#medicated - Hello Poetry

She wasn’t born angry. She was born with feelings that came without volume control, with a nervous system always braced for impact, with emotions that surged faster than her mouth could explain them. DMDD, they called it— Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder— a name for the way her world stayed on fire. Chronic irritability. Explosive outbursts. A sadness so constant it lived beneath the anger like a bruise. But no one explained that to her. They didn’t tell her it wasn’t a choice, that her brain struggled to regulate what others handled quietly. They just told her she was too much. Instead of asking what she felt, they asked what to prescribe. One pill to quiet the rage. Another to slow her down. Something to help her sleep. Something to help her wake up. Her childhood became a rotation of dosages, side effects, and adults watching her to see if she was finally manageable. She learned that help meant sedation. That peace meant numb. That being “better” meant being smaller. No one sat with her feelings long enough to teach her how to survive them. No one taught her words for the panic, or grounding for the overload, or that anger was often grief with nowhere safe to land. She was still called a monster— just a quieter one. Still a disappointment— just easier to control. They feared her emotions so much they medicated the child instead of the pain surrounding her. Instead of care, she got compliance. Instead of understanding, she got chemical silence. As she grew older, the outbursts faded— not because she healed, but because she learned what happens when you show them. The anger turned inward, and depression took its place, heavy and dull and relentless. DMDD didn’t disappear. It evolved. It became exhaustion. Hopelessness. A constant belief that something inside her was fundamentally wrong. Now she struggles to untangle who she is from who she was medicated into being. She wonders what emotions feel like without apology, without fear, without a prescription attached. She wasn’t a child to be feared. She was a child who needed tools, patience, and someone brave enough to sit with her pain instead of trying to erase it. And even now, beneath the diagnoses and bottles, there is still that same little girl— not broken, not dangerous, just desperately wanting to be understood.

0

Jan 4

Jan 4, 2026 at 2:53 PM UTC

DelaneyKonen

DMDD

She wasn’t born angry. She was born with feelings that came without volume control, with a nervous system always braced for impact, with emotions that surged faster than her mouth could explain them. DMDD, they called it— Disruptive Mood Dysregulation Disorder— a name for the way her world stayed on fire. Chronic irritability. Explosive outbursts. A sadness so constant it lived beneath the anger like a bruise. But no one explained that to her. They didn’t tell her it wasn’t a choice, that her brain struggled to regulate what others handled quietly. They just told her she was too much. Instead of asking what she felt, they asked what to prescribe. One pill to quiet the rage. Another to slow her down. Something to help her sleep. Something to help her wake up. Her childhood became a rotation of dosages, side effects, and adults watching her to see if she was finally manageable. She learned that help meant sedation. That peace meant numb. That being “better” meant being smaller. No one sat with her feelings long enough to teach her how to survive them. No one taught her words for the panic, or grounding for the overload, or that anger was often grief with nowhere safe to land. She was still called a monster— just a quieter one. Still a disappointment— just easier to control. They feared her emotions so much they medicated the child instead of the pain surrounding her. Instead of care, she got compliance. Instead of understanding, she got chemical silence. As she grew older, the outbursts faded— not because she healed, but because she learned what happens when you show them. The anger turned inward, and depression took its place, heavy and dull and relentless. DMDD didn’t disappear. It evolved. It became exhaustion. Hopelessness. A constant belief that something inside her was fundamentally wrong. Now she struggles to untangle who she is from who she was medicated into being. She wonders what emotions feel like without apology, without fear, without a prescription attached. She wasn’t a child to be feared. She was a child who needed tools, patience, and someone brave enough to sit with her pain instead of trying to erase it. And even now, beneath the diagnoses and bottles, there is still that same little girl— not broken, not dangerous, just desperately wanting to be understood.