Everyone keeps telling me to breathe.
Breathing is really good.
It’s how you know you’re alive,
But I have the tendency to hold my breath.
You see, when I breathe,
I breathe in all the dust from the rug I have been swept under.
Dust is 80% dead skin,
Which makes me feel like I am breathing in the broken pieces of the girl I used to be.
When I breathe,
I have to exhale,
And I’m scared that they’ll smell tears under my mint toothpaste.
When I breathe,
I have to exhale,
And I’m scared that all these unspoken words might poison the air
And somehow still never be heard.
When I walk the halls,
I wear this duct tape, I mean smile, across my face.
I keep it all in,
Telling myself that no one wants to hear it anyway.
You see, when you have post-traumatic stress disorder,
You make monsters out of doors, doors out of monsters, bathrooms into torture chambers.
You make sunshine into a playground, feel the woodchips in your skin.
You make school doors into prison gates and ask why they won’t let you in.
The inside of this jail cell looks so much happier than out here
Because where I come from,
They say social status is happiness.
They keep telling me that if I stare at it long enough, I’ll get there.
Well, I’ve been staring at the mirror for fifteen and a half years now,
And I don’t like it any better.
They say that we can tell them anything and they won’t judge us
Because that’s what school counselors are supposed to do, right?
So why did she ask me what I was wearing?
It was never about what I was wearing,
And now it’s always about what I am wearing.
There’s too much skin!
Quick! Cover it.
You’re jeans don’t fit.
They’re too big, but I was only 99 pounds when I bought them,
So where does that leave me now?
You see, it’s really hard to put food in your mouth when you have chewed up your cheek.
It’s really hard to keep food in your stomach when you have so much to hold.
It is always about what I am wearing.
It’s about the scars.
People say if you have PTSD,
You must have scars, right?
Well, I don’t have a lot of physical ones.
There’s one above my left elbow from being shoved into some lockers,
But if that’s not enough,
Take a look at my hands.
They are covered in scars from seizures
Because knuckles and carpet don’t mix.
What does that have to do with it you ask?
Maybe if I actually slept,
I wouldn’t have so many of them.
I am up at all hours of the night,
Telling myself that what is wrong with me is that I have PTSD,
And there’s this little voice in the back of my head
Saying, “Yeah, Why do you have it, Alex?”
“Bullying! You always had to be out of the box. If you’d just conformed a little, you’d be fine.”
Well, that’s not me,
And I don’t know if it’s my fault or not,
But I have taken plenty of blame for it
Because it easier to point fingers at the person who is already down.
I am awake at all hours of the night,
Telling myself that what is wrong with me is that I have PTSD,
And there’s this little voice in the back of my head saying,
“Yeah, why do you have it, Alex?”
You see, this is the disorder of victims of war.
This is the disorder of victims of war.
This is the disorder caused by bullets and shrapnel.
For that purpose, I have to say that rubber bands, pencils, and tampons work just fine.
They don’t pierce skin,
But that gives them more reason to keep throwing them at you and for people to ignore it.
When I would go to the office and say, “I’m hurt. I need to go home,”
They would say, “Where? You’re not bleeding.”
Can’t you see it’s internal?
I need a surgeon to cut away what part of me they cannot love.
But there is no tumor, no mass, and no ingrown lifeform.
I do not know why it is they do not like me.
You see, it is always about what I am wearing
Because my emotions don’t sit well with other people.
They don’t understand how such “nice” kids could do this.
They accuse me of lying,
So I have learned to survive with a smile.
Smiling is life.
Smiling is existing.
It is always about what I am wearing.