forty, for three kinds of pain
swell into sixty, they suggested;
the idea of dependency and
docile, smiley dazes
too much, like a bruised sprain
tiptoeing on the edge
of a complete break

i don’t need to be happy all the time
i just need to be happy more

I am tired of all the meds
The meds make me blurry
They are evil
They look for your weak spots and attack

My relationship with mirrors is strained.
When I look I usually see what's probably
myself. I look better, probably, than before
when I slept no more than
3 hours every night
and spluttered through life
choking on words and stumbling over
misconceptions.
Now all of that is merely a buzz
trampled by a maximum dosage of meds
that let me function in life
but make everything a bit numb.
I much prefer numbness to personal nihilism.
Other times when I look in the mirror I
don't see much of anything.
When I'm in public and
the innocent looming presence of others
threatens my mind's fragile ego,
I see them abstracted in my periphery,
their glinting knives of eyes
sparing me a passing glance
(She's just smiling politely,
but my skewed eyes glimpse
faux teeth and behind them gargled, ****** judgements. I don't judge the digust.)
and I skim over a transparency
of myself in the mirror.
Too bad I can't actually disappear.
(Or maybe I can.
But I try to stray a little farther from those thoughts.)
Sometimes I feel heartbreakingly
ugly in that mirror. Lonely. Unwanted.
Even with all those doting eyes on me.
I feel relied upon for something. To be
the one who makes them laugh. The one
who fills the silence. The one
who works hard even with setbacks.
(Do they even expect that of me? Or do I?)
When
in reality
I'm none of those things.
Not truly. Not really.
Theres always that tug of opposition in me,
that feeling of ingenuity, a touch of facade.
But I don't want them to see an ugly side.
The side that mistrusts violently,
that lies stagnant with thoughts screaming.
Clamming up in the face of oppressing quiet.
The side
that rears its head when
they look a little too close.
Maybe it's my truest self, that broken side.
I wouldn't know. There
are too many walls. I can't even break them
myself.
Or maybe I've broken them all,
but I'm blindfolded,
feeling around an abyss with my eyes
wide open,
vision obscured by skin-tight fabric.
I could just,
untie that knot behind my head,
spiral further and further down--
just to feel something else--
But it's safer in this uneasy emotion.
I dont know if I'll ever find myself in
the mirror again.

When people ask me who I am without my anxiety I don't know how to answer them

I walk around with a zipper at the nape of my neck

And when I open myself up without the anxiety that forms me there is nothing but sadness and ice left

Sometimes I feel like there is sunlight penetrating through my bones, begging to escape

But when I pull down the zipper my anxiety laughs at how I could think that there was even a possibility of something bright and warm inside of me

 

If you ask me who I am without my anxiety I will tell you, I am me, but the voice inside my head tells me I am nothing

My anxiety is the love that fills me

The terror that inspires me

The perfectionism that drives me

But I can't say that out loud

Because dinner party conversation or first date question games are not the appropriate places to say that without it I am dead inside

 

When I take my medication, I have been described as flat

1 dimensional

Having no substance

So when you ask who I am without my anxiety

Telling you I am nothing, may be the only honest answer

If the meds aren’t enough,
then what shall fulfill your drive
to stay alive?

Haven’t you had enough already,
to have your insides ruptured?

Is this how you end things,
without leaving any
trace of ******?

nothing helps anymore,
every morning the same drill,
take the meds to paint a smile,
keep people an arm's length away,
just become a stranger,
it hurts less when there is no one to lose,
never let your guard down,
make jokes so others laugh,
go back home and  get ready for bed,
cry alone until sleep washes over,
then wake and continue the act

I haven't been so sad recently,
which is rare. I had the bad five months last year-
to the point I nearly killed myself.
And now I'm okay, but then it makes me think;
I'm not acting how I should act.
I don't feel like me anymore.
I'm bored,
I don't cry so often,
I feel like I'm wearing new shoes
that are slightly too small, to the point they
rub but don't leave a mark.
I think it's because I got so used to
being let down, that my body automatically
drops me a few stories every couple of weeks.
My eighteenth birthday was bad.
I think I just gave up on birthdays
and to think they used to be my favourite.
Now, I spend my time doing what is asked of me;
go to classes, smile, do work, go home, do homework,
sleep and not dream.
It feels weird.
I don't feel like me;
I want to feel like I'm dying again,
like the world itself is crumbling beneath my feet,
that, if I smile or move a muscle,
my whole being would explode;
shattering thousands with reminders that I was here,
because now I feel empty.
I'd rather feel like death personified
than nothing at all.