Hospitals:

The smell of stale ***** under antiseptic. Bland steamed food and pills the same color as candy.

Latex gloves and discharge papers.

Medications. Cheerful pats on the back by friends and neighbors; as if one simple smile and it gets better could cure a decade of empty. Anxiety. Manic highs and suicidal lows.

Go to school, go to work. Get a job. Have a wife, have some kids and a house in the suburbs with a white fence and a dog.

"Get over it. I've had it harder than you. You've got nothing to worry about."

Were they right? I had a roof overhead and food on the table. Maybe they were right and I was wrong, wrong, wrong. I could get over it!

What was I missing all along?

Just. Be. Happy.

But not too happy.

"Don't do that. They'll think you ain't right."

Was I ever right, mother? Did I come out of your womb silent and somber? Or did I claw my way out with your blood on my gums?

A textbook case of this and that. Far too skinny, an inch too fat.

Bipolar. Anxiety.

Three years of ****** sobriety.

"Your life is easy compared to mine. You haven't been what I've been through."

Suffering ain't a **** competition.

Am I not sick enough?

Will I ever be sick enough for you?