FoundAlongRoad

Feel like a permanent ill, mentally, n apparently ugly
Obviously
Physically
Lashes of shame and anger
I wake with your words in my mind sometimes
And this feeling of dark embarrassment
I’m used to knowing I just go too far
Throw in everything with my heart
Shield myself while I walk through the dark
I healed some wounds from back so far
But ended up mutilated
My self-esteem lost it’s grip
Sex drive lost the plot
All tucked in like lost,
Little pieces
Hiding the bleeding
Cuz I can’t make it stop
Just cut that part off
Pack it up until I’m strong enough
The burn of a thousand cuts
I can’t rise above
I thought I was better than this
But it just hurts too much
Lock it away, throw you in with the scar you made
There are others just like it but yours seeps out and stains the floor
I know you don’t deserve the blame
I’m trying, I’m trying
I should be able to handle this pain
I know I’ve built back through much more
But this time I don’t have answers or options and everything in me just feels like it’s rotten
It was so much at once and I broke it down and soothed what I could
And lost so much of myself in all of the good

Saw through the lens of potential
Like transparent alternate dimensions
I wanted to take you there
The sun glinting off of illusions
Let it happen cuz I needed the happiness
It would bring me
My own alternate reality
Then as always it curled around and bit me
I always have to watch for old ills to rear their head
But it wasn’t just black-and-white thinking
Even in mourning I could see your colors
But I could also see what could never be
Could almost touch the impossible, so real to me
And by nature it turned back to get me

A struggle, a balance, a dance, with my mind
Always only having 20/20 hindsight
And losing familiarity with my own body
Did I abuse you as much as the rest of me
And it’s now catching up to me
Oh to go back to being twenty
Oh to be able now to fix me
They say it’s so easy like I wouldn’t leap from a building to get back what’s gone now
My wisdom teeth keep shedding and regrowing and I kept hoping
It would spread to the others
But it’s just them and I don’t feel any wiser
Maybe that’s why I always have to learn from the beginning again
Juggling the fears like knives in my brain and only starting to learn more terms for why the world and I aren’t the same
But I’ve always been this way
Sure I’m more damaged and have better ways to cope
But why didn’t they find all these things about me when I was a kid
I think back to all the therapy
And how most adults around only cared that I said I was gay ‘too early’
But I suppose all the other disorders and suicide attempts eventually overshadowed what should’ve been obvious
I had to heal what trauma gave me
To see which symptoms are just normal for me
But honestly when it all fell into place
‘It’s not just trauma and OCD’
And I heard the statistic about females
being overlooked, misdiagnosed
Often told they’re gifted kids (or different)
The pipelines are real
To burnout, to autistic adult
I could’ve fallen to my knees
I’m almost 33
And I felt so letdown
And like I finally wasn’t all alone
But I suppose I did a lot of it to myself

How do I fix what’s disintegrating now
How do I trust myself
How do I stop shutting everyone out
Don’t tell me easy words with blood still running down me now
I have to find it for myself

It’s been so long
Since my self-loathing was so strong
I’m sorry to everyone else
And mostly I’m sorry to myself.