the infinate abyss

I realized I stopped writing. That I no longer know the days we've been separated. Its been too many to count and it has become the new version of my life. Have I stopped writing because I have settled into the pain or the greif of it all?

It no longer feels raw, like it can't be contained. But, it's always present in these little ways, creeping in the back of my mind. However, now I am managing. I am managing at life, which isn't something anyone ever wanted to say about themselves.

When I lived in Italy my professor used to say, "we will manage" like ti will all be okay, we'll get through it and it was comforting. But now, my state of being wonders, how long will I be managing and getting through it. When will it pass to feel like I can truly look back and say that I've done it. That I have survived the hardest period of my life. Will it be light on the other side? Will I be happy?

What effort does it take to be kind?

To not lash out with your words. To not tear me down. To not reach into my deepest insecurities and use them against me until I begin to believe I am as worthless as you make me feel.

Do you know how difficult it is to convince yourself that you have worth when your own mind is constantly arguing otherwise? It's like walking up a down escalator—I keep climbing, but I never seem to move forward. I stay in the same place, exhausted from trying.

And when everything grows quiet, when the distractions fade, the weight of simply surviving settles over me. In those moments, it's hard to remember the bubbly, carefree, childlike version of myself. She feels so far away that I wonder if she ever really existed.

I am tired of you telling me I'm wrong, and I'm even more tired of believing you.

It is an exhausting way to live.

I am no longer searching for someone to convince me of my worth. I am searching for peace, because I am old enough now to know that peace is worth protecting.

You tell me to grow up, to act my age. But I have been doing that for years. I have carried responsibilities you cannot see. I have fought battles inside my own mind just to keep moving forward, just to believe that tomorrow is worth showing up for.

So I don't need your voice becoming another one I have to overcome.

I don't need to carry your insecurities alongside my own.

The parts of me you call childish are not weaknesses. They are the parts that still know how to hope, how to wonder, how to soften instead of harden. They are the parts that have kept me alive in a world that has often felt unsafe.

I will not let you convince me that those parts deserve to disappear.

Call me beautiful

Crass with words at times

But you say you won’t hurt me

It feels foreign

To feel protected to be held like I matter

It feels scary and terribly heartbreaking

Time passes.

I feel at peace, then loneliness settles in and I miss you.

The missed connection. The familiarity that masquerades as safety.

I sit in silence, finding moments of contentment, yet still missing, still longing for what feels familiar.

Why?

Why can I not let go? Why do I still reach for you in the quiet?

I know I should release the connection, know that she deserves more.

But she doesn't believe it.

What she wants and what she deserves stand on opposite sides of the room, and she lingers in the space between—