x---an--othered--another---x

[x---an--othered--another---x]

this is about the first woman that broke me.

CW // parental abuse, neglect, family trauma, conversion therapy, body dysmorphia, christianity

Dear "Mom".....

This is everything I want to tell you, and too terrified to speak.

I know you will never understand.

You and Dad always used to speak about how my arrival to the world was with purpose. Unlike my older brother, I was the baby that was planned, because he always wanted a little girl. Unfortunately, now, we understand why. But we aren't here to speak about him -- not yet, anyway.

In childhood, I remember my anxious attachment with you. When out of my sight, it was not unusual for me to cry or scream for you. I found life without you to be vile and fearful. I was also terrified that you would never come back to me.

I loved you so deeply. I needed you even more. I always wanted my mom. I felt emotionally empty and confused without her... perhaps, to a point that could be considered "abnormal". I don't know how it started. I just felt it, and too such an overwhelming capacity, even for a small child. Mama's boy in the making.

Sometimes -- many times, actually -- you did leave me quite perplexed, to say the absolute least. When in good spirits, you were perfect; a loving, nurturing, kind, and thoughtful existence, capable of soothing and comforting my deepest woe or worry. It was not unlike you to occasionally spoil me, be it with gifts, snacks, quality time, or simply your positive attention. Your laughter could put a soft smile on my face, and, beside of you, I felt not only loved and cared for, but also, whole. It was a fullness I could never achieve through anything or anyone else. I understood this early in life.

In retrospection, it is phases like this that make me ashamed of my burning resentment for you.

Because, what the rest never knew, is that this was never you, all the time. I firmly believe it is who you wanted to be, and even who you still hope to be -- maybe even believe that you already are. Perhaps, you tried your best.

But, I cannot forget this.

There is a special kind of self-blame that comes with looking into the same eyes that once bore an adoring gaze for you, and, suddenly, watching them fill with what could only be described as unbridled hatred and loathing in your anxious direction. To be sharing a warm embrace for one moment, to finding it impossible to look up at that twisted, angry expression so soon after. Regardless of what you intended, I need you to know that I was legitimately scared of you, in such moments. If looks could kill, I would have been dead by age 10.

Of course, this is much more than just an uncomfortable stare that I am so disturbed by when I reflect upon the past we shared. Whether you will ever accept this or not is irrelevant, because, in the end, this is the truth: You physically assaulted me, and more than once. When you caught me telling my friends about this, you gaslighted me into believing that it was 110% my fault, that I triggered your explosive rage and therefore deserved this. If not this specific approach, you would only convince me that I was grossly exaggerating, or that it never even happened to begin with. If you happened to ever be reading this, I am positive you would do it, again.

Let's get specific, lest you then make the bold claim that I am engaging in an infamous "fake accusation" -- the abuser's favorite go-to line. I first remember an instance when I was 12: I got into the car after school with sharpie markings on my arms, because my friends wanted to playfully draw on me, and I told them they could do so. I had no reason to suspect that this would be some horribly upsetting event in your eyes; you had never even mentioned to me that this kind of thing was a problem, at all.

Your response? You took me to the nearest grocery store parking lot, parked as far away from the doors and other cars as possible, and proceeded to punch me. Granted, it was my thigh, sometimes my arm, but it was with as much force as you could muster in that moment, and you did it repeatedly. I was in legitimate shock, and, for one of the first times in regards to you, I flinched. I cowered. I cried, and I asked you to stop. You did, only to continue to verbally tear into me. By this point, I was too stressed out being in a car with you to even hear what you were saying to me.

You never apologized for this.

While this was not the first time you had taken out your tantrum on me -- physically or emotionally -- I can confidently say that this was the day I knew I could never trust you. From this day forward, my every move and word would be calculated. I would learn to hide everything from you, which, eventually, led to hiding everything from everyone I ever knew.

You laugh when you tell us the story of how I would "vomit on command" when you would spank me as a toddler. I obviously do not remember this, as I was between two and four years old, at the time. I thank whatever deity helped me forget this, because I have since digested how actually fucked up what you always described really is.

"You would get into trouble, and I would spank you, and you started puking to make me stop," you would say with a giggle and a smile. "So I got to where I would just hold you over the porch when I did, so you would puke over the ledge instead of the floor."

Mom, do you understand that what you were punishing with such callous ferocity was my trauma response to your husband grooming and molesting me?

Nevermind the "where were you when it happened" speech -- why were you beating the shit out of me when I showed that behavior (which, by the way, is concerning as shit)? Why were you beating the shit out of me AT ALL?

And why, even now, do you tell the story with such a sadistic giddiness about you?

Moving on. I can harp forever on the chronic, neverending shame, despair, and animalistic fear that came with the fanatic Southern Baptist family dynamic -- or, those jarring, unexpected alternations in your ability to provide me with healthy love and emotional substance. However, the abuse really kicked up a notch once I reached puberty, which, I was unfortunately old enough to internalize, and therefore remember later into my adult life.

I couldn't count how many times you body-shamed me. Called me ugly, made "jokes" about my chest and ass, jumped on me the second my leg hair became visible to you. I remember those acne pills you insisted I start taking, because you were so worried that I would get scars all over my face from the intense breakouts. You loved the idea of me wearing make-up, but if I wore it my way over yours, then I just looked "evil" and "scary". You always hated how much I hated skirts and dresses.

It was as if my own body did not belong to me. Nothing I wanted to do with it was ever good enough for you. I was not allowed the control over my self-expression, my appearance, my whole vessel. You only wanted it to be yours to control and manipulate. Why?

And let's not forget your obsession with my hair. Good fucking god, Mom, your preoccupation with my beauty (of lack thereof) was so not fucking normal. I remember all the times you forced me to have my long hair cut into a dumb bob, because "it's not like you're gonna style it, anyway, what does it matter?" I remember sobbing the first time, and you did not emote in response, whatsoever. Or when I did not take a shower on Christmas Eve night, and you got mad at me because my hair was "too greasy". What was the response to that one? Oh, right. You "accidentally" caught my ear in the flat iron, after sloppily and angrily clamping the hair you were attempting to straighten for me.

On Christmas morning. I was seriously mortified. Inconsolable.

I became desensitized to my looks quite quickly, as I had internalized and accepted the fact that you so kindly graced me with. It became a finalized concept to me that I was irredeemably disgusting to look at and would never be called beautiful by anyone in my life. As true to myself as the grass was green. You made sure I knew this. My friends were always a threat to both of you for a reason. God help you should I tell them. God help you should I experience genuine love from another person.

As if this weren't enough, fast forward to the days I began to realize my queerness. I came out to the first person, and I felt nothing but freedom and euphoria. I became addicted and kept on telling others. I wanted to be known, to be seen, as me.

Living in a small town, it, of course, did not take long for the pastor and his wife to receive notice that their child was openly coming out of the closet to everyone but them.

Cue the fuckin' war drums, here, because I fear that words will simply never do.

When you stole my phone to rummage through my texts, you saw that I had also come out to my aunt -- the only family member I could count on to be supportive, at that time. You responded to her with a short text:

"Never talk to [000] again."

And she never did.

She died, two years later.

She, too, never got to know me. It was out of my control. I will never forgive you for this, and I mean that, genuinely.

In those two years, I covertly dated behind your back. Despite that you had taken my only source of external contact -- just in time for summer break -- and made extreme attempts to isolate me so that only direct family could access me... we stayed together. It was so very strained, but all I wanted was love. In the midst of "voluntary" conversion therapy, I needed it more than anything. I could quite literally have died without it.

My grades naturally dropped through these months of pretending I could be cured of my diseased attraction, which was met with force, as usual. Anything but an A, or a high B on the report card, and I may as well have shot someone in the streets. By now, it did not matter, to me. I was so fucking dead inside, by now. You broke me. At this point, you could have gutted me with a knife, and I would have barely reacted. I felt like nothing, so much so that I became no one, at all.

But hey. At least ya'll felt better.

Only, you didn't. The divorce came mere months following these events. I had never been so happy to see a relationship fail in my life. I should have been sad, but I knew this would be my ticket back into a normal life. You would finally fuck off, and I could just be a human being with no judge or critic looming over me every waking moment of my life. Maybe now, finally, I could live a life that wasn't graded. I didn't have to be godly -- perfect -- anymore.

You never knew this, but I will say, the way I became aware of this news was a lot less exciting. Through another restless night, I snuck to the kitchen for a snack. Your bedroom door was closed. The light remained beneath the doorway. You were fighting. Unfortunately, it was not that uncommon for you two to bicker, so I, for the most part, tuned it all out.

That's when the punching started. Your voices went momentarily silent, as if confused or stolen. Only the muffled, gutteral growls on occasion emitted from behind that closed door, between was sounded like the intentional, rage-induced smacking of skin.

I could only use my imagination.

In my mind, I immediately jumped to the conclusion that our father was beating the shit out of you. Cue dissociation. The only emotion left inside of me was anger, similarly.

I grabbed a knife. I had no idea what I wanted to do about this, but I wanted to be ready, just in case. And I sat outside that door, and listened to this physical exchange intently, clutching my kitchen knife by the handle, ready to do... whatever.

It was after I heard his annoyed pleading of "stop, stop it" and your hissing "who is she" that I finally had an accurate picture in my mind of what was happening just a few feet behind me.

I went to my room. I tried to call my brother, but he was asleep, as this was all going on at around 3AM. I called my best friend, who had to also go shortly into the call. I laid in my bed, alone and afraid to a point of triggered regression. I slept with the knife under my pillow, just in case.

I pretended not to hear it, the next morning. I never told you. I had no idea what to think or feel, and I did not want you to influence those things for me. Long story short, you both were over, and, honestly, I was celebrating that shit. Even as you mourned it for months on end. I was burnt out of sympathy. I only wanted to be free.

Things slowly improved once dad was removed from the household, but, by then, it was far too late. I could sense you attempting to connect with me, to withhold your emotional reactions toward me, to engage with me and approach me with adult kindness. I entertained your efforts for a while under the guise that I may finally experience a loving, motherly relationship. I have since discovered that there are still so many things etched in this old stone that no act of kindness will ever undo, that I cannot move on from, because you still never apologized, or even acknowledged that you were anything below a great mother whatsoever. In all fairness, would it even matter to me if you did, anymore?

This does not even cover all of those miseries passed down from you to me. Between trashing my drawings because they weren't holy enough for you, assuming me stupid when I couldn't pass math with flying colors, always reassuring me that my friends would never fully love me, and ESPECIALLY not like you did, and so much more..... this relationship was doomed from the start.

And I am tired of blaming myself for not wanting to see you, anymore.

Every time I speak with you, I feel gutted and anxious. The persistent sense of powerlessness and insignificance comes back full force, as if no amount of years has separated me from your dysregulated emotions, whatsoever. When I know we have to engage, I am assaulted with cluster migraines, and my mouth is sewn shut. I take on another person around you, even now, because I have no reason not to assume that you are no longer capable of that kind of mistreatment.

Afterall, it still does not exist to you, does it?

Nobody saw it. I was too small to be my own advocate. No family or church members would ever believe me. Even if they did, they would tell you. You even successfully convinced me, for so many years, that I am the one being to hard on YOU for these things.

Mom. You were the god damn adult.

It is not up to a child to control you emotions for you.

The saddest part of all of this, is that... I am still anxiously attached.

Your favorite way to punish me as a kid was the silent treatment. Sometimes, it would go on for days. In those periods of time, I really thought you would never love me or speak to me, again. I blame this for my inability to cope with separation from those I love even still.

As fucked as you may be, that space is still a vacancy. The absence still hurts. The abandonment feels so unbelievably eternal.

I am sure you sense my distance. I am absolutely breadcrumbing you; I admit it. I will respond to your daily texts maybe once or twice a week, because it is all that I can handle, anymore. It is arguable whether or not even that is not setting me back. In all honesty, I want to be rid of you, entirely.

But... that's retaliation, isn't it?

I guess I never learned how to do that.

Or, maybe, I am still so fucking scared of you.

Whatever it may be, I know in my core that I am better off without you. But, how do I communicate this to you? How do I shamelessly become the thing I hated so much? How do I do that to someone? How do I abandon another person knowing just how much it hurts to be on that other side?

And why am I the only one who seems to ask themselves this question, here?

I cannot keep dismissing these pains. They not only haunt me in a way that feels so self-conjured, but they pave the path for me to enable similar behaviors within myself, to fall in love with that same violent smile in another person.

To normalize the abuse.

I simply will not do this.

Dear "Mom".....

While unquestionably the better parent, you are not a good one, yourself. I long for a day where I can comfortably address this with you. I fear that this is only a product of my waking dream.

I need to wake up.

Whether or not I ever say goodbye in the flesh, I have far beyond said it in my heart and mind.

Please. Give a shit.

Beyond surface level.

For once.

Sincerely,

000

P.S. You never wanted a little girl. You only wanted a pet. Accept that.

[x---an--othered--another---x]

this is about..... a couple of goons.

CW // SH, suicide, abuse, alcohol, binging, ED, dysphoria

Dear Vessel & Essence (or, Body & Mind),

Part I : Vessel

I seem to imitate the very dynamic that built me upon ruin from the early stages of life -- neglect, and punishment. One of you, discarded; the other, intruded, invaded. You look to me for guidance, yet I steer you into a vast bleakness, every time. I owe you an apology. I have not been so kind to you.

To my vessel -- you have been left vacant and empty. Guts scrapped like a pumpkin, your smile is just as equally carved by one other than yourself, and your flame but a source of toxic smoke. Fear of the world has kept you still and stagnant. What even are fingers and toes? Nothing -- as far as we know.

In Decade One, your punishment was inevitable, despite your tiny stature implying that the evil you were capable of was likewise just as small. The gutteral cries manifesting as "difficult" behavior was met with heavy hands and an iron fist. Endurance was part of your routine, and endure you did. Please know that you have done no wrong, here; you only operated as intended, and I thank you for it. I know you remember what has been done, because I occasionally hear those weakly whispers when the scars are similarly touched. It was neither fine nor fair. You deserved better than this.

Yet, I cannot in good conscience fail to mention my same failures in regarding you. Free I am from the chains that bound me to that faithless servant of familial criticism, abandonment, manipulation, altercation... and still, I sit within that prisoner's cell, even as the gates remain open.

And, I punish you further.

I find you in a shard of glass, and I say to you, "Be better." You obey, but the rule remains the same. "Just be better."

A message you undoubtedly internalized through the grime of infantilized filth, the sentiment of the command at its core is well-intended. But the true cruelty of this mantra unfolds when you realize that better never actually comes.

Rather, this encompasses you in the form of a malevolent curse, as you continuously chase a goal that is constantly drifting out of reach. Digging holes in the sand as the pit simply refills itself, each time, I chant bitterly, like a burnt-out CEO - be even better, dammit! Like you are mere and meager.

Like you are not enough.

In Decade Two, I carried on their abuses for them. In an effort to feel that the pain was mine to control, I forced upon you that same old sting, but made you use your hand, instead.

In a dark sea of clouded thoughts, I brewed a storm atop my skin -- a whirlwind of punches, wild streaks of red slivers, wildfires that grew with a simmer and boil. Battered and bruised was the only make-up I ever cared to wear on you.

Over-indulgence quickly affected your health. Frantic efforts to escape the chronic state of lost mind led into a series of unfortunate events in a list of habitual patterns. When self-mutilation failed to provide the same catharsis, I stuffed you head to toe with sweet, temporary serotonin. While all bodies are different, you took another shape due to my own inability to care for you. This was not genetics -- this was, as it often is, simply neglect.

No one, including myself as well as you, suspected from the beginning that I may try to terminate you, completely. Not commonly was this the resort, but I cannot say it never came. If my memory serves me well (which is, admittedly, iffy), there are five instances that come to mind, off the bat. I had no problem bringing you to that ledge, each time, with all of my fun and creative ideas to rid myself and the world of you, forever. We had a thing for baths back then, did we not? And those tabs that help you sleep at night? Sometimes, I even brought a gun to the fist fight. I never played fair, and I knew that.

And, I'm sorry.

Something always stopped me, and I've never known what that thing was, and is. Believe me, I am thankful, regardless. But back then, my, how irritating that was. To prepare, to be ready to go, to have it all put together in a neat little package, and then... a strange, spontaneous warmth, that would always, always, ALWAYS, ground me down and stop me in my fatal tracks.

Ideation remains, but that is a conversation for Essence. For now, we are focusing on you, Vessel, and fortunately for us, it has been years since our last (almost) attempt at something so heinous and permanent.

Still, I have things to apologize for. I intend to apologize for all of it, because you are deserving of it, and I hope you can forgive me for what I have put you through, in full.

Circumstances alone can service as an explanation behind my sadistic parading of self-sabotage and defeat, though this does not make the way I treated you okay. No way in hell you have forgotten the intoxication phase -- where days and nights, upon weeks and weeks, maybe more, I drank my liver dumb and feral. We would spend our nights in a drunken haze, swimming and swaying about, until the aggressive mental assault could be softened enough to consider sleep a possibility.

Between resurfacing memories of the past, emotionally abusive partners and friends, a hidey-hole in the closet, and an absolute lack of visible purpose in all that can be experienced in this waking life, I had no solution ready but to self-medicate. So many mornings, hungover at best, still half-drunk as a standard, and, on worse days, waking up to the vomit of my binge between my teeth. Three years later, you've got cavities galore, and that is thanks to the acid that came in and out of me, those days.

Fortunately, the story does not end here.

I did, eventually, start to figure it all out. I am far from knowing even most things, but the process of elimination can be powerful, albeit very gradual and timid in the way that it trickles down to fill the space between yourself, and all of those unhealthy fucking coping mechanisms.

When the psychedelic experience revealed these monstrosities to me in a way that I could finally understand and show compassion for, I found myself wishing to put more effort into actually caring for you.

This is where I found trauma therapy. Psychoactive medication. Building a home. Changing my surroundings. Slowly losing my grip on the burden of social performance. Hormone replacement, because I wanted that for myself. Meditation. Writing to heal. Losing my ego long enough to feel love, empathy, consideration, awareness, reflection, tact, and more... not only for myself, but extended toward those I cherish, just as well.

No more self-harm. Binge eating. Alcoholism. Smoke addiction. Dependency on the fantasy that it all ends with me, and I hold that choice at any given moment.

I do, in fact, have control, as I have always had a choice.

As a neat little game I played recently, called Fran Bow, once said:

"But one thing I do know... between guilt, and fear, I choose happiness."

We know that this is not quite as easily done as it is typed or said, but, it cannot be any harder or less rewarding than the patterns I have succumbed to before trying.

So.

Dearly, Vessel...

I thank you for your patience.

I thank you for your resilience.

I thank you for your unwillingness to surrender.

I thank you for never giving up on me.

I thank you for holding my bones.

I thank you for holding my heart.

I thank you for holding me together.

I thank you for being you.

From now on, I will work heavily toward welcoming you as you are, while changing what I can (and want to), while letting go of what is etched within. You have done nothing wrong, and you do not need to be punished. Instead, let's work together. Shall we?

Sincerely yours,

000

P.S. Tell your brother his letter is coming soon.

[x---an--othered--another---x]

this is about..... a girl.

Dear "Unrequited",

What better way to kick off my inflated sense of self-importance via internet self-loathing, than to start off my dramatic, psuedo-intellectual banter in regards to "some girl"?

Funny, to me, how you can spend a whole life -- a long gone childhood of pain -- clutched by the demonic grip of prolonged, repetitive, lifelong trauma..... only to experience just as heavy of a blow to the brick wall, because a woman was once too pretty AND too sweet, while simultaneously doing so halfway in your direction.

Just kidding. It's not funny at all. It sucks. It's also fucking amazing. I would change so many things, but also, nothing at all.

Oh. Right. This is a letter to you, isn't it? Three long-winded statements in, and I haven't even said hello. Perhaps, that's part of the problem?

It has to be. You seem to like those types. They not only know exactly what they want, but they tell you, and they tell you directly. You don't have to do much talking to know where you stand, and I don't feel that you differ from most people in finding that to be ideal. If it were up to me, I would attract these same types, and be this type, just as well.

Instead, what I encounter in your presence is that classic "freeze" response. You walk in my door, and I am terrified. Not in the sense that I lack confidence, but because my mind -- whether I choose to believe this or not -- knows exactly what it wants. In fact, it is SO sure of its desire, that absolutely no risk of fucking it up can be tolerated within this self-sabotaging system.

Emphasis on "self-sabotage", there, as this paradoxically results in my complete inaction. Do you know how long it takes for the love-boat to set sail back off of your shore? Not very long. Especially when you're, in the grand scheme of things, some dude, amongst a hefty crowd of other "some dudes", who, at this point, probably know exactly what the hell they're doing when it comes to loving (or just really, REALLY, liking) someone.

What you need to know is that this is not birthed from a lack of confidence, or a lack of love for you (like, fucking hell, that's so far from my truth). Growing in a home that punished love -- to the point that I was often followed, spied on, waiting for the next surefire proof of this "criminal activity" -- has, as the maladaptive childhood does, rendered me scared and useless in the face of an innocent thing. I resent the evil of my past, that has plucked from my eye, the ability to find something besides sweaty palms and racing heart and mind in what so much of our modern world considers to be beautiful -- perhaps, even essential to human life.

Everything you read above -- this is all an example of the wall I create to soften the blow of that emotional distress. In my attempts to put space between the awful that was dealt to me, I also then brick off any sort of halfway resemblance to those old scenarios. As a result, I lock love out of my door without even realizing. I create a space of inescapable loneliness, and wonder why this always happens, staring at the deadbolt like I did not lock the door myself, like I did not choose this, like love is always to blame.

Etc., etc.

And yet, I am still rationalizing you away.

So, let me start over.

Dearly "unrequited".....

I have a total crush on you. I have for quite a long time, actually.

It started with a face, as it often does. I find you quite pretty, like any person with eyes likely would.

You found me at a bar, where we both had too much. Those kisses we shared sobered me, but I knew I would never tell you. I knew I couldn't possibly be yours. Ever.

And you just, kept showing up. The butterflies would promptly follow, every time. I swatted them away, just enough to hit on you, but to never actually become vulnerable to you.

It's better this way, I would always think. And for some, I'm sure that's true. With others I have "courted" (in whatever sense), this has been just as true for myself, as well.

But, the inevitable thing happened.

We kissed, and it was just... too good, that time around. Not even because of your conniving charm, or your frisky hands, or the devilish things you would occasionally say.

But because of those goddamned butterflies.

As always, my mind knew exactly what it wanted -- who it wants. And yet, my heart and body will be perfectly still, like some sort of emotional paralysis, thinking you away like a demon in the shadowy corner of my room.

But, I fucked up. I forced my hands to resist their urge to swat it away.

I let the butterflies swarm.

I think I may have made the wrong choice, because it seems every time I embrace this feeling, I can only seem to run you off and away from me.

That's when I sigh, take my loss, and do the walk of shame to bring my pesky little insect back into their terrarium of death and decay. They say butterflies chase the dead, and to that, I say, you'll find plenty of food in here, little guys.

"Unrequited", as I have dubbed you...

I have so much I want to say to you.

But every clumsy word that falls out of my mouth feels like I'm shoving you off of a cliff.

Every advancement I lean into with a driving gusto, makes me feel like I am assaulting your being, attacking your peace of mind.

And yet, every move, every fantasy that I forcibly suppress, feels like neglect. Like I am placing a curtain over you. Squeezing you into the magician's hat and hoping you'll be gone when I get back.

I suppose, I am just confused.

Any answer is fine -- seriously. Nothing is more helpless and hopeless feeling than a lack of knowledge.

I always know exactly what to say, until I don't, and then I freak out.

Without force, perhaps, someday, you can help me understand?

I am happy if you're happy, and unhappy just the same. I am also simply put, not very good at this. I was never given the proper chance to practice, and, I know a 26-year-old "guy" being a whimpering mess when you value strong types is not exactly attractive. Believe me, you would not be the only one to feel a similar way.

But, I also tend to emulate love like a "high school sweetheat" for this reason, too. If being stunted in love has done nothing for me, it has helped me seek out the core, raw, childish nature of the dating world. Safety. Simplicity. Substantial. Something good.

So, I will not apologize for my softness -- not that you have ever asked me to -- but please know that there are still sides of me that have not revealed themselves to you. That only will if I am in a this-should-be-obvious-but-here-you-go state of clarity.

I can only ever act on what I know, that I know, that I know. Lest I make anyone at all uncomfortable.

Regardless of where you stand, understand that I love you as a person. I also "like" you as..... someone. I guess.

When I am with you, my muscle tension fades, as I find joy in your presence. Shy smile. Analytical hazel eyes. Soft, guarded self, who sometimes opens up the door to whisper what she needs, or scream what nobody else can hear. The talks of the deities that follow you, even when I have no idea what you're talking about. Your spontaneity, your drive, your internal sense of independence. Your "sloppy" existence.

I like it all, quite a lot.

And I'll take it, in any shape that fits within the confines of my life.

Will you ever see this words? Probably not. But, it won't make any of that any less true and real to me.

Thank you for being alive at the same time as me.

Best regards,

000

[x---an--othered--another---x]

this is about..... me.

- NAME: "zero" - AGE: 26 - SIGN: aquarius - GENDER IDENTITY: agender masc, afab - PRONOUNS: they/them - COORDINATES: southeastern USA - POLITICS: Leftist - SPIRITUALITY: yet to be determined - MISC: cptsd, bpd, adhd (to name a few)

Dear Nobody,

You are probably only here because I supplied you with a link that then led you here.

What I have simultaneously given you is a stack of letters, waiting -- with eager patience -- to be written, at last.

It could be about you, next.

With hopes to lessen my kneejerk habit of occasional trauma-dumping, I created (once again) a space to scream. In this blog, you can expect to find a mixture of emotional expressions: grief, gratitude, bitterness, betterness, hatred, endearment, regret, arrogance.

The choir of children in my mind have many names that are begging to be spoken.

So, allow me to speak them.

Greetings. My "name" is zero.

And this is about you.