told me what I deserved. I sat in the backseat and sobbed. And when we got home, my parents laid into me — cruel, cold, relentless — kicking me while I was already on the floor.

That was the night I started to understand that I was going to have to let them go.

I wasn't ready to do it yet. But I knew.

Shortly after that I found a new therapist — Dr. Scott, who I still see today, shout out to Dr. Scott — and I came to him and said: I think I want to go no contact with my parents but I don't want to. Can you help me fix my relationship with them instead?

That's what started five years of the hardest, most important work of my life.

And somewhere in those early sessions, I started drawing.

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The First Shirts

The first designs I ever made were Make Your Therapist Proud and Be Kind to Your Mind.

I wasn't making them for a store. I wasn't making them for anyone else. I was making them because I had my parents' voices in my head constantly — tearing me down, telling me I wasn't enough, wasn't smart, wasn't lovable — and I needed something to push back against that noise.

I needed to hear things I didn't yet believe.

So I drew them. And then I printed them on shirts. And then I wore them.

And something happened when I wore them — something I didn't expect. They said things I couldn't say out loud. They held the truth for me on the days I couldn't hold it myself. Every time I walked past a mirror, every time I got dressed, every time I caught a glimpse of what was written across my chest — it was a reminder. Not a lie. A promise.

Be kind to your mind. You are enough. Not broken.

I didn't believe them yet. But I wore them anyway. And slowly, they started to become true.

Every design in the collection started the same way — as something I needed to hear and couldn't say out loud. The Not Broken Shirt was one of the first. The It's Okay to Not Be Okay Shirt came not long after. Both are still among the most resonant pieces in the collection.

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2023

In November 2023 I went no contact with my parents.

I had spent the prior year in EMDR therapy — processing not just the things that happened in my childhood but all of it, layer by layer, going back further than I'd ever gone before. I had been very low contact for most of that year. And I had healed, quietly and without anyone noticing, more than I had in the previous decade.

When I finally sent the message formally — I need space, please honor this, I will reach out if anything changes — I blocked them both and sat on my bed and sobbed.

What came after was the hardest season of my life. Not because I lost my parents. I had already grieved them — that year of EMDR had done that work. What I didn't expect was losing my siblings.

All three of them said they supported me. Then one by one they went quiet. Two came back after a couple of months. My youngest sister — the one I helped raise, the one I threw myself in the line of fire for so many times growing up — never came back. She still hasn't.

And my mother — who had stopped speaking to me six months earlier after telling me through my sister that if I didn't want a relationship with my father, she didn't want one with me — began sending my childhood photos back. One box at a time. Through my sister who also wasn't speaking to me. She would pull up, drop the box on the step, say "mom doesn't want this anymore," and leave.

Baby pictures. Childhood photos. Mom doesn't want this anymore.

I was not okay.

I wore It's Okay to Not Be Okay more days than I can count that year.

I drew Not Broken during a session where I kept telling my therapist I felt shattered — and he asked me how we could reframe that. I'm not broken. I'm healing. I printed it on a shirt and wore it until I believed it.

I made Got Trauma? because sometimes all you can do is laugh at the absurdity of it. I drew I Unpack Trauma Like It's Amazon Prime because at that point trauma was basically all I had, arriving in waves, and dark humor was the only way through. I drew I'm the Plot Twist in My Family's Generational Curse because I knew — even in the middle of the grief and the isolation and the boxes on the doorstep — that I was choosing something different. For myself. For the children I don't have yet. For everyone who comes after me.

I drew Breathe, Darling — This Is Just a Chapter, Not Your Whole Story because I needed to see it in the mirror every single morning.

For the therapy-goers in your life — or for yourself — our Gifts for Therapy-Goers collection has the full lineup. The My Therapist Knows All Your Names Sweatshirt is the one that makes everyone laugh and then immediately say 'wait, that's me.'

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April 1, 2025

On April Fools' Day 2025, I was laid off from my job at the CDC.

My therapist said: you should do something with your art.

I had been drawing since 2021. Four years of shirts I made for myself, phrases I needed to hear, designs that had gotten me through cancer and estrangement and grief and all the ordinary extraordinary hard days in between.

In the month of April 2025 I built Self-Care Shirts. I took everything I had made — everything I had worn when I couldn't speak — and I made it available to anyone who needed it.

It launched on May 1st. Mental Health Awareness Month. It felt like the only right day.

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Why Any of This Matters

Sometimes you can't say what you need to say.

Maybe it's too big. Maybe the words don't exist yet. Maybe the people around you wouldn't understand. Maybe you're in a season where you don't fully believe the thing you know you need to believe, and saying it out loud feels like lying.

That's what the shirts are for.

They're not slogans. They're not affirmations in the generic sense. They're phrases that started in real moments — drawn in grief, in therapy, in the quiet after things fell apart — and found their way onto fabric so that other people could wear them too.

So that someone across the room sees You Are Enough on your shirt and thinks: I needed to see that today.

So that you catch your own reflection in the morning and your own chest tells you: This is just a chapter. Not your whole story.

So that you feel a little less alone in whatever you're carrying.

That's the whole thing. That's always been the whole thing. 🤍

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Self-Care Shirts donates a portion of every order to 988 and The Trevor Project. Every design was drawn by Alyssa Ostroff — during the seasons when she needed these words most.

Shop the collection →

If you're struggling right now, call or text 988. Anytime. You are not alone.

And if you're looking for something for someone in recovery, our Gifts for Someone in Recovery collection was built specifically for the people doing the quiet, everyday work of healing. The You Are Enough Hoodie is one of the most meaningful pieces to give.