[author’s note: when i was 14, my therapist used EMDR therapy to help me find a safe place for when i’d get panic attacks at school because of trauma from bullying. at this point i had severe social anxiety and the kids that bullied me just walking past would cause panic attacks.
in this poem i’m describing the safe place i created. it was at a pond in my grandfather’s pasture, specifically during the golden hour.
side note: i excluded the end (which is on wattpad) because i feel that i don’t relate to it anymore and it doesn’t feel right to leave in on here.]
her voice hadn't cracked. not as she described to me how she was going to commit suicide in detail or how her parents were disappointed in her, nor did she show any remorse for trying to kill herself just hours ago; it hadn't cracked until she told me that she just felt lonely.
jokingly, you yelled "get out of my life," so i laughed and said "okay," walking into oncoming traffic, completely careless. you quickly grabbed my backpack and pulled me out of the road, into a hug. you seemed concerned and told me you loved me so much. that meant a lot to me, and you have no idea.
- 𝒋𝒂𝒗𝒂 (entry from 𝒍𝒐𝒗𝒆 𝒃𝒐𝒎𝒃)
author's note: love bomb is more about the process of my deteriorating mental health in an emotionally abusive relationship than it is about gut-wrenching poetry. it’s more like diary entries i posted at the time and now use as a warning for what it looks and feels like to go through that. this entry in particular was more of an indication of my state of being than anything else. my ever-growing suicidal ideations, my below-the-bar standards, the fact that i put someone who did absolutely nothing on a pedestal, et cetera. it’s better to read it all in one go, so if you would like to do so i suggest going to my website or wattpad below.
❝ when you took off looking for love, love took off looking for you. ❞
this was a quote 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗺𝘆 𝗽𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝘁 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲 speaking about god, but i like to use it as my own interpretation of what could've been before i was in an abusive relationship. people notice and care more than you think; a lot of people are just afraid of saying something.
i keep going back in time to get some perspective on how i only knew and felt so much for three years;
how i didn't feel my anger until now
or how the only thing i've truly felt above all else the past three years was betrayal and heartbreak.
even when i was a skeletal zombie of my old self and my heart had a permanent resting place in my throat, i didn't feel this sharp pain in my chest or get drunk to the point of forgetting myself.
everything i went through has become more real every day since it happened.
i say i want to heal but when my brain tries to feel all of the hurt again, i tell it to fuck off and fall back into the numbness of sleep or vodka.
my brain tries to heal me, too, but when i start to panic it makes me crawl into myself and flips the autopilot switch, so i sit in a chair behind my eyes and watch my shell do the motions.
throughout it all, people have come to me asking how to deal. the truth is, i never did.
i knew how to distract myself, i knew how to defend myself, and i knew how to get myself out; but after bursting through the doors of abuse and manipulation, i was stripped to the bone, standing in a blank room with no instruction on how to truly grow my skin again.
the only thing i have to show you of my trauma are metaphorical scars and bad poems, but the difference will be apparent one day. i will win.
i don't think anyone really sees through the blinds i put over my window of destructive self-image and angst,
but i also don't think they want to.
even if i screamed it in their face how i still can't breathe through the current of terrible things the first person i ever loved said to me,
or how i've always crumpled under the weight of words and how i'm still angry at the image of middle school girls mocking me that sometimes still makes me white-knuckle the steering wheel,
still, no one would ask if i was okay.
i could tell them how i've spent every single day since i was 16 repeating the names of people i loved who hurt me until i fall asleep,
and that even sleep can't keep away the nightmares.
if they looked at me through an x-ray and saw the butterflies i ate that kept me from eating anything but the lies i was fed,
or the beating of my heart in my throat every time i think he's around again,
they still wouldn't care.
so i think it's time to stop looking for someone to run to
i'm curled up on the sidewalk. an explosion, white hot searing pain, and deafeningly loud; a force so strong I was sent flying backwards. it wasn't a physical explosion, but it had all the aspects of one. words dripping with venom burned my skin. just the yelling itself hammered into my ears and made my existence that of a mouse. anger was thrown at me so hard it knocked me backwards. the feeling in my stomach forced tears out of my eyes, and i didn't fight it.
i finally fought the lion, whose teeth gnawed on our bones longer than i was alive. all of my pent up anger broke the dam. with my accusations came consequences; consequences with a force equivalent to an explosion.
the sidewalk cools my burning skin. the cool night air soothes my mind like a mother nurturing a child. the rich blue of the sky is like a ceiling of a house safer than i've ever had. it's so calming, i feel as if i'm not physically here, but that i'm engrossed in a painting.
i know at one point this peacefulness will be over; that i may never have this again. i will have to go back to my house with the short fuse and the extinguisher. i will have to place my words carefully with a steady hand, or savor the mood. i will then worry again, but now is not the time.
bpd is not just bursting out in anger because you can’t control your emotions, it’s complaining, crying in front of your lover because of all the things that hurt you and the things you expect from him and later feeling guilty, hating yourself so much that you’re thinking you don’t even have the right to complain and the only thing you deserve is to be treated like shit