misophonia is not getting angry when you hear people breathing or eating. misophonia is 'i'm supposed to feel
stronger because there's a scientific
reason behind all the pain clenched like a fist inside my own body, I'm
supposed to feel better.' that's what doctors say. but the answer is a long list of riddles the doctors can't
decode. 'we know why your heart is
breaking, but we don't know how to
stop it.' misophonia is the maximum number of pills I can hold without dropping any. it's the moment when my doctor says she won't allow me to go to a college more than two hours away. it's the effort to smash my own bones on cement just to drown out the sound of somebody talking about what they had for dinner. it's that autocorrect and spellcheck still don't  recognize it as a word. it's about hearing sounds so menacing and monumental that not a night goes by where they don't swallow me whole. it's the fear of leaving my house and hearing something bad. it's my hands not feeling like hands and everything I try to touch turning into snow. it's having to bring headphones everywhere in case I hear a word I hate. it's my doctor telling me with a sad look on her face that she'd be surprised if I make it to 45 years old. it's having to ask directors if any of my trigger words are in the script before I see a show. it's the knowledge that I'm a quickly ticking time bomb, that it gets worse over time. that I might wake up tomorrow morning not being able to stand the sound of my mother's voice. it's the fact that the most common result of misophonia is self harm but I've made it this far without it. it's my chest igniting every time I hear someone start to talk. (I'm sorry I can't marry you, I can't stand the sound of your voice in the morning). it's simple words that can cause my composure to break like a separation of continents, like all that hurt never meant anything. years of wishing, on my knees, that I was deaf so I could skip the chapters when my whole body feels like a slowly melting candle, like I'm not allowed to be afraid of fire. it's in 9th grade when the bell rang to go home and I was sitting in the back row of English class with my fingers pressed so far into my ears they popped, trembling, until Mrs Gitsis asked someone to take me to the counseling centre. it's not 'ew, I hate the sound of people chewing.' do you lose sleep because the reverberations of that sound won't leave your head? do you have to lock the windows on your second floor to feel safe? it's having to wear gloves in 90 degree weather because I can't see my hands without them. it's waking up at 3am to arms that turn into stumps, unable to go get help because the sound of footsteps makes me want to die. it's reaching for a knife every time somebody says a common word. misophonia is being taken out of school because I can't sit with other kids in the cafeteria. it's hearing clapping after a show that's supposed to be for me transforming into screeching metal tires reverberating around my skull at frequencies i didn't know were possible. it's feeling every nerve ending in my body start to tingle seconds before someone says a trigger word, like god feels bad for all he's done so far and he's trying to send me a sign. it's the fact that most therapists haven't even heard of it. it's the fact that the ones who have don't know a cure. it's that there is no cure. it's when all someone has to do is repeat sentences, words, and phrases they know will break me. it's when my second therapist told me I was making it up. it's when my parents told me I just wanted to boss people around. it's when I started not being able to eat dinner with my family anymore. it's growing up in a household with a parent affected by serious OCD who has to vacuum 24/7 but I can't hear a vacuum or else I'll try to see my pulse from the inside. it's the sadness and anger that clenches itself around my heart like a fist until I feel like the dust I was created from. it's when something as simple as the sound of a drawer closing makes me wish I were dead. it's the knowledge that one day I won't be able to handle feeling like an abandoned building and the volcano inside of my head will erupt. it's the knowledge that I can't get help. I can't ever get help.

I am sun-kissed and I glow in the moonlight,
my eyes reflect like water,
and summer makes me speckle and freckle
and I crave rivers and mountains
and other things that make me beautiful.

I am long-legged like the spiders you hate,
my hair is red like roses and smells like springtime,
I am soft in a way you imagine clouds to be
and I no longer fear you or the dark.

I have grown out of sidewalk cracks,
I am a ******* garden and you can't step on me anymore.

I am too tall to be contained and too beautiful to be detained
and I will never again haunt myself with things I couldn't be.

I am too much to be too little and somewhere you always knew it.

So when you talk to me like you think I still love someone who made me believe I was just an ugly girl,
remember that there are flowers growing inside me,
and I washed the taste of your sharp tongue out of my mouth months ago.

I am an ocean with waves and depths and storms and beauty and there is so much to me that you will never get to see.

You were an anchor weighing me down confining me to one stark place of myself,

I am so much more than you ever saw, I finally know this now.

You dream about your day in the sun
A shot at the spotlight
Fifteen minutes of fame
Oh
You fantasize about chance meetings
Lucky opportunities
Late night drinkin’ at parties
Oh
Honey
Well
You may be skinny
But you got no muscle
You may dream big
But you work small
With ease
Unaware fame is a disease
It’ll break you
‘cause you aint anybody
sick of people hearin’ your name askin’ who?
Too much makeup lookin’ gaudie
Looks is all you have
No ambition- talent to be had
You
Think about the result
The perks
Obssessed like the cult
Think you know how it works
Down on your knees
Flex that ***** it’s a tight squeeze
Longing to be seen
Desperate for the 15
10 + 5
and you’re in the hive
10+ 5
but it’s a straight dive
10 + 5
will make you feel alive
You think you’re one of a kind
You’ve made up your mind
you need that 10+5
but it won’t last a lifetime.

My father hit me.
Hands strangling my neck.
I was just a kid,
he said it was my fault,
I believe that it was.
He said I didn't deserve to live,
I believe that too.
I believe his screams
and the bruises he laced my body with
I believe his words
that I'm nothing
that I'm garbage.
I blame that monster
for breaking something inside me
that 7 years later is still not repaired.

I blame her for never calling the cops.
For calling me a liar
for telling me I gave the bruises to myself.
for making me feel guilty.
I blame her for telling me she wished I was one of her miscarriages
I blame her for telling me I'm good for nothing
for telling me I'm fat
for telling me,
like him,
I deserve to die.

I blame them
for the anxieties
and anger
and fears
and panic
and the scars on my heart.

I'm scared of the world.
I'm scared of it's people.
I need help.
I'm dying.
slowly.
quickly.
steadily.
and not at all.

I feel everything,
every word
every breath
is a dagger to what once was a heart
when every day
you're told you're wrong
you're told you're a mistake-
an inconvenience-
that could never be loved
it takes an effect
you cannot fight
and just when I think
maybe I can get better
a single word
sends me spiraling
dying
crying
suffocating
and scared
wishing someone would touch me
in a kind, gentle way
would hug me till I fall asleep
and love me
even though I cry a lot.

I was told
the blame was on me
that I ruin
and poison
everything I touch,
but I blame them,
so much so
I can't get better,
so maybe we're both to blame.

"oh god, seeing you in that dress
makes me realize just how fat you've gotten
why didn't you brush your hair?
I don't care if you wanted it curled that way it looks awful!
who's he?
he looks like a freak,
this is disgusting
I can't believe you embarrassed me this way
you nasty **** I bet you lied to me too!
I don't understand where I went wrong
to have such an ugly sinning daughter"


oh yes,
what would I be without my mother?
happy.
I'd be happy.

And these dark thoughts haven't left since the cold morning,
The night before I had once again tasted loneliness and his bitter sting,
And the empty dance of sweat and liquor,
The bodies lost in the night's embrace.

I have feared for my life too many times before,
A will to strike my own heart and and leave it bleeding,
I have walked this line again and again,
A mistake made three too many times.

The mistake of thinking anyone could want me,
To strip my soul of all that feels whole for a shot at empty passions,
The choice to throw myself, to be swept away in impossibility,
To believe for one second, that I could be desired.

But I am cracked, never whole, this sick soul lingers,
And I ache for the possibility that to be touched would heal my pain,
But that is no reality, and I know it is surely not mine,
And maybe I just want to feel empty.

If it means not waking up again on that cold morning.

I'm different
yeah I'm different,
I'm different
yeah I'm different,
been praised
since birth
for my originality
*****
mentality
bow down
to the freak of freaks
with the good techniques
compliments of god
just for being odd
think I'm plagued by benality
cursed by originality
they think it's the coolest
they think it's so great
they don't understand
how this twists my fate
I'm different
yeah so different
pretending to be indifferent
to being treated
maltreated
isolated
outcast
never understood
different isn't so good
and if I could
I'd be so much more generic
I'd have little simple thoughts
eco friendly watts
get starbucks on weekends
do my nails and hair
highlights down to there
and if you only knew
how it feels
to be so **** alone
you wouldn't be so prone
to envy my creativity
when it's met
with such negativity
to have no coherence
of proclivity
I'm a slave
in captivity
people come by and watch
but don't touch
they point
ooh and aaah
but they don't know what to feed me
how to care for mee
my biggest strength
is my biggest flaw
Since birth
I've been told
I'm so original
but I'm so broken it's clinical
almost criminal
these thoughts I have
living in a world so fictional
I'm so ******' lonely
and hungry
and slowly
freezing to death
with no one to keep me warm
or speak to
I'm cryin up a storm
because no one understands
no one knows my heart
no one knows my soul
you'd think with all this praise
I'd be able to climb out of this hole
but truth be told
lord behold
I am a long sad story
nobody can unfold.

for once
I would like to fall asleep
in someone's arms
and drift to happy dreams
feeling safe,
and warm,
and calm,
perfectly at ease
breathing in their scent
knowing
that I wouldn't mind
waking up.