malu's thoughts [they/them]

i want to leave something, even if no one ever sees this

[malus-thoughts]

i actually want to stop picking up a razor to end the pain. because in the end i'm not huritng them, i am only hurting myself.

i read that a while ago and it's the first thing that stuck with me.

you can tell me that i will have these scars for the rest of my life, but if i cannot see until the next morning that "for life" doesn't scare me.

my emotions are a rollercoaster and i've been needing to throw up for years, but there is no end in sight.

the razor was the emergency break i didn't realise attacked the structural integrity of it all.

and now i stopped using that break but the ride just keeps going. and i still feel seen. i feel understood. and i feel safe. for the first time in years.

[inkskinned]

i know we’re both just messing around pretending to be whole but look at me. if the train was coming would you move. if the ground was falling from under your feet would you even notice or would it just be another tuesday for you. if somebody stabbed you could it hurt worse than you already do. what i’m saying is that i love you but i think we both drive over the speed limit when it’s raining. what i’m saying is that i want to hold your hand and i understand about how you sometimes have to sit down in the shower. what i’m saying is that i’m here for you and if the train comes please move.

[inkskinned]

i wrote this 7 years ago, somehow. every day someone else finds it and whispers to me - oh, i understand this. something always turns in the wash of my stomach: i am so, so glad you feel seen. i wish you had no idea what this post was about.

i wrote this while working in a program for new writers. on wednesdays, two of the teachers would be contractually obligated to read our writing aloud to the group of 300+ teens. i had never read my work in public before. i had something like 6k poems and was panicking about it. none of them are good enough. sometimes the train is howling. it is hard, actually, sometimes, even as an adult.

and then i thought - what is one thing i wish i could tell all of them. each of these 300 kids. what did i need to hear, at 16?

i wanted to tell them about the day you wake up, and the sun feels warm finally. i wanted to tell them about carving a life out of soapstone, your hands turning bloody. i wanted to tell them that sometimes yes - it actually does feel easy. i wanted to tell them about weddings and cookie dough and long road trips. about albums of new music and old friends laughing and the sound of snow falling.

you will learn the pattern of the train. you will learn to close your eyes when you hear the engine rumbling. you will learn to let yourself have the grey days in their lily-soft numbness. sometimes it will feel like life is wet paint, and god has smeared your canvas across a sewer grate. sometimes it will be so boring it isn’t even pronounceable - the tenacious, soundless blankness. survival isn’t just ugly nights and wild mornings. it is also the steady, unimportant moments. it is just driving with your seatbelt on. it is calling a friend on the way home. it is burying your face into the fur of your dog.

when i had finished reading this poem aloud, the auditorium was silent for a solid minute. someone stood up to take a picture of where it had been projected onto a screen, and then three more people followed the action, and then - like a bad internet story, people remembered they were supposed to be clapping. kids came up to me after it - thank you for writing that. i think i hear a train coming.

i would write this differently now, i think, but it has been 7 years. i still live by the tracks. i also haven’t picked up a blade in over 10 years. the scars are still there, but these days i only pick up scissors to cut my hair. i know why you can’t tell your mom about it. i know how the numbness slips over everything, a restless horrible cotton. i know how when you dropped the dish, you weren’t crying about the broken glass. i know about feeling like all the roads have closed their exits, that you aren’t supposed to still-be-here - and yet.

i am still here, and still yours, and i haven’t forgotten. what i’m saying is if any hope is calling to you - i know it’s hard, but you have to listen. i’m saying keep driving, but slow down the car. sit down in the shower, i’m not judging you. we can stay in the dark with the good hot water and do nothing but stare. notice the stab wound. make it through another tuesday.

i know what it is like to miss yourself. do what you need to. come home to me. i am writing to you, my past self, from the future. i’ll be waiting for you.

and when the train is coming - please move.

[malus-thoughts]

how should I think more than black or white when everything I feel it all or nothing

and how should I feel any in between when I only think in black and white?

[malus-thoughts]

all the fear I’ve felt over the years that I couldn’t place. All the uncertainty and uncomfortableness. It all comes back to you.

Never being able to place why I’m feeling like this, because you were supposed to be a safe place, someone I could trust.

The confusion because there were no marks. No bruises, not marks to show my pain. No scars left behind by you.

Wanting someone to see my pain, but there not being anything to see.

And now,

all these feelings come back to me. And I’m a child again, hoping you won’t find me.

[malus-thoughts]

i was once asked wether what i felt was fear or worry. i didn't understand the difference. i probably still don't.

but i know i was scared. i would not have been able to explain what i was scared of. i would not be for at least another two years.

but i know now. i was scared of a lot, but in that moment i was scared of not being taken seriously. it was your job to take me an my problems seriously and you failed.

it's been over two years and i am still fighting for my life.

[malus-thoughts]

fear

in the end, i think everything i am is fear.

i am angry? no.. well, okay, yes. yes i am angry, but only for a second. the anger overshadowing everything and then i am scared. scared of them leaving, scared of being alone and lost, scared of him.

i am sad? yes, but i am also scared. scared that it will never get better. scared that i put in all that work, and i'll still be me in the end.

i am averse? yes. yes, that single behaviour made me hate you. because i'm scared. i am scared the harmless thing you did was just forshadowing. i am scared i cannot protect myself in future interactions, so i have to make sure we will never get there.

i am happy? i might be, but not for long. the highest high is almost always followed by the lowest low. that low scares me, the deep despair and pain in my chest that i cannot handle.

and then there is the emptiness. hollow nothingness, while i'm desperatly searching for anything to feel. even fear. because in that moment i feel like the deepest fear is better than not feeling anything.

they say you shouldn't let yourself be controlled by your fears. but I am nothing but fear.

[malus-thoughts]

the past and the present

It's been a while since I've posted anything on here. Time passed, stuff happened, I'm still alive (& kicking?).

I was admitted to a psych ward a month ago for a ten week DBT program, but I struggled a lot adapting to living there. It was decided it would be best for me to be there for three weeks, get used to it and then come back to do DBT. This would also give me time to gain the weight I need to have in order to be allowed to do DBT. It's been a little over a week since they discharged me and yeah, I'm not doing well. That's not surprising, I am coping, I am still almost three weeks clean. We've made a plan and I've been sticking to it: waking up at 7:30, eating at least three meals a day, doing something productive, going outdoors at least once a day. I'm embarrased that this is the limit of what I can handle.

I should really be sleeping now, especially regarding that I will have to be awake in less than 7 hours again. I just can't. Overwhelmed by past memories. Traumatic memories, triggered two weeks ago. Ones I cannot deal with. The fear of flashbacks. The overwhelming fear that I cannot place. Telling myself that I am safe in this moment. Safety I cannot feel. I have been coping the past week, I don't know what triggered it to get worse today.

I stared writing spoken word poetry again. I need this one to make it out of my notes app:

And now you realise that everything you set out for yourself was just a dream. You've become what you were always set up to be: unfulfilled potential. Too broken to be mended without marks, too diagnosed to be ever healed.

I know that it can get better. I know that it probably will get better, but I will never be unharmed. I can just decorate the scars.

I promise, I will keep myself save. Please do the same. enduring, mio

[malus-thoughts]

perception

And then, just randomly you understand that this is not something you actually control. It's not just some silly quirks, it's not even funny. I am actually ill and I probably will be for a really long time. I often feel like I would be able to control my mental illness if I were stronger. I think that if I really wanted to, I could get better, just like that. If I really put my mind to it, I can do anything, right? I know that it is not my fault and that I'm doing everything I can to get better. Even if at times that is just surviving. But if I believe that I'm just not doing enough, it feels like I have more control than I actually do. I won't get magically better by working out, eating healthier, or having a more structured life. I just wish that people could understand this. I wish they could see how hard I am fighting to stay alive.

[malus-thoughts]

comfort

[trigger warning: suggested talk of self harm]

my therapy session today was awful. not because of anything that happened, but it just was a lot and i haven’t processed it. thus, i feel awful.

i am looking for anything comforting, because today involved a lot of traumatic experiences i haven’t worked through at all and it’s all a mess.

it’s stuff that always looked and felt harmless, because i didn’t grasp the size of it. i thought it was manageable, even fine. sometimes i felt like i had an advantage because i had certain privileges because of it. i don’t anymore. it’s a horrible experience, day after day. not certain when or where. endless time spent alone trying to calm myself while knowing people talked about me. sitting in hallways staring at walls. making fun of it with friends because i couldn’t cope. i feel helpless. and i feel like i am in these situations again, seeing the same stuff i saw, feeling the same.

i need a hug. but like a special one. i wish i could hug that one friend, but she lives really far away and i don’t think we’ll see each other before february. i’m looking for warmth and in effect getting all my plushies on my bed, anything that will provide comfort.

my brain also jumped to unhealthy coping mechanisms, feeling like those would provide comfort. i know that they don’t, but i’m desperate. i’m also thinking about buying stuff „as a treat“, but i know that there will also be no comfort.

i think what i really wish to be able to do is go back in time and find a different solution for my younger self. i believe i could have prevented what they will be going through, if i were smarter or more in touch with myself. in reality i was sick in a system that not only made me sick but also hindered me to get help. i was doing more than i ever thought i could, without realising it. i did. the best i could. my therapist told me that, logically it makes sense and i know it. i just don’t believe it.

i blame myself. because i can hold myself accountable. i can change myself, i can’t change the system i was in. the system so many were and will be suffering the same way i was. i want to help them, help them not go through the same stuff, but i can’t.

i hope that one day i can close this chapter, because i am so done with it.

[malus-thoughts]

17 and staying alive

[trigger warning: suicidal thoughts and self harm] these are my last hours of being 17, or my last hours as a kid.

except, i will not change in the next two hours. the way i am suddenly percieved by society will change tho. i can drive alone, i can buy alcohol, i can sign leases and sign my own work contracts. 

17 is my favourite number, it’s been for a few years now. i like the way it looks, i like that it’s a prime number. somewhere in the back of my mind i had this idea that because it was my favourite number, it would be a good year, you know?

in reality, 2022, which basically was me being 17 (because i was born at the end of december) was one of if not the worst year of my life. so dark, that i was not sure if i would be alive now. “i do not want to die, but I [really can] not imagine myself being alive in a year and having turned 18.”, i wrote that on the 3rd of january this year. and it wasn’t something i just said, i was scared for my life.

i finished school with a really good grade and started going to an outpatient clinic directly after my written exams, doing the oral one while i was a patient there. i was there for five months, two more than they usually do. i struggled to adapt and didn’t really talk to anyone for the first 3 months. i discovered that i have some traumatic experiences i still have to work through. at the end of my fourth month i met an awesome friend, she was the reason i was able to open up. we just get each other.

she is 6 month older than me and has already turned 18. today we talked about how turning 18 feels weird when you are suicidal and she sent me a screenshot of something she said the night before she turned 18. “i feel like i’m not supposed to turn 18, like i was meant to be one of the ones that didn’t make it.” i know that she gets how i feel, because this puts what i feel into words so well.

the first month after i left the clinic i felt good, for my standards. i didn’t feel great but it was the first time in at least 12 months that i didn’t feel like shit all of the time. the highlight being a cavetown concert i went to with the person i met at the clinic. i was genuinly happy. then it all went downwards and has been getting darker and darker lately, the thoughts getting louder and louder.

while 17 wasn’t the age i first stared having suicidal thoughts, it was the age i first had the idea that i could put these thoughts into action (i feel like the term suicidal ideation works really well here). it was the year i experience my first crisis, and the year i first spoke about it, to friends and medical professionals, which helps. 

this year i realised that i am not cisgender, i came out to some friends and i got a binder. i even changed my hair to be more affirming and i am really in love with my (currently) blue hair and haircut. while i don’t love to be trans*, i am working toward feeling more at home in my body.

positvely, i am now 10 months self harm free.

thinking about it, i am glad i can let go of 17, while it doesn’t seem time yet. i still feel like a child. 17 feels right, i feel 17. but considering how this year went, the next year has a big chance of improving.

in an hour the number after “age:” will have changed, but i won’t have. it doesn’t mean i have to grow up right now, it just means that i get more priveleges. i dont believe a lot of the things i just wrote in this last paragraph, but they are new thoughts, i didn’t have myself before, maybe it is something to look forward too. this too shall pass.