My life always seemed so perfect to me, an unnerving sense of childhood innocence I crave to feel once again. Living in a world where my biggest worry was cutting my hair or which dog I should snuggle with. A world centered around me and my family, I had control, like my very own videogame. I knew the soul characteristics of this game, I the youngest with an infatuation for dogs and my sister’s attention. My perfectly matched parents and their warm castle of a bedroom, where I felt safest. My sister, often deep in conversation about the newest school gossip with my mother. I never thought life was any different or should be any different.

I always held my heart on my sleeve, a delicate soul easily hurt. But nevertheless, strong-willed. Even as a premature newborn my parents would joke that I forced my way out into the world, demanding that I should be born in July instead of August. This personality would bring me far but not far enough. Failing me in the time I desperately needed. It would bring me to the exact point I remember losing the haze over my eyes. Where I began to see the world as a prison, where I saw flaws highlighted in neon yellow.

It started as any other summer day, my sister off on a mission in Utah, and me and my parents happily mixing as always. I had seen the warning signs; I had known what was to come. However, the buildup is starkly different from the explosion. I feel the warm cocoon of blankets surrounding me as my mind solely focuses on how long I have until my nearing birthday. Then suddenly years come crashing down on me. Leaving me in a claustrophobic daze, feeling as if I was being suffocated from the inside out. I hear screaming, the engine of the car I once loved coming to life. I begin to walk not necessarily knowing where I am going or where I came from until I reach my father at the entrance of my game of life. I don’t know how long we stood there. I couldn’t make any detail out of my field of vision except for the approaching police cars informing me that my mother had just overdosed.

Somehow, I make it to the hospital, whether it be days or hours after the first crack to my sanity, I wouldn’t be able to tell you. She lays there still as a rock, looking weaker than I have ever seen. My once shining star has been broken. From that day forward I would begin to feel alone for the first time in my life. The trust and security I had set upon them slowly being chipped away. And the happiness and beautiful simplicity within my mind has gone.

Just as fast as my innocence was ripped away from me so was my childhood. My sister now retreating to her room at any possible moment, my parents acting as if everything was peachy keen but secretly, I could already see the divide I was desperately trying to ignore.

Coming home from my new school I would often walk into a dull silence, either finding myself utterly alone or having to comfort my sobbing mother in the kitchen sitting in her signature clear plastic chair. A seat I would often find myself in, trying to relive the old connectiveness. This would be the moment I would turn from the baby of the house to the glue desperately trying to hold everyone together. Beginning to comfort and care for those in my life I so desperately needed the same treatment from.

As the household I once played along in began to form separate divisions like states within a nation. I craved attention and love, to feel special and as if everything in my life was the same. I turned to someone who would only further my destruction, controlling me in a way I didn’t know possible. Taking advantage of my body and the big heart I easily give away. Beginning to separate me in a way never known possible. The worst part of this stark transition being the way my family so ignorantly missed my silence and pain. As I began to sit and shake at the mention of that name, as I began to wish for my own death, holding knives up to tear out the heart I now hated.

Eventually the place I once called home would need repair, replicating the cracks found within.  My parents turned to a man who would only deepen my separation and self-hatred. Once again, I would lose something within myself to him so violently, I could barely comprehend. As I near the end of my elementary school career I can say I am a completely different person.

With one final attempt to reconnect with those I cared about the most I would spend my first year of middle school trying to latch on to the friendship my mother and sister had built. Even acting as if we had an unbreakable bond once we traveled outside of the country.

The years of fighting and division would now come to end as my parents finally admit their lack of unbreakable love for one another. Only increasing the responsibility I was already subconsciously forced to take on. Only this wouldn’t be the only time. My somehow perfect and happy uncle I was silently wishing to become was dying. Months of indescribable pain forcing my parents back into a clearly fake marriage.

I can remember specifically the last time I would be able to see him. Sitting in his hospital room with a large window looking upon the lively woods and a collage of his happiest memories standing tall and proud. In the center of this room, I would find once again someone I love lying motionless in the hospital. I can smell the new baby food, medicine, and the continuous smell of clean sanitation. I can feel the heat and humidity. And for the first time in my life I can fully understand the shared emotion of loss. As I feel the same tears mirrored on those around me.

This loss would be the last hit, officially ending my family, as my father leaves for the last time initiating a new somehow heavier loss. One that would leave me alone to clean up the broken aftermath. Now I do not have the privilege of being ignored. Now I am the focus of my parent’s new resentment. Living an entirely different life.