When you close your eyes,

You don't see the blistering pain

Written all over my face

When you walk away,

You don't glimpse the tears

Streaming down like stardust

When you turn away,

You don't hear how my heart breaks,

Shattering into so many pieces

When you leave,

I beg you to stay

But, you don't care

To see or listen,

No matter how I suffer within

Some people will never know what it is like to self harm. And that is for the best. Self harm is an addiction, the kind that I can perfectly remember the moment when it all went wrong.

A bent paperclip, twisted into a wire the length of my hand. Long enough to do damage, short enough to hide.

That's probably what went wrong.

Not the paperclip itself, but the hiding. I learned about all kinds of places I could hide things. I learned that while they dug apart my room, they never checked the school locker. They never spotted the difference between my cuts with a razor blade and my cuts with a paperclip, even though I said they were the same things.

But it wasn't the issue with them. It was the issue with me.

The thing about me is I didn't even notice I was depressed. I thought it was normal. All my friends were the same way. I didn't even consider people's insensitive bullshit as bullying until someone told me it was. I thought everyone got called ugly by their friends. I thought everyone was told they were too weak or scared to kill themself. I thought that was normal.

I guess I was wrong.

I thought.

I believed.

I was confident.

Now, I’m falling down.

You told me I could fly.

You told me I could be free.

If I just trusted in me.

If I just trusted in you.

I jumped when you pushed.

My makeshift wings spread wide.

You told me if I flapped my arms.

If I just believed in us.

I thought could fly.

But I didn’t.

I’m falling.

And I don’t know why.

Did I believe?

Was my trust in you not enough?

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

All I know.

As I near the ground.

As I close my eyes.

I was wrong.

I tell this to you in confidence,

and I know you'll misunderstand.

You'll hear what happened on the fence,

and tell everyone in the land.

I tell this to you in confidence,

that I don't want to be here

but you're the only one, since

I faced my deepest fear.

There on the fence,

there was a boy

in my defense

a cute one, dressed in the color of soy.

He looked at me like I was meat

he told me he was lost

He told me he woud like to greet

me properly, so I stepped into the frost.

I tell you this in confidence,

don't you dare tell a soul

this is me letting down my defense

don't burrow in like a mole.

I have no actual confidence,

only what I know.

But I tell you this in confidence,

it was I who stepped in the snow.

I need to cut again

I need to slice up my body until

you can't see the flaws

I need to do it.

I feel like a drug addict,

I'm suffering withdrawal.

I need to see blood leak from

small lines.

It's funny how much damage

a few lines can cause.

Isn't that what letters are,

just little lines?

If they are, then

lines is what destroyed me,

and lines is what rebuilds me.

If this seems too graphic,

If so, then

take a look at statistics,

because, of suicide,

the victims becoming more and more.

How to rebuild

the fragile trust of my parents

to convince me to stop

before I go too deep?

When the closest friends can't stop me,

how can anyone else?

Why can't I force my miserable brain to

understand the consequences?

My parents have the mistaken impression that

taking everything out of my room,

cutting me off from my friends,

will save me.

But what would really save me

is a child confidant,

not some professional writing everything I say down.

I have the right to remain silent,

because everything I say can and will be used against me.

It's not just

in a court of law.

It's in me.

What do I need?

If only I knew.

If you give a man a chance, he's going to ask for your Snap.

When you give him your Snap, he'll probably ask for a nude.

If you give him one, he'll ask for more.

Then he'll want to set up a hook up time just in case he can get lucky.

When he looks at his phone, he might notice a lack of a response.

So he'll probably another text asking for a reply.

When he's finished sending the fifteenth text, you will finally see the notification.

You'll start reading the texts.

He might have gotten carried away and started insulting you.

He may even end up reporting you!

When he's done, he'll move on.

You'll have to tell your friends and cry.

He'll find a new DM and slide in, making himself comfortable with all the people he harms.

He'll probably try to text you back.

So you'll respond to him telling him you're done, and he'll ask to see some pictures.

When you don't send him pictures, he'll keep the one you already sent.

Then he'll post on his account claiming you a whore.

Which means you'll be shamed.

The picture will be reported but the damage is already done.

Everyone hates you and thinks you're a slut.

So... If you give a man a chance.

You'll surely be undone.

Sideways for attention, downwards for results. Up and down for the hospital, side to side for the morgue.

Why does it matter which direction I cut myself? For a long time, I let these comments of others dictate the way I cut. I heard it both ways. Some days, sideways was for attention. Other days, it was up and down. I let people dictate how I self-harmed. And I find it utterly ridiculous and shameful that anyone would even think of saying stuff like that. Where do people even get the idea that this kind of stuff is okay? Where have people gotten the idea that they can control what people do to themselves? Why have we made RULES about self-harm? And what kind of person assumes someone is cutting for ATTENTION? It’s not even funny. It’s awful. People cut as a cry for help, and here are people trying to tell you that you’re just trying to get attention. In my opinion, these comments are even worse than the “You’re too scared/weak to kill yourself” that I hear from people. Not only are all of these comments extremely hurtful, they also fuel people to do those things.

The direction someone’s cutting makes no difference. It doesn’t matter where, how, when, how much, how deep. And yet people’s feeling are being invalidated every single day by comments like these. What kind of society normalizes this crap? What kind of society do we live in where people are dying every single day and NO ONE CARES? Why? People don’t use self-harm as a ploy for popularity. They use it to be rid of the evils lurking in their own mind. But people are making comments like these, and they don’t care how they impact other people. They don’t care about the people like me, who sit in the bathroom and cry because you’re “just doing it for attention” and you’re “too scared to die.” I’m so sick of it. And I want to know just how people have allowed this to happen. We have been in the dark for so long that we now start turning off the lights.

Here’s a novel idea. Why don’t we provide kids with support and kindness rather than this crap? Why don’t we stop making comments and laughing at the stupid YouTube videos saying stuff like “I have crippling depression” and using it as a JOKE? Sideways, vertical, diagonal, I DON’T CARE. No one should care about the direction of your cuts, and using it as a way to validate someone’s feelings should be illegal. Murder is illegal. And comments like these, that cause kids to commit suicide, are exactly like murder. Instead of defiling their life with hostility and judgement, give them the support they need. You might just save a life.

Suicide is the NUMBER ONE CAUSE OF DEATH amongst teens, and it’s IN THE TOP TEN amongst America as a whole. Hmm, I wonder why? Could it be because of THIS? Could it be because someone was told they were “too weak” or “too scared” one too many times? Could it be because they were told that their self-harm was a plot for attention? Could it be? The fact there is even the most remote possibility of this hurts like a stab wound. How do we turn this into a joke? How can people joke about being depressed? How can people? How did America stoop so low that we are killing kids with ignorance and pitiful jokes?

Welcome to America. You’re “free”, but you’ll be surrounded by people who want to control every aspect of your life - including your self harm. And as long as you fit in and stay silent and cut the RIGHT way, you’ll be fine. But of course, there is no right way to cut yourself. Society doesn’t care. To them, you’re just another statistic, a dot on a wall. To them, you are just another hapless victim of fate. They don’t understand the role they had in your depression. They can’t. Because it’s been so deeply ingrained in our culture that we don’t know how to separate ourselves from it. We can’t realize the power of words until it’s too late. So let’s realize NOW. Let’s stop telling people to go kill themselves. Let’s stop telling people they’re too scared. Let’s stop telling people they’re too weak. Let’s stop telling people how to cut. Instead, tell them to NOT. Tell them suicide is not a show of strength. Tell them cutting is not okay. Tell them to be strong. If we can’t fix the world, let’s fix the people in it.

That’s what we need to change. Everyone matters. No one, no matter their race, culture, sexuality, or gender, should ever feel like they aren’t valued, or that they should do things to fit in. Every school tells kids to be themselves. So why don’t they start enforcing it? Every school claims to be bully free, but it’s impossible. People have cruelty in their blood. We need to stop hiding behind statistics. Because if we don’t our country will dissolve. Our finest thinkers will vanish before our eyes. Our innovators with the most potential will die before they leave high school. The progression of ideas will come to a screeching halt. We need to stop normalizing this. Stop denouncing it.

FIX IT.

Sincerely,

A.C.

It’s very simple.

I don’t need you, I want you.

You are a choice, not a necessity.

And I am a privilege, not a right.

So please... make up your mind, before I change mine.

Trust me, I’m lying

When I say that I’m fine

Trust me, I’m lying

When I give you a smile

Trust that I’m lying

When you ask how I am

You can trust me to lie

To be honest, I am

I’m lying by smiling

A paper thin grin

Pasted over still eyes

Weary watered look

Hidden

Beneath a weathered disguise

I lie through my words

Through the smile on my lips

I lie through my answers

To an unspoken question

Reassurance

Twisted fingers

And a thumb facing up

You can’t really see me

I can smile all I want

You can trust me, I’m lying

That much may always be true

Trust the dishonest to lie

Fear what the honest may do

This smile on my face

These words that

Slip past my lips

They’re lies shrouded

In a total eclipse

I can’t trust you to listen

So you can trust me to lie

You can ask how I am

“I’m fine.” I’ll reply.

The world is my enemy,

death is my crown,

alone are my memories,

silence is my sound.

Twisted are the streets

that walk away to me,

bloody are the creeks

that flow from me to sea.

Stolen time won't tick,

rickety is my clock,

darker is my wit,

I burn rather than walk.

Living, breathing, taking,

same is different to some,

wary is my waking,

darkling days have won.

The world is my enemy,

sin has become my crown,

bloody are my memories,

yet I will never back down.