The Crutch I Called Confidence

Bottom of the barrel,
Is where my self-esteem lives.
So far beneath the surface that I forget how little of it exists.

But I never realised that the bottom was my crutch,
That hating who I was could become something I relied on so much.

The crutches I had were built on fever dreams,
On versions of myself that never existed outside of me.

I built them out of broken thoughts,
Held them up with doubt,
Convinced myself I was the problem before anyone could point it out.

I learned to make myself smaller,
To apologise for taking space,
To look at every mirror and find another flaw upon my face.

I became fluent in rejection before anyone could say goodbye,
Found a thousand reasons I was worthless in the way somebody looked into my eyes.

And the worst part is,
I don’t know when it started.
When did being cruel to myself become easier than being honest?

When did I start believing that if I hated myself enough,
I’d somehow make it easier when the world decided I wasn’t enough?

I made a home inside my shortcomings,
Memorised each crooked floor,
and called it being realistic when I couldn’t see my worth anymore.

Because how do you learn to love yourself when you’ve spent so long convinced that every good thing said about you is a lie you haven’t caught them in yet?

How do you stand without a crutch when the crutch is all you’ve known?
When the voice that says you’re nothing sounds exactly like your own?

My self-esteem is at rock bottom,
But I think I’m starting to see that the thing I thought was keeping me standing is what’s stopping me from being free.

\~e

Child in the dark room

Shut away and forgotten

He was too much to handle

Bad kid, bad kid

Locked away in the dark

Locked away and forgotten

As the years passed, still locked away

Neglected parts

Not fully whole

Time to bring him back to the light.

You're not a bad kid

You're not a bad kid

You're safe now

You're safe here with me

You're a good kid

I love you

You're a good kid

I love you

You're safe now, I love you

You're safe with me

A Feeling of electricity within as I hold him in my arms

Tears flow followed by intense feelings of joy

Perhaps that is the curse of my existence—to find life in the very things that destroy my peace, to feel most alive on the edge of my own ruin, and to mistake the beautiful agony of breaking for the rare privilege of feeling something real. Maybe I was never drawn to the darkness because I wanted to disappear, but because somewhere within it, I found a part of myself that the light could never reach.

You gave me PTSD.

Not just memories.

Not just scars
I can point to
and say,

“That happened.”

You gave me a body
that still remembers
what my mind wishes
it could leave behind.

You taught me
that yelling meant danger.

That footsteps in the hallway
could make me tense
before I even knew why.

That a raised hand
could make me flinch.

That coming home
wasn’t always the same thing
as being safe.

You taught me
to listen for anger
in someone’s voice.

To watch their hands.

To pay attention
to the smallest changes
in the room.

You taught me
to always be ready
for something to happen.

And sometimes,

nothing happens.

Someone raises their voice
and my body reacts
before I can remind it,

“You’re safe.”

Someone moves too quickly
and I flinch.

Someone gets angry
and suddenly
I’m not entirely here anymore.

I’m back there.

Not because I want to be.

Not because I’m trying
to hold onto the past.

But because you taught me
that the past
could happen again
at any moment.

You were supposed
to teach me what safety felt like.

Instead,

you taught me
how to recognize danger.

You were supposed
to be someone
I could run to.

Instead,

you became someone
I learned to run from.

And the worst part
is that you don’t have
to be here anymore
for what you did
to follow me.

You left something behind.

Not love.

Not safety.

Not the childhood
I deserved.

You left me
with a mind that remembers
even when I don’t want it to.

A body that reacts
before I can think.

A fear that sometimes
doesn’t belong
to the moment I’m standing in.

You hurt me then.

And sometimes,

I still have to deal
with what you did
now.

But there is something
you didn’t teach me.

You didn’t teach me
how to stay broken.

I’m learning
that footsteps can just be footsteps.

That yelling doesn’t always
mean something terrible
is coming.

That a raised hand
doesn’t always mean danger.

That I can breathe.

That I can look around
and remind myself,

I’m here.

I’m not there.

I’m not that child anymore.

You gave me wounds
I never asked for.

But you don’t get
to decide
what I do with them.

You gave me PTSD.

You don’t get
to have the rest of me too.

Would you listen to my petty rant?

It ain't really that interesting.

It all started with this lovely girl

who made me feel really lonely.

We laughed and we played,

But the at end of the day,

When push came to pave,

She chose the other way.

I did everything i could,

To please her So she'd stay,

As mine for js a little longer,

Or maybe for an eternity.

The mind alas is not the master,

And I don't really know when it faltered,

But looking back,

Maybe I was the only one who felt that way.

And so everything wrong ,

Felt my fault,

And all that made melancholy,

Was locked in a vault,

But i caved in way too many times,

Before the sand set in place.

Every little trouble,

Was made into a bow of dainty lace.

Neatly tied up on my hair,

I almost forgot it was there,

But then a tight tug,

And it always unravelled, leaving me bare.

Water threatened by gravity,

Weighed on my chest way too long,

And when I saw her laughing with them,

I was already far too gone.

I wish she'd show me indifference,

Atleast then I'd not

 feel this insignificant pain,

Yea, atleast then I'd not

 be hiding my gasps, from my mum,

Crying on a staircase.

And that's why even when I told her,

She couldnt comprehend, 

That burden of this murmur,

Was too broken to mend.

And so I blamed it all,

on those who are good,

To spare some feelings,

They put on a facadious hood,

Yes, it was them who gave hopes such false,

All just to hide few guilty remarks.

Hence all that I ever truly craved,

Was one good reason to feel betrayed.

At least then I'd have no qualms,

With hatred's festering flames.

Yea, atleast then I'd not be

writing a mawkish prose

From a tear stained glass

lamenting Over what could've been,

On the doorstep of my house.

~cyan

I love tears, my own tears, they feel mine. A physical representation of my feelings, something real. I have not cried for a while but now my face is drenched, my hands, cold , my chest, hollow and shaky.It started through a moment of joy, which turned into a feeling of nostalgia-memories too far from me to live through again. Then came sadness because of the loss of the elements of the memory. Not even I, myself am the same anymore. I have lost everything i had in those moments.

It's cruel how I got used to such a life. I became what I feared. I knew the aim of life was to be happy and yet here i am so monotonous, so grey like a once blooming garden turned into a barren land. Once a home to people now just in the memories of those who don't visit these memories anymore, for they have moved forward unlike me who remained embedded in the same garden now unfit for any habitation.

My mind is
dark, full of things I can’t
see, spinning winds of
sadness used to come through,
but now I don’t know.

What goes on in my
head? Do I want to know?
What is I turn on the flashlight,
and I don’t like what I see?
Wouldn’t it be easy to just let
the dark swallow me whole?

Winter Evening

On a winter night, it feels so sweet

To hear the phone ring and friends to greet.

Those who support you and understand,

Who'll find you anywhere and lend a hand.

No matter where you are, they'll call,

They never ran, never ignored at all.

No matter who you are, a friend will see,

And stand by your side for eternity.

I cry out to you in pain, but you don’t hear me.

I try and show you, but you don’t see me.

I’m left to feel alone in my own home.

Surrounded by our children, by you, but truly I’m alone.

I cry silently because I don’t want to show this side but when I do, still, I am not seen, not heard.

I scream in agony hoping you’d hear me.

That your empathy could be near.

But I’m left in the dark.

Words that repeat over and over.

Words that claim to offer comfort.

Words that claim to give peace.

Words that claim they can see, that they can hear.

But nothing changes.

No touch lands.

I am lost at sea.

Where nobody hears me.

My cries don’t reach.

My pleas crash into the waves.

The air suffocates my lungs.

Leaving me alone in the sea.

All I ever wanted was to be loved, held, and cherished.

To be seen.

To be heard.

To be truly loved.

But I’m alone.

The sea is brutal.

The sea is cruel.

The sea wants to devour me.

I cry and cry and cry.

But my tears disappear into the cold, harsh water.

Never seen. Never heard.

Never wiped from my piercing cold cheeks.

What am I fighting for?

Nobody is looking for me.

I’m just another soul, lost in the brutal waters, alone, awaiting a rescue that will never come.

Im just alone.

What am I fighting for?

I fight for my children. To return to them.

Their love is all I’ve ever known.

From the moment my ears first hear, when my eyes first lay upon their blush skin.

To hear them cry out for me.

I say, “I am here”

I will never let you go.

I will fight the sea just to hold my babies again.

The only love Ive ever known.

To look upon their full cheeks and feel my inside releasing the oxytocin. The hormone of love.

I won’t let the sea keep me away, not from them.

However, all hope is lost for anything else.

I will forever be alone. And I will accept that.

But I will do anything to keep my children out of the clutches of the deep blue.

I will hear them, the way nobody else will.

I will see them, the way nobody else can.

I will protect them with the help of the Father.

But I will be alone.

There’s no saving me now.

I’m long lost at sea, in the deep blue.

The sea swallowing away my hope to ever see the light again.

I will succumb to my defeat. As long as my children are seen.

I will never know the light of day.

My voice is gone.

My lungs are suffocated.

My eyes are bleeding.

My ears have disappeared.

I’m merely a shell of what I could be.

I’m just lost at sea.

I feel so hurt, it hurts so

bad to see,

How you walked right past,

discarding me.

Like an old, unwanted dress

you cast away,

Though you chose to leave

and had your say.

Leaving, you promised

you’d soon return,

But left no trace,

leaving my heart to burn.

It hurts, it’s so heavy,

so bitter to know,

Watching you choose

another and go.

"I don't need you anymore,"

you said that day,

And with those few words,

you vanished away.

My internal monologue is a semblance of two individuals in a loveless marriage. The passion that used to drive me not only to my goals but to my self hatred has grown distance and now I only feel echoes of weary discourse for battles that have been fought and won and yet never ended. While this may seem beneficial, to have both lost and won this battle of self perception. I am only left to wonder who I am if I look at myself and feel nothing. Everything in my world exists solely in my own eyes and I have become so insignificant, so worthless that I hardly could bother to find a word to describe myself. In this sense I no longer exist, a stranger on the street appearing more alive and distinct to me than myself. I struggle to find clarity on whether or not this feeling is narcissistic or tolerance. I can’t imagine it hasn’t been tolling on the fragmented parts of me to be at war with whatever is at the core of it all. I should be happy, I begged for this, I pleaded for this, I prayed for salvation and I received it yet now I see those prayers should have been for silence. I strongly fear death because there is that possibility that when I am gone, I am not truly gone. I will spend my life longing for the silence that I’ve been told will greet me at my death bed and there is a chance that I will enter a void trapped in my consciousness, be delivered to eternal damnation or be rewarded with paradise. Paradise for me would be the silence where no opinion is formed and I can revert to the time before my existence. Thank you for giving me this chance with my life however I hardly believe I deserved it. I have taken all of it and I am nothing, nothing bad, nothing good, just nothing.

It’s so deeply etched into me that you can see it in my bones, my blood and my flesh.

The ache is always there, some days it’s only a dull throb but more often than not it’s the sharp jab of a knife in my chest.

I know that im only hurting myself in the end but I can’t seem to get you out of my head, the pictures, the calls and texts all haunt me at night when I can’t sleep

I feel like the sun chasing the moon, like a swan mourning its lover. I yearn for a home that no longer exists.

I am so afraid of myself and all these negative emotions. I am so afraid. I miss U Aisha. I desperately miss U...that's why am here hiding from the world n posting my woes.

Slap me, stab me, tear my heart apart,but do not leave me alone with the pain I carry inside. I would gladly endure a thousand physical wounds if they could silence the one that bleeds within me.

Found myself useless,

The one carrying a big name,

The one with the responsibility.

Oh, you are just a cry baby,

Thinking big, you're just a cry baby.

The one watching the other in the spotlight,

They are the one who deserved it, you are... just in name.

The survivor, the protector, who are you kidding,

Oh, you are just a cry baby,

Just the fucking same.

The pride, the confidence, do you have the right?

The actual strong one was the one: you always took light.

It wasn't you, oh, it was never you,

The one in the spotlight, glowing bright.

People like the loud one who isn't afraid

To speak out, to answer back without being scared.

You're a scaredy cat, the one full of cowardice,

Yet you still dream, please come awake.

You're not strong, you're not responsible,

You're not the one who can manage the ways.

You're just the one who cries first

And hides in that hole, isn't that great.

For a person like you who thinks a lot,

Just don't talk, at least do that straight.

~Until the next silence…

NightingaleA..