in through your nose..out through your mouth

You know what? Fuck deep breaths. Fuck letting it all out. And fuck mental health walks just one fuck more. I picked one thing off the floor. I put it in a pile that it didn’t belong and i called that a win. 

And you know what? I DO have it worse than anyone else. That makes me feel better - i am no longer apologizing for shit. I will not listen to anyone who tells me i should be grateful for what i do have because right now in this moment, i have nothing. More has been ripped from me, and torn through my skin than everyone else. Justifying all of it… letting it all out - that’s another thing that can get fucked. 

It was a release and absolutely terrifying when I no longer wanted to kill myself. Not because I was low but because apathy replaced it. It’s too much to plan, too much to clean… i dont want anyone coming into the shambles that have taken over my once mopped floor. 

Safe - that word has drastically changed in meaning for me. I no longer associate it with pepper spray and locked doors, 

No. 

no.
I feel safer if i don’t have to finish sentences, if i look at my phone.. Sometimes i dont feel safe if a light is on and goddamnit the ideas of having ideas just to not follow them up with action is not safe. So i dont think at all sometimes, some days…weeks go by with thoughts being stopped in their tracks. My mind isn’t clear, not because i meditated (fuck that, too by the way) - my mind is clear because i lock the doors in my head and pepper spray the ones that will erase the apathy and put me back to the place where i was asking people for pills, willing to pay for them… wanting them so fucking badly. Im also not trying to not try. Fuck you. I have nothing left to say to you, so ill speak to the ones that i want to.

A letter to you, from no one.

Hi my love.
I know, i know… its not ok, is it? You’ve failed? Talk to be about it. Tell me all the ways that youve failed and i wont say a thing. I wont nod or shake my head, i wont interject, open my mouth. I wont shed a tear because you dont need that right now, sweet girl. You need to be seen. You need someone with open eyes to not do a damn thing. People have told you so many times that ‘they have been there’ and i promise you thats not true. No one has felt what youve felt or been where youve been. YOu win. You win that award, the one that lets you feel the lowest or fantasizes about validation. 

Or

So yeah, tell me everything or nothing. You can tell me only what you want me to hear, what you have the energy to say. You don’t have to tell me about the most embarrassing and shameful shit that youve done that have brought you to this place. Lie to me to make me feel bad for you. Tell me a story that never happened not because it didn’t happen but because that story is the closest link to how you feel right now. That story, the words, the lies and feeling no shame about it? YOu’re not a liar. You just need to lean on the words that the truth won’t explain.
Hair on the floor. Garbage piled up, dirty dishes, dirty everything… that might not be enough to say. That might not be good enough of represent what and who you are… so make up a story that is worse than anything you can possibly imagine and yet suits the place youre in. Make it make sense to them. Give yourself the permission to make it nothing to you.

Cry, my love. “Letting it out” isn’t the answer and not why youre crying no…, not you. Just fucking cry, the tears that run and open your mouth without making a sound.

Don’t want to eat? That’s ok.

Don’t want to read a text, or sleep? Fucking don’t

Can you rest? Are you able to rest at all? That’s ok my love. rest

I will not tell you everything is going to be ok, because right now it’s not and that’s what matters. 

It matters to me. I swear that it matters. A stranger who you have never met and love. One that you hate or don’t feel at all. It still matters. 

I don’t know who are, i have no fucking clue what got you to the moment, but my own reflection is connecting me to you.

What is it that you need, my darling? Anything - tell me anything. Even if the answer… especially if the answer is ‘i don’t know’ … that’s enough for now. That’s enough for however you want it to be. 

Piles of laundry and clumps of hair are on my floor. I found a few short cuts to survive but you don’t need that shit right now. You don’t need answers, clarity, the sunshine or anything at all.
I certainly didn’t either.
And i still don’t.

Because right now you don’t want help. Not right now. RIght now, help and everything that comes with it isn’t the answer. You don’t want it.

or

Do you? 

You do? Ok, let’s figure out what that looks like for you. What it means. Then let’s do it if we can.

Throw one thing away. One piece of trash that is in the corner that you tossed from the couch 3 days ago because you didn’t have energy. You gave less than a shit about it. You can throw that away. One thing. One small container. if you are able or can do that, when you get up to pee, step over it or don’t. Pick it up and let it fall from your hands back onto the floor as if that’s where it belongs. Or you can throw it away, that’s what you did. That moment belongs to you.. And if you don’t? Youve still won… look at you! You fucking stood up! Is that enough? Honey, sweet girl, that’s self care. You did it. Did you flush the toilet? No? Fantastic, you didn’t push yourself and that’s wonderful. I’m so proud of you. 

You don’t need to be proud of yourself. You don’t need to be perfect. Be nothing. Like me right now, be nothing at all. It doesn’t mean that youre nothing. It doesnt mean you don’t matter. It means that it just is. 
If you don’t feel as bad as you should. If you know a million people who ‘have it worse’ no, they don’t. If you don’t connect with my words, then you don’t. But whatever it is that you feel, all of it, any of it at all. The one thing that connects to your truth means something to me.
i won’t ask you how youre doing unless you need me to. I promise i will because i will see it in your face. I promise ill see it if it's there only because I know that look. The one where you smile and pause just long enough to remember the words and gather them. The ones that are going to fuck everyone else but yourself. tell the person in front of you that “youre doing fine” because they don’t matter enough to spend your last bit of energy telling the truth. The agony of standing there and listening whatever bullshit is going to be poured all over you. whatever they say doesn’t matter
FUCKING LIE TO THEM. 

Becuase FUCK THEM TOO.
But i will say this… you matter. That’s the only thing that i will ask of you. No. I’m not asking you anything. You don’t have it in. you to answer or think about. You don’t have to believe me. In fact, hate me right now because i’m just another person feeding you bullshit that has no meaning. It might not. But its the truth. Even if you have nothing to look forward to. Even if your hobby is sleeping. Podcasts, running, coloring, writing, shopping, cooking. Those aren’t your hobbies. Today, your hobby is nothing. That’s the best one! Nothing. Tell people you love to cook. Promise them you will cook for them one day and never do.
Lie to them too. Then laugh about it later.

Dont you dare read this one day and feel sorry for yourself. Apologize to no one for nothing. This is where you’re at, whatever that means and right now? Because right now? Right now Im not even safe enough to finish that sentence, to think it through enough to say something meaningful.

I’m angry too. With you, with myself, with the bitch who keeps texting me how much she cares, how she will always be there for me. You know why? Because she’s no different from the last bitch or the one before her copying and pasting those words as if they meant something.

Heres one thing i can tell you. You dont want to die, you just dont want to be here anymore. You don’t want to stop existing, you just cant exist right now.

So dont

But stay. Thats all you have to do, fight like fucking hell or give up trying but just stay.

Not because its a command, or like i have the answers or any answer at all because…

Because im not here to help you, make things better, sit beside you or in front of you.
I do have a pen and paper if you want to write, if you want to crumple it up and throw it across the room. Hold it in your hands. And right now, in this moment, that flat and white sheet of paper is the only thing right now that is real and it is something you have. Rip it, scream into it, use it as a tissue or write “fuck you” to the world as if it were a billboard everyone can see. Or do nothing at all with it. That matters too.
If you don’t have a piece of paper and you’re mad that you don’t, then use a small bit of energy to pick something up. Or have no energy at all and close your eyes to pretend that you do.

Do nothing. That’s the fucking answer right now. Nothing. You don’t owe anyone shit. You dont owe the productive woman you were yesterday, a week ago, a month…a year ago. YOu owe her nothing 

I wont tell you that ive been there too. I wont tell you that everything is going to be ok. Deep breaths are bullshit and so are showers because right now, whatever youre doing is the one thing you should be doing. If that’s not it then cool. Youre brave as hell for saying no to me. For knowing your truth. Even if it’s not mine. And maybe right now is not real so call it nothing at all because nothing. that’s bullshit also. 

Are you ashamed? Then don’t think about it. Dont tell anyone but yourself. Say nothing for days if you want to. If you have to? Then say the only shit you have to say. 

In this moment, you are where you are and where you need to be. Stand in front of a mirror and believe that no one will every understand. Stare at it even if you don’t recognize yourself… you can still look  if your own reflection isn’t you. Because, try to rock with me on this one… if you don’t see yourself in that reflection, then you’re not alone. Or cover the fucking mirror up. Or you can look at it. You can stare at yourself even if its just to justify that youre still here. 

Trust me, i have been told that “ive gotten through worse” ive heard endlessly that “Ive been there too.” I fucking hate the people who tell me how strong i am because right now, i have the strength to press down on keys to make anything make sense. 30 minutes ago, i had enough strength to think about words at all. The loops in my head of the memories
“Remember, youre strong”
“just remember that…whatever”
Nothing and no one matters. Or maybe one thing does. If everything matters and that’s too much to think about right now then lie to your own goddamn self if it helps you let go. Then turn it into the truth… 

It might never be ok again but there is a tiny little feeling that one day it will be.
One day something will be ok again.
Not right now.
And that’s ok, too.
Did you read the whole thing? Do you know how hard it is to read anything at all? My god. You did such a good job. 

Now be done. All of this was for you. The words below are for everyone else.

Dear whoever is reading this, 

Anyone who wants to make me feel better… anyone who feels like me right now at all… Anyone who is ‘together’ and works out, has a routine, or … whatever the end of that sentence should be.
I don’t need suggestions and i don’t believe any promise youre about to send my way. But i do
need you to know that i am not going back to the top of these pages and giving this piece one more moment… I don’t want to fix anything right now and moreover, everything being broken is the best gift i can give myself so I will not be deleting anything. I wont be editing sentences that dont belong or words that dont fit. The redundancies or any syllable that makes you sad for me.

Because fuck you too.