Through the Fog

Tag: vulnerability

  • Not Forever

    I don’t want

    forever

    to come in an orange bottle.

    Don’t want my mornings

    measured in milligrams,

    my stability

    scheduled between refills,

    my future

    printed in tiny pharmacy text

    I can barely read.

    I know what they say—

    that this is help,

    that this is balance,

    that this is how I stay

    safe

    and here.

    And part of me

    is grateful.

    Because I remember

    what life felt like

    before the quiet

    was possible.

    But another part of me

    keeps whispering:

    Is this the only way?

    Will I ever stand

    without the scaffolding?

    Will healing ever mean

    freedom instead of maintenance?

    I don’t want to fight

    the people trying to help me.

    I don’t want to romanticize

    the chaos I survived.

    I just want to believe

    there is a version of living

    where my body

    knows how to be steady

    on its own.

    Where peace

    isn’t borrowed.

    Where calm

    isn’t counted.

    Where staying alive

    doesn’t feel like

    a prescription.

    Maybe forever

    isn’t the point.

    Maybe the point

    is staying

    long enough

    to grow into someone

    who has choices

    I can’t see yet.

    So for now

    I hold two truths

    at the same time—

    I don’t want this

    to be forever.

    And I still want

    to be here

    long enough

    to find out

    what isn’t.

  • What it’s Like to Be Seen

    It’s strange what happens when someone really sees you.

    Not the version you’ve practiced, not the one that smiles on cue or says, “I’m fine,” even when you’re falling apart — but the real you. The one you keep hidden behind sarcasm, behind busyness, behind the stories you tell to keep people from asking too many questions.

    Being seen feels terrifying at first.

    Because it means someone is looking past the armor you’ve spent years building. It means your flaws are showing, your scars are visible, and the truth you’ve tried so hard to bury is standing in the open, trembling in the light.

    But it’s also freeing.

    Because when someone looks at you and doesn’t turn away — when they stay, even after seeing the cracks — it changes something inside you.

    You start to believe maybe you’re not too much.

    Maybe you don’t have to hide to be loved.

    Being seen isn’t about attention; it’s about being understood.

    It’s when someone looks at you and doesn’t just see the surface — they see the story. The pain. The strength. The fight it took to still be here.

    And for a moment, you feel weightless.

    Because for once, you’re not performing —

    you’re just you.

    And that’s enough.

  • The Only Bad You’d Ever Done

    The only bad you’d ever done

    was see the good in me—

    a version of myself

    I didn’t believe in,

    a softness I’d buried,

    a light I swore

    I didn’t deserve.

    You looked at me

    like I was something worth keeping,

    even when I was all sharp edges

    and quiet storms,

    even when I pushed you away

    just to see if you’d stay.

    You loved the parts of me

    I learned to hide,

    held the pieces

    I was ashamed to touch,

    saw something whole

    in someone who felt

    always broken.

    Maybe that was the problem—

    you saw the best in me

    when I was drowning

    in the worst of myself.

    Maybe the only bad thing

    you ever did

    was believe

    I was better

    than I knew how to be.

  • Experience, Misnamed

    What made us think we were wise—

    was it the way we survived

    without stopping to ask

    what it was costing us?

    We confused endurance with understanding,

    mistook scars for proof,

    called repetition experience

    and believed pain automatically meant growth.

    We spoke with certainty

    before we learned how little we knew.

    Loved like permanence was guaranteed.

    Spent time like it couldn’t betray us.

    We thought being strong meant staying,

    that knowing better would come later,

    that consequences were lessons

    meant for someone else.

    But wisdom didn’t arrive in confidence—

    it came quietly,

    through loss,

    through regret,

    through the ache of realizing

    we would choose differently now.

    Maybe we weren’t wise.

    Maybe we were just brave enough

    to keep going

    without instructions.

  • Self Destruction

    I don’t destroy myself loudly.

    There are no explosions,

    no dramatic exits.

    Just a slow erosion—

    choice by choice,

    silence by silence.

    I wear it like a habit.

    Like something familiar

    I reach for when I don’t know

    what else to do with my hands.

    Old patterns feel safer

    than unfamiliar hope.

    I sabotage gently.

    Miss the calls that might save me.

    Stay where I know I’ll be hurt

    because at least it’s predictable.

    Pain I recognize

    feels easier than healing

    I don’t trust.

    I tell myself I’m in control.

    That I could stop anytime.

    That this isn’t destruction,

    it’s coping.

    But the mirror keeps count

    of what I’m losing

    even when I refuse to.

    Some days it looks like recklessness.

    Other days it looks like discipline—

    like denying myself rest,

    joy, softness,

    as if I haven’t earned them yet.

    That’s the trick of it.

    Self-destruction doesn’t always beg.

    Sometimes it convinces you

    you deserve the damage.

    I don’t hate myself—

    that’s the lie people expect.

    I just don’t know

    how to be gentle

    without feeling exposed.

    So I choose what hurts

    before something else can.

    And still, somewhere under the ruin,

    there’s a part of me

    that notices the harm,

    that flinches,

    that wants out.

    That part is quiet.

    But it’s not gone.

  • Resentment, Unfinished

    When resentment rides high

    but emotions won’t grow,

    I feel everything

    and nothing

    in the same breath.

    Anger sharpens its teeth,

    paces my ribs,

    while feeling stays stunted—

    rootbound,

    afraid of the light.

    I want to care louder.

    I want to rage cleaner.

    Instead I exist in this in-between

    where hurt ferments

    but never transforms.

    It’s exhausting—

    carrying so much weight

    with nowhere for it to bloom.

    Just bitterness circling itself,

    calling that motion

    progress.

  • Lessons

    Everyone you meet

    has something to teach you—

    even the ones who stay a moment,

    even the ones who leave too soon.

    Some will show you kindness,

    soft as sunlight on tired skin.

    Some will show you strength,

    quiet and unspoken,

    the kind born from surviving.

    Others will show you pain—

    not to break you,

    but to uncover the places

    you still need to heal.

    Some will teach you patience,

    some will teach you boundaries,

    and a few rare souls

    will teach you love

    in a way you never knew existed.

    Every person is a chapter,

    every encounter a line—

    and whether you keep them

    or let them go,

    they shape you

    in ways you won’t see

    until later.

    Everyone you meet

    has something to teach you—

    and sometimes

    the lesson

    is simply

    who you’re becoming.

  • Between What’s Said and Buried

    Photo credit-Thiébaud Faix

    Communication breaks me open

    in ways I don’t always survive.

    It drags the truth out of the corners

    I’ve kept in shadow,

    forces me to name the things

    I swore I’d never admit aloud.

    I’ve spent years learning

    how to make my silence look graceful—

    how to swallow storms,

    how to smile with a mouth full of grief,

    how to carry secrets

    without letting the weight show.

    But silence is a grave,

    and I’ve buried too many versions of myself

    trying to keep the peace.

    Trying to keep people.

    Trying to keep from falling apart

    in front of the wrong eyes.

    So when you ask me what’s wrong,

    I hesitate.

    Not because I don’t want to tell you,

    but because I don’t know

    how to hand you the truth

    without bleeding in the process.

    Communication isn’t easy for people like me—

    people who learned to fear their own voice,

    who were taught that honesty

    was the fastest way to lose someone.

    People who mistake vulnerability

    for danger.

    But still—

    I try.

    I open my mouth even when it trembles.

    I let the words come out

    messy, fractured, imperfect,

    hoping you’ll stay long enough

    to understand the quiet parts too.

    Because even though communication

    breaks me open,

    I’m tired of sealing myself shut.

    I’m tired of burying what I feel

    and calling it strength.

    Maybe this is what growth looks like—

    letting my truth exist

    outside of my own head,

    even if my voice cracks on the way out.

    Maybe this is how I rise

    from all the graves I dug for myself.