when i was a teenager i fancied myself an adult even when i was younger than a teenager 11, 12, 13 years old, barely not a little girl, i thought i was a grown up because functionally i was an adult i came home to empty house and cooked for myself, cleaned up after myself, did the dishes while i was still afraid of all the knives, did the laundry when i was barely tall enough to reach the bottom of the washer
And at the time, i thought this was a good thing i talked about how mature i was, how together i was in high school i was all about how well prepared i was for life because i already knew how to cook and clean for myself i already knew how to care for myself
and then i went away to college and at first i was fine, i was right, i could look after myself i got good grades, i cleaned my dorm room, i cooked myself dinner i was functionally and legally an adult and then my mom got cancer i was 400 miles from home and my mom got cancer and i didn't want to be an adult anymore
suddenly i was nine years old crying alone in my bed except i couldn't cry alone in my bed because i had roommates so it was one am and i sobbed on the porch being careful not to cry out too loudly because i was afraid of what the neighbors would think
when i started going to therapy one of the first things she said was that i was a parentalized child that's someone who, as a child, was forced to act as their own or someone else's parent a psychiatric diagnosis of 'she just grew up too fast'
i grew up too fast and now i'm twenty one years old and trying to remember how to be a child again but i can't remember something i never was i feel like i'm trying to hold onto water
there's a part of me that's young and scared and a part of me that's old and fakes being well adjusted and for a long time they coexisted not in harmony, just in separate parts of my brain where they couldn't see or speak to each other but now someone's gone and introduced them and they won't stop fighting the screaming in my head is loud and never ceases and i'm never sure which one of them is winning
i have to learn how to be a child and be okay with crying and asking for help with things i should know how to do and i have to be an adult and be responsible and wake up on time and i don't know how to do all those things at once because as much as i like that shel silverstein poem, our ages are not pennies in a bandaid box i can't be seven or twenty one based on when it suits me i do not know how to reconcile the warring parts of me
my mother lived through cancer and i haven't spoken to my father in almost two years but i am still dealing with the shrapnel that's taken the place of the blood in my veins and if anyone tells you that growing up quickly is a good thing that it will make you well prepared for living alone don't listen to them
i listened to them and now i'm twenty one years old and i can't go to the doctor without bringing a teddy bear and i can't sleep without a nightlight and sometimes i even drink from sippy cups because i find the familiarity soothing because the little girl inside of me never learned to be an adult and the adult that made itself my skin can't remember how to be a child because they never were one i am two separate halves that cannot figure out how to be whole together
your life is a building with a hundred stories and no elevator you have to go to each floor before you can reach the top if you skip too many stairs you might just fall down to the bottom and i promise there is no shortcut worth dying for